THE
DEMON
AWAKENS

R. A. Salvatore

A Del Rey® Book

BALLANTINE BOOKS * NEW YORK

CONTENTS

Prelude

PART ONE

FATE

CHAPTER 1

The Unexpected Kill

CHAPTER 2

True Believer

CHAPTER 3

The Lingering Kiss

CHAPTER 4

The Death of Dundalis

CHAPTER 5

God’s Chosen

CHAPTER 6

Carrion Birds

CHAPTER 7

The Blood of Mather

CHAPTER 8

The Preparer

CHAPTER 9

Touel’alfar

PART TWO

PASSAGE

CHAPTER 10

Made of Tougher Stuff

CHAPTER 11

Cat-the-Stray

CHAPTER 12

The Windrunner

CHAPTER 13

Running Fast Down a Long, Long Road

CHAPTER 14

Jilly

CHAPTER 15

Miss Pippin

CHAPTER 16

Endwar

CHAPTER 17

Black Wings

CHAPTER 18

The Test of Faith

CHAPTER 19

Truth Be Told

CHAPTER 20

The Oracle

CHAPTER 21

Ever Vigilant, Ever Watchful

CHAPTER 22

The Nightbird

PART THREE

CONFLICT

CHAPTER 23

The Black Bear

CHAPTER 24

The Mad Friar

CHAPTER 25

Brother Justice

CHAPTER 26

Bradwarden

CHAPTER 27

The Fat Prophet’s Warning

CHAPTER 28

Siblings

CHAPTER 29

Of Singular Purpose

CHAPTER 30

Symphony

CHAPTER 31

Home Again, Home Again

CHAPTER 32

Darkness Rising

CHAPTER 33

The Telling Blow

CHAPTER 34

Justice

CHAPTER 35

Escape?

PART FOUR

THE RANGER

CHAPTER 36

Confrontation

CHAPTER 37

Catch of the Day

CHAPTER 38

Mercy Repaid

CHAPTER 39

The Difference

CHAPTER 40

Nightbird the Leader

CHAPTER 41

Tempest

CHAPTER 42

Reputation

CHAPTER 43

A Place of Particular Interest

CHAPTER 44

The Revelations of Spirits

PART FIVE

THE BEAST

CHAPTER 45

Parting

CHAPTER 46

The Fiend’s Fiend

CHAPTER 47

One Harmony

CHAPTER 48

Enemies Ancient

CHAPTER 49

Hunted

CHAPTER 50

Flight

CHAPTER 51

Aida

CHAPTER 52

Through the Maze

CHAPTER 53

Destiny

Epilogue

Copyright

THE DEMON SPIRIT

Dedication

PART ONE
WILDERLANDS

CHAPTER 1

Another Day

CHAPTER 2

St.-Mere-Abelle

CHAPTER 3

Roger Lockless

CHAPTER 4

At the Gates of Paradise

CHAPTER 5

To Seek the Truth

CHAPTER 6

Underestimated

CHAPTER 7

The Long Night of Fighting

CHAPTER 8

Intervention of Conscience

CHAPTER 9

Old Friends Well Met

PART TWO
THE PECKING ORDER

CHAPTER 10

The Holiest of Places

CHAPTER 11

Roger Lockless, I Presume

CHAPTER 12

Unexpected Guests

CHAPTER 13

The New Enemy

CHAPTER 14

Right and Wrong

CHAPTER 15

Pride

CHAPTER 16

To the Father Abbot’s Amusement

CHAPTER 17

Edicts from on High

PART THREE
THE DEMON WITHIN

CHAPTER 18

Enemies of the Church

CHAPTER 19

Change in Direction

CHAPTER 20

Following the Bait

CHAPTER 21

In the Bowels of St.-Mere-Abelle

CHAPTER 22

Jilly

CHAPTER 23

The Other Brother Francis

CHAPTER 24

Resolution

PART FOUR
DOWN THE ROAD OF SHADOWS

CHAPTER 25

A Choice for Roger

CHAPTER 26

The Newest Abbot

CHAPTER 27

The Escape

CHAPTER 28

When Duty Calls

CHAPTER 29

Hungry for Battle

CHAPTER 30

In Search of Answers

CHAPTER 31

Alternate Routes

CHAPTER 32

Pony’s Nightmare

Epilogue

About the Author

Also By R. A. Salvatore

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Copyright

Prelude

The demon dactyl came awake. It didn’t seem such a momentous thing, just a gradual stirring in a deep cave in a far, empty mountain. An unnoticed event, seen by none save the cave worms and those few insomniacs among the bevy of weary bats hanging from the high ceiling.

But the demon spirit had awakened, had come back from its long dormancy into the statuelike form it had left behind after its last visit to the world called Corona. The tangible, corporeal body felt good to the wandering spirit. The dactyl could feel its blood, hot blood, coursing through its wings and mighty legs, could feel the twitching of its mighty muscles. Its eyes flickered open but saw only blackness, for the form, left standing in magical stasis in the deep cave, head bowed and wings wrapped tightly about its torso, had been covered by magma. Most of the fiery stuff of that time long past had bubbled and flowed away from the cavern, but enough had remained to harden about the dactyl’s corporeal form. The spirit had come back to Corona encased in obsidian!

The demon spirit fell deep within itself, summoned its powers, both physical and magical. By sheer will and brute strength, the dactyl flexed its wings. A thin crack ran down the center of the obsidian sarcophagus. The dactyl flexed again and the crack widened, and then, with a sudden powerful burst, the beast blew apart the obsidian, stretched its great wings out to the side, clawed tips grasping and rending the air. The dactyl threw back its head and opened wide its mouth, screeching for the sheer joy of the return, for the thoughts of the chaos it would bring again to the quiet human kingdoms of Corona.

Its torso resembled that of a tall, slender man, shaped and lined by corded strands of taut muscle and sporting a pair of tremendous batlike wings, twenty feet across when fully extended and with strength enough to lift a full-grown bull in swift flight. Its head, too, was somewhat human, except more angular, with a narrow jaw and pointed chin. The dactyl’s ears were pointed as well, poking up about the demon creature’s thin tuft of black hair. Neither did that hair hide the creature’s horns, thumb sized and curling in toward each other at the top of the demon’s brow.

The texture of its skin was rough and thick, an armored hide, reddish in hue and shiny, as if lit by its own inner glow. Shining, too, were the demon’s eyes, pools of liquid black at most times, but shifting to fiery red orbs, living flames, when the demon was agitated, a glow of absolute hatred.

The creature flexed and stretched, extended its wings to their full glory, reached and clawed at the air with its humanlike arms. The demon extended its fingernails, transformed them into hooked claws, and grew its teeth—two pointed canines extending down over its bottom lip. Every part of the demon was a weapon, devastating and deadly. And undeniably powerful though this monster appeared, this demon’s real strength lay in its mind and its purpose, the tempter of souls, the twister of hearts, the maker of lies. Theologians of Corona argued over whether the demon dactyl was the source or the result of evil. Did the dactyl bring the weakness, the immorality, to humanity? Was the dactyl the source of the deadly sins, or did it manifest itself and walk the world when those sins had festered to the point of eruption?

For the demonic creature in the cave, such questions hardly mattered. How long had it been? the dactyl wondered. How many decades, even centuries, had passed since its last visit to Corona?

The creature remembered that long-ago time now, savored the thoughts of the streaming blood as army after army had joined in delicious, desperate battle. It cursed aloud the name of Terranen Dinoniel, who had rallied the humans and the elves, chasing the dactyl’s armies back to the base of this mountain, Aida. Dinoniel himself had come into this cave after the beast, had skewered the dactyl . . .

The black-winged demon looked down at a darker red tear marring its otherwise smooth hide. With a sickening crackle of bone, the creature’s head rotated completely around and bowed, examining the second imperfection of its form, a scarred lump under its lower left shoulder blade. Those two scars were perfectly aligned with the dactyl’s heart, and thus, with that one desperate thrust, Dinoniel had defeated the demon’s corporeal body.

Yet even in its death throes, the dactyl had won the day, using its willpower to bring up the magma from the bowels of Aida. Dinoniel and much of his army had been consumed and destroyed, but the dactyl . . .

The dactyl was eternal. Dinoniel was gone, a distant memory, but the demon spirit had returned and the physical wounds had healed. “What man, what elf, will take Dinoniel’s place?” the demon asked aloud in its hollow, resonating voice, always seeming on the edge of a thunderous roar. A cloud of bats shuddered to life at the unexpected noise and flew off down one of the tunnels formed when the lava had flowed from this spot. The dactyl cackled, thinking itself grand to be able to send such creatures—any creatures!—scurrying with a mere sound. And what resolve might the humans and the elves—if the elves were still about, for even in Dinoniel’s day they had been on the wane—muster this time?

Its thoughts turned from its enemies to those it would summon as minions. What creatures could the dactyl gather this time to wage its war? The wicked goblins certainly, so full of anger and greed, so delighting in murder and war. The fomorian giants of the mountains, few in number but each with the strength of a dozen men and a hide too thick and tough for a dagger to puncture. And the powries, yes, the powries, the cunning, warlike dwarves of the Julianthes, the Weathered Isles, who hated the humans above all others. Centuries before, powries had dominated the seas in their solid, squat barrelboats, whose hulls were made of tougher stuff than the larger ships of the humans, as the diminutive powries were made of tougher stuff than the larger humans.

A line of drool hung low from the dactyl’s mouth as it considered its former and future allies, its army of woe. It would bring them into its fold, tribe by tribe, race by race, growing as the night grows when the sun touches the western horizon. The twilight of Corona was at hand.

The dactyl came awake.

PART ONE

FATE

What song is this, drift through the trees

To lift men broken from their knees?

To untwist hearts from grasping sorrow,

To offer the promise of the morrow?

Hark what song,

What music sweet?

Warm whispers of the dawn.

Hot blood waft steam in night air cold.

What hopes of treasure, what hunger of gold

Hath brought foul beast from caverns deep

To face the Nightbird, to know endless sleep?

They come for greed.

They come to bleed.

At gentle hands of elven breed.

The shining sword, the horse’s run,

The bane of monsters all and one.

To their midst the rider, Nightbird the Ranger,

Flashing Tempest’s anger, denying the danger

Cutting and slashing!

Tearing and gashing!

Chasing the nightmares away.

Fast run, you goblins, the Ranger sets his bow,

To let your blood, to stain white snow

Arrow and arrow, the river of red

Fast fall the Evil; to the one is dead.

Hawkwing’s fury,

Goblins to bury

In worm’s cold domain.

Scatter, goblins, fly and flee!

You’ll not outrun Symphony.

Hooves of music rend the gloom

Bearing Nightbird know your doom!

At Tempest’s fall,

So shall you all

To blackness evermore.

Away drifts musk Symphony sweet.

Away goes Nightbird, the forest to greet.

In springtime sunshine, of Evil no traces,

Through flowers and lovers, step measured paces

Hark, listen you all

The Nightbird’s call

And sleep peaceful lovers, secure.

—“The Song of the Nightbird”

CHAPTER 1

The Unexpected Kill

Elbryan Wyndon was up before the dawn. He dressed quickly, fumbling with his clothes in the red light of the hearth’s glowing embers. He ran a hand through his tousled straight hair—a light brown shock that bleached pale on its top layers under the summer sun. He retrieved his belt and dagger, which he had reverently placed right near his bed, and Elbryan felt powerful as he ceremoniously strapped the weapon about his waist.

He grabbed the heaviest wrap he could find and rushed out into the dark and chill air, so anxious that he hardly remembered to close the cabin door behind him. The small frontier village of Dundalis was quiet and eerily still about him, sleeping off the well-earned weariness that followed every day’s hard labor. Elbryan, too, had worked hard the previous day—harder than normal, for several of the village men and women were out in the deep forest, and the boys and girls, like Elbryan who was nearing his teens, had been asked to keep things aright. That meant gathering wood and tending the fires, repairing the cabins—which always seemed to need repair!—and walking the perimeter of the sheltered vale that held the village, watching for sign of bear, great cat, or the packs of hunting wolves.

Elbryan was the oldest of those children, the leader of the pack, as it were, and he felt important, truly he felt a man. This would be the last time he remained behind when the hunters went off on the season’s last and most important expedition. Next spring would bring his thirteenth birthday, the passage from childhood in the hardy land that was the northern wilderness. Next spring, Elbryan would hunt with the adults, the games of his youth left behind.

Indeed he was tired from the previous day’s labors, but so full of excitement that sleep had not come to him. The weather had turned toward winter. The men were expected back any day, and Elbryan meant to meet them and lead their procession into the village. Let the younger boys and girls see him then, and afford him the respect he deserved, and let the older men see that the village, under his watchful eye, had fared well in their absence.

He started out of Dundalis, stepping lightly despite his weariness, passing through the darker shadows of the small, one-story cabins.

“Jilly!” The call was not loud but seemed so in the quiet morning air. Elbryan moved up to the corner of the next house, smiling for his cleverness, and peered around.

“It could be today!” protested a young girl, Jilseponie, Elbryan’s closest friend.

“You do not know that, Jilly,” argued her mother, standing in the open doorway of their cabin. Elbryan tried to muffle his snicker; the girl hated that nickname, Jilly, though nearly everyone in town called her that. She preferred the simple “Jill.” But between her and Elbryan, the title was Pony, their secret name, the one Jilseponie liked most of all.

The snicker was soon gone, but the smile remained, all the wider for the sight. Elbryan didn’t know why, but he was always happy when he saw Pony, though only a couple of years before, he would have taunted her and the rest of the village girls, chasing them endlessly. One time Elbryan had made the mistake of catching Jilseponie without his male companions nearby, and of tugging too hard on her yellow mane to prove the point of his capture. He never saw the punch coming, never saw anything except how wide the blue sky had suddenly seemed as he lay on his back.

He could laugh at that embarrassment now, privately or even with Pony. He felt as though he could say anything to her, and she wouldn’t judge him or make merry of his feelings.

Candlelight spilled out onto the road, softly illuminating the girl. Elbryan liked the image; every day that passed, he found that he enjoyed looking at Pony more and more. She was younger than Elbryan by five months but taller than he, standing about three inches above five feet, while the young man, to his ultimate horror, had not yet reached the coveted five foot mark. Elbryan’s father had assured him that Wyndon boys were normally late in sprouting. All jealousy aside, Elbryan found the taller Pony quite a pleasing sight. She stood straight but not stiff, and could outrun and outfight any of the boys in Dundalis, Elbryan included. Still, there was a delicate aura about her, a softness that a younger Elbryan had viewed as weakness, but the older Elbryan viewed as oddly distracting. Her hair, which Jilseponie seemed to be constantly brushing, was golden, silken, and thick enough to lose a hand in; it bounced about her shoulders and back with an alluring wildness. Her eyes, huge eyes, were the richest and clearest blue Elbryan had ever seen, like great sponges soaking in the sights of the wide world and reflecting Jilseponie’s every mood. When Pony’s eyes showed sadness, Elbryan felt it in his heart; when they soared with sparkling joy, Elbryan’s feet moved involuntarily in dance.

Her lips, too, were large and thick. The boys had often taunted Pony about those lips, saying that if she ever stuck them to a window, they would surely hold her fast for all eternity! Elbryan felt no desire to tease when looking at Pony’s lips now. He sensed their softness, so very inviting . . .

“I will be back in time for the morning meal,” Pony assured her mother.

“The night woods are dangerous,” her exasperated mother replied.

“I will be careful!” Pony responded dismissively, before the older woman had even finished the sentence.

Elbryan held his breath, thinking that Pony’s mother, often stern, would scold the girl severely. She only sighed, though, and resignedly closed the cabin door.

Pony sighed, too, and shook her head as if to show her ultimate frustration with adults. Then she turned and skipped off, and was startled a moment later when Elbryan jumped out in front of her.

She reflexively cocked a fist, and Elbryan wisely jumped back.

“You are late,” he said.

“I am early,” Pony insisted, “too early. And I am tired.”

Elbryan shrugged and nodded down the road to the north, then led the girl off at a swift pace. Despite her complaints concerning the time, Pony not only paced him but skipped right by him, obviously as excited as he. That excitement turned to sheer joy when they passed out of the town and began their ascent of the ridge. Pony chanced to look back to the south, and she stopped, stunned and smiling, and pointing to the night sky. “The Halo,” she said breathlessly.

Elbryan turned to follow her gaze, and he, too, could not suppress a grin.

For stretched across the southern sky, more than halfway to the horizon, was Corona’s Halo, the heavenly belt—a subtle tease of colors, red and green and blue and deep purple, a flowing softness, like a living rainbow. The Halo was sometimes visible in the summer sky, but only during the deepest parts of the shorter nights, when children, and even adults, were fast asleep. Elbryan and Jilseponie had seen it on a few occasions, but never so clearly as this, never so vibrant.

Then they heard a distant piping, soft music, perfect melody. It floated through the chill air, barely perceptible.

“The Forest Ghost,” Pony whispered, but Elbryan didn’t seem to hear. Pony spoke the words again, under her breath. The Forest Ghost was a common legend in the Timberlands. Half horse and half man, he was the keeper of the trees and the friend of the animals, particularly of the wild horses that ran in the dells to the north. For a moment, the thought of such a creature not so far away frightened Pony, but then her fears were washed away by the sheer beauty of the Halo and the fitting melody of the enchanting music. How could anyone, or anything, that could pipe so beautifully pose a danger?

The pair stood on the side of the ridge for a long while, not speaking, not looking at each other, not even realizing that the other was there. Elbryan felt totally alone, yet one with the universe, a small part of majesty, a small but endless flicker in eternity. His mind drifted up from the ridge, from the solid ground, from the sensible experiences of his existence into the unknown, exhilarating joy of spirituality. The name of “Mather” came to him briefly, though he didn’t know why. He didn’t know anything at that time, it seemed, and yet he knew everything—the secrets of the world, of peace, of eternity—it was all there before him, so simple and true. He felt a song in his heart, though it had no words, felt a warmth in all his body, though he was not at that moment a part of that corporeal form.

The sensation passed—too quickly. Elbryan sighed deeply and turned to Pony. He was about to say something but held the words, seeing that she, too, was immersed in something beyond language. Elbryan felt suddenly closer to the girl, as if they two had shared something very special and very private. How many others could look upon the Halo and understand the beauty of the thing? he wondered. None of the adults of Dundalis, certainly, with their grumbling and grouching, and none of the other children, he decided, who were too caught up in silliness to ponder such thoughts.

No, it was his experience and Pony’s—theirs alone. He watched her slowly drift back to the reality about them—the ridge, the night, and her companion. He could almost see her spirit flowing back into that five foot three inch body—a body that was growing more shapely by the day.

Elbryan resisted the sudden and inexplicable urge to run over and kiss Pony.

“What?” she asked, seeing turmoil, even horror, come over his face, despite the darkness.

The boy looked away, angry at himself for allowing such feelings. Pony was a girl, after all, and though Elbryan would openly admit that she was a friend, such deeper feelings were truly horrifying.

“Elbryan?” she asked. “Was it the song, the Forest Ghost?”

“Never heard it,” Elbryan retorted, though when he thought about it, he had indeed heard the distant piping melody.

“Then what?” Pony pressed.

“Nothing,” he replied gruffly. “Come along. The dawn is not long away.” He started up the ridge at a feverish pace then, even scrambling on all fours at times, crunching through the thick carpet of fallen leaves. Pony paused and watched him, confused at first. Gradually a smile found its way back onto her face, her dimples showing the slightest blush of red. She suspected she knew the feelings that Elbryan was fighting, the same feelings she had battled earlier that same year.

Pony had won that battle by accepting, even relishing, those private feelings, the warmth that washed over her whenever she looked upon Elbryan. She hoped Elbryan would wage a gallant war now, with an outcome similar to her own.

She caught up to her friend at the top of the ridge. Behind them, Dundalis sat quiet and dark. All the world seemed still, not a bird calling, not a whisper of wind. They sat together, yet apart, separated by a couple of feet and by the wall of Elbryan’s confusion. The boy didn’t move, hardly seemed to blink, just sat staring straight ahead at the wide vale before him, though it was too dark for him to even recognize the place.

Pony, though, was more animated. She let her gaze linger on Elbryan until the boy became obviously flustered, then she politely looked away, back to the village—a single candle was burning in one of the houses—and back to the Halo, which was now fast fading in the southern sky. She could still make out the brighter colors, but that special moment of beauty, of innermost reflection, had passed. Now she was again Jilseponie, just Jilseponie, sitting on a ridge with her friend, awaiting the return of her father and the other hunters. And the dawn was approaching. Pony realized that she could make out more of the village, could discern the individual houses, even the individual posts of Bunker Crawyer’s corral.

“Today,” Elbryan said unexpectedly, his voice turning her about to study him. He was at ease again, the uncomfortable feelings tossed out with the mystery of the night. “They will return this day,” he announced with a nod.

Pony grinned warmly, hoping he was right.

They sat in silence as the day grew about them. In the wide vale, the wall of blackness gave way to the individual dark spots that were the evergreens—rows and rows of ancient trees, Corona’s oldest soldiers, standing proud, though most were not twice Elbryan’s height. The starkness of the scene from this vantage point, in this mounting light, amazed the companions. The ground about the trees caught the morning light and held it fast, for the undergrowth was not dark but was white and thick; a padding of caribou moss. Elbryan loved the stuff—all the children did. Every time he gazed upon the white carpet, he wanted to take off his shoes and pants and run through it barefoot and bare legged, to feel its softness between his toes and brushing against his shins. In many places, the caribou moss was even deeper than his knees!

He wanted to do it, as he had so many times in his earlier years, wanted to cast off his shoes and all his clothes . . .

He remembered his companion, his earlier feelings, and turned away from Pony, blushing fiercely.

“If they come in before the sun gets too high, we’ll see them a mile away,” Pony remarked. The girl was not looking ahead, though, but at the ridge to the south behind them. Autumn was well advanced, and all the leaves of the deciduous trees, particularly the sugar maples, were bright with colors, shining red and orange and yellow, painting the ridge.

Elbryan was glad that the distracted girl had not noticed his own shade of red. “Coming down that side of the vale,” he agreed sharply, catching Pony’s attention, and pointing to the wide gentle slope of the vale’s northeastern face added, “a mile away!”

Their assessment proved overoptimistic, for the starkness of the scene had confused their sense of distance. They did indeed spot the returning hunters, to their complete joy, but not until the group was moving along the bottom of the bowl-shaped vale, a line of tiny forms far below them.

They watched, chattering wildly, trying to count and to guess who was leading but getting confused as parts of the line wove in and out of the tree shadows.

“A shoulder pole!” Elbryan cried out suddenly, spotting the line that seemed to join two of the men.

“Another!” Pony added happily, and she clapped her hands with glee as more came into view. The hunters would return with carcasses—elk, caribou, or white-tailed deer—slung on shoulder poles, and it seemed to the watching pair as if this hunt had been successful indeed! Their patience fast disintegrated; they leaped out together, running fast down the steeper slope, picking their angle to intercept the returning troop.

From the ridge top, the vale seemed stark and open, but descending into it, Elbryan and Pony quickly remembered just how confusing and intimidating a place it could be. Down among the squat but wide-spreading pines and spruce, vision in all directions was blocked after just a few feet; the companions became separated quickly and spent many minutes just talking themselves back together and then arguing over which direction would lead them to their fathers.

“The sun is in the southeast,” Elbryan reminded Pony, squaring his shoulders as he took command of the situation. The sun had not yet come up high enough to peer over the rim of the vale, but they could make out its position easily enough. “The hunters approach from the northeast, so all we have to do is keep the sun just behind our right shoulders.”

It seemed logical enough to Pony, so she shrugged and let Elbryan lead and didn’t mention to him that if they simply called out loudly, their fathers would likely hear them and guide them in.

Elbryan picked his way determinedly, weaving about the bushy evergreens, not even looking back to make sure Pony was keeping up with him. He moved faster still when he heard the voices of the hunters. His heart pounded when he recognized his father’s deep tones, though he couldn’t make out what the man was saying.

Pony caught up to him, even passed him over that last expanse, leading the way through the tangle of two wide pines, pushing aside the prickly branches and bursting into a clearing right beside the returning party.

The startled, almost feral, reaction of the hunters froze Elbryan in his tracks and sent Pony ducking for cover. Elbryan hardly heard the sharp scolding his father offered, the boy’s eyes basking in the sight, moving from the carcass of a caribou buck, to a deer, to a line of coneys, to . . .

Elbryan and Jilseponie stood perfectly still, stricken. Their fathers, who had come forward to meet the impetuous children, to scold them again for being so far away from Dundalis, let the opportunity pass. The object on the fourth shoulder pole, each man realized, would be enough to get the lesson across.

The sun was up, the day bright, and the village wide awake by the time Elbryan and Pony led the hunting party back into Dundalis. Expressions ran from excitement to awkward fear to blank amazement as the villagers took stock of the kills, especially the last carcass on the shoulder poles, a smallish humanoid form.

“A goblin?” asked one woman, bending low to regard the creature’s hideous features: the sloping forehead and the long thin nose, the tiny but perfectly round eyes, now glazed over, sickly yellow. The creature’s ears, pointed at the top and with a loose flapping, fat lobe at the bottom, stuck out several inches from its head. The woman shuddered when she considered the mouth, a tangle of greenish-yellow fangs, all crooked but each angled inward. The chin was narrow, but the jowls wide with muscle. It wasn’t difficult to imagine the power of the creature’s bite or the pain of getting free from those nasty teeth.

“Are they really that color?” asked another woman, and she dared to touch the creature’s skin. “Or did it just turn that way after it died?”

“Yellow and green,” an old man answered firmly, though he had not been out on the hunt. Elbryan watched the wrinkled and bent elder, Brody Gentle, by name, though the children usually called him “body Grabber” in mock horror, teasing him and then running away. Old Brody was a snarling type, angry at the world and at his own infirmities, and an easy mark for children, always ready to give chase and never quick enough to make a catch. Elbryan considered the man’s true name now, for the first time, and nearly laughed aloud at the contradiction of the surname with Brody’s grouchy demeanor.

“Surely is a goblin,” Brody continued, obviously enjoying the attention, “big one, too, and they’re yellow and green,” he answered the second questioning woman, “living and dead, though this one’s fast turning gray.” He snickered as he finished, a sound of utter contempt that seemed to lend credence to his greater knowledge of the goblin race. Goblins were little seen creatures; many considered them more myth than truth. Even in Dundalis, and in other frontier villages nestled in the Timberlands on the borders of the deep Wilderlands, there had been no confirmed sightings of any goblins for longer than the villagers could remember—with the apparent exception of Brody Gentle.

“You have seen goblins before?” asked Olwan Wyndon, Elbryan’s father, and his tone and the fact that he crossed his large arms over his chest as he spoke showed he held many doubts.

Brody Gentle scoffed at him. “Oft have I told the tales!” the old man fumed.

Olwan Wyndon nodded, not wanting to get Brody into one of his legendary fits of outrage. Sitting by the hearth in the village’s common house, Brody had recounted endless tales of his youth, of battling goblins, even fomorian giants, in the first days of Dundalis, staking out the ground for proper folk. Most listened politely but turned up their eyes and shook their heads whenever Brody looked away.

“We had the word of a goblin sighting in Weedy Meadow,” offered another man, referring to another village some twenty miles to the west of Dundalis.

“A child’s word,” Olwan Wyndon promptly reminded them all, quieting nervous whispers before they could gain any momentum.

“Well, we’ve much work to do, and you’ve tale to tell,” Pony’s mother intervened. “Better suited for the common house, after a supper of venison stew.”

Olwan nodded and the crowd gradually dispersed, one person taking a last, long look at the goblin, which was indeed fast turning gray. Elbryan and Pony lingered long by the corpse, studying it intently. Pony didn’t miss her companion’s derisive snort.

“Small as an eight-year-old,” the boy explained, waving a dismissive hand at the goblin. That was something of an exaggeration, but, indeed, the goblin wasn’t much above four feet tall and couldn’t have weighed more than Elbryan’s ninety pounds.

“Perhaps it is a child,” Pony offered.

“You heard body Grabber,” Elbryan countered. He screwed up his face, the ridiculous nickname sounding foolish in his ears. “He said it was a big one.” He ended with another snort.

“It looks fierce,” Pony insisted, bending low to study the creature more closely. She didn’t miss Elbryan’s third snort. “Remember the badger?” she asked quietly, stealing the boy’s bluster. “Not a third the size of the goblin.”

Elbryan blanched and looked away. Earlier that year, at the beginning of summer, some of the younger children had snagged a badger in a noose. When they came into the village with the news, Elbryan, the oldest of their group, had taken command, leading the way back to the spot. He approached the snared creature boldly, only to find that it had chewed right through the leather bindings. When it came around at him, teeth bared, Elbryan had, so the legend—and among the children, it was indeed a legend—said, “run away so fast that he didn’t even notice he was running straight up a tree, not even using his hands to grab a branch.”

The rest of the children had fled, as well, but not so far that they could not witness Elbryan’s ultimate humiliation, as the badger, like some vindictive enemy, had waited at the base of Elbryan’s tree, keeping the boy up in the branches for more than an hour.

Stupid badger, Elbryan thought, and stupid Pony for opening that wound once again. He walked away without another word.

Pony couldn’t sustain her smile as she watched him go, wondering if she had pushed him a little too hard.

Every villager was in the common house that night, though most had already heard the tale of the goblin fight by then. The hunting party had come upon a band of six creatures, or actually both groups had come upon each other, stepping out of the thick brush onto an open, rocky riverbank simultaneously, barely twenty paces apart. After a moment of shock, the goblins had thrown their spears, injuring one man. The ensuing fight had been brief and brutal, with many nicks and cuts to both sides and even a couple of bites to the humans, before the goblins, outnumbered two to one, had fled, disappearing into the brush as suddenly as they had appeared. The only serious wound to either side was the hit to the slain goblin—a spear thrust that had punctured the creature’s lung. It had tried to flee with its companions but fell short of the brush for lack of breath and died soon after.

Olwan Wyndon told the tale again in full to the gathering, trying hard not to embellish it. “We spent three days looking but found no more sign of the other goblins,” he finished.

Immediately a pair of mugs came up into the air from the side of the room. “To Shane McMichael!” the two mug holders bellowed together. “Goblinslayer!”

The cheer went up, and Shane McMichael, a quiet, slender young man just a few years older than Elbryan, reluctantly came forward to stand beside Olwan in front of the blazing hearth. With much prodding, the man was prompted to tell of the fight, of the cunning twist and parry and the straightforward thrust that had come too soon for the goblin to completely dodge.

Elbryan savored every word, envisioning the battle clearly. How he envied Shane!

Afterward, the conversation turned into an exchange of what other people had recently seen, of the report of a goblin sighting in Weedy Meadow, and even a few wild tales from Dundalis folk claiming that they had noticed some huge tracks but just hadn’t said anything about it. Elbryan at first listened intently to every word but, gradually taking the cue from his father’s posture, came to understand that most of the talk was no more than individual efforts to grab a bit of attention. It surprised Elbryan that adults would act that way, especially considering the gravity of the situation.

Next came a discussion, led by Brody Gentle, of goblinkind in general, from the numerous small goblins to the rare and dangerous disfigured fomorian giants. Brody spoke with an air of expertise, but few in the room hung on his every word. Even young Elbryan soon came to realize that the old man knew little more than anyone else concerning goblins, and Elbryan doubted that Brody had ever seen a fomorian giant. Elbryan looked at Pony, who seemed to be growing quite bored by it all, and motioned to the door.

She was out into the night before he got out of his chair.

“Bluster,” Elbryan insisted, joining her. The night was chill, and so the boy moved close to Pony, sharing their warmth.

“But we cannot deny the goblin,” Pony replied, motioning to the shed where the creature had been placed. “Your father’s tale was real enough.”

“I meant Brody—”

“I know what you meant,” said Pony, “and I do not believe him either—not completely.”

Elbryan’s surprise at her qualification of the remark reflected clearly on his face.

“There are goblins,” Pony explained. “We know that well enough. So perhaps those who first came to the edge of the Wilderlands to settle Dundalis did have a few fights on their hands.”

“Fomorians?” Elbryan asked skeptically.

Pony shrugged, not willing to discount the possibility of giants, not after viewing a dead goblin.

Elbryan conceded the point, though he still thought Brody Gentle more bluster than truth. He couldn’t hold that thought, though, or any other negative feelings, when Jilseponie turned to look him directly in the eye, when she, her face only a few inches from his own, rocked his olive green eyes with her stare.

Elbryan found his breath hard to come by. Pony was close—too close—and she wasn’t backing away!

And she was coming closer, Elbryan realized, her head slowly drifting toward his, her lips, so soft, in line with his! Panic hit him, wrestling hard with a jumble of other emotions that Elbryan did not understand. A part of him wanted to turn away, but another part, a larger and surprising part, would not let him move.

The door to the common house opened with a crash, and both Pony and Elbryan immediately spun away from each other.

The younger children came out in a mob, swarming around the older pair. “What are we going to do?” one of them asked.

Elbryan and Pony exchanged curious looks.

“We must be ready for when the goblins come back,” another boy remarked.

“The goblins were never here,” Pony interjected.

“But they will be!” claimed the boy. “Kristeena says so.”

All eyes turned to Kristeena, a girl of ten who always seemed to be staring at Elbryan. “Goblins always come back for their dead,” she explained eagerly.

“How do you know that?” Elbryan asked doubtfully, and his tone seemed to hurt the girl.

She looked down and kicked the dirt with one foot. “My grandmother knows,” she answered, her voice suddenly sheepish, and Elbryan felt a fool for making her so uncomfortable. All the gang was quiet, hanging on Elbryan’s every word.

Pony nudged him hard. Pony had told him many times that Kristeena was sweet for him, and the older girl, not viewing a ten-year-old as competition, had been charmed by the thought.

“She probably does know,” Elbryan said, and Kristeena looked up, suddenly beaming. “And it sounds right.” He turned to the shed, and all the younger children flowed about him, following his gaze.

“And if the goblins do come back, we must be ready,” Elbryan decided. He looked at Pony and winked, and was surprised when she returned the gesture with a serious frown.

Perhaps this was more than a game.

CHAPTER 2

True Believer

Twenty-five stood in a line, cloaked in thick brown robes with voluminous sleeves and large hoods that were pulled low to hide their faces. Quiet and humble, they kept their heads bowed, their shoulders stooped, and their hands folded before them, though not a digit showed from beneath the folds of cloth, not a flash of flesh in the whole of the line.

“Piety, dignity, poverty,” the old father abbot, Dalebert Markwart, intoned in his nasal voice. He stood alone on the balcony above the main entrance of St.-Mere-Abelle, the most prominent monastery in all the kingdom of Honce-the-Bear, in the northern temperate zone of Corona. Intertwined with the rocky cliffs of the southeastern coast, St.-Mere-Abelle had stood solemn and dark for nearly a millennium, with each generation of monks adding their toil and craftsmanship to the already huge structure. Its gray rock walls seemed to grow right from the solid stone, an extension of the earth’s power. Squat towers anchored every turn in the wall; narrow windows showed that the place was built for somber reflection and defense. The visible parts of the monastery were impressive; the sea wall alone rose and melted back into the cliff face for more than a mile. But the bulk of the place could not be seen from beyond the walls; it was buried under the ground, in tunnels strong and square, in vast underground chambers—many smoky from the constant torchlight, others brightened by ways magical. Seven hundred monks lived here and another two hundred servants, many of them never leaving the place except to go on short visits, usually to market in the village of St.-Mere-Abelle, some three miles inland.

The new class of twenty-five stood one behind the other. As they were positioned according to height, Avelyn Desbris, tall and large-boned, was near the back, with twenty-two before him and only two behind. He could barely hear the Abbot above the constant groan of the wind, weaving always through the many rocks. But Avelyn hardly cared. For the majority of his twenty years, the young man had dreamed of this day, had set his sights on the Order of St.-Mere-Abelle as surely as any general would focus on his next conquest. Eight years of formal study, eight years of grueling testing, had brought Avelyn to this point, one of twenty-five remaining of the two thousand twelve-year-olds who had begun the process, each desperately vying to gain admittance in this class of God’s Year 816.

Avelyn dared to peek out from under his hood at the handful of spectators lining the road before the monastery’s front gates. His mother, Annalisa, and father, Jayson, were among that small group, though his mother had taken ill and would not likely make it back to their home in the village of Youmaneff, some three hundred miles from the coast. Avelyn knew with near certainty that this would be the last time he saw her, and likely the last time he’d see his father, as well. Avelyn was the youngest of ten, and his parents had been well into their forties when he was born. His next youngest sibling was seven years his senior, and so he wasn’t really close to any of them. By the time Avelyn was old enough to understand the concept of family, half the children had already moved out of the family house.

His life had been good, though, and he had been close to his parents, more so than any of his brothers or sisters had been. The bond had been particularly strong with Annalisa, a humble and spiritual woman, who had encouraged her youngest child to follow the path of God from his earliest recollections.

Avelyn dropped his gaze once more, fearful of discipline should he be caught peeking out from under his hood. Rumors hinted that students of St.-Mere-Abelle had been dismissed for less. He pictured his mother on that day many years before when he had announced that he would enter St.-Mere-Abelle: the tears that had come to her; the smile, gentle, even divine. That image, that confirmation, was burned into Avelyn’s thoughts as clearly as if it had been painted and magically illuminated on the inside of his eyelids. How much younger and more vibrant Annalisa had seemed! The last few years had been hard on her, one illness after another. She was determined to see this day, though, and Avelyn understood that with its passing, with his entering St.-Mere-Abelle, the woman would no longer fight against mortality.

It was all right, to Avelyn and to Annalisa. Her goals had been met, her life lived in the spirit of generosity. Avelyn knew he would cry when word reached him of her passing, but he knew, too, that his tears would be selfish—tears for himself and his loss, and not for Annalisa, whom he knew would be in a better place.

A grinding sound, the great gates sliding open, brought the young man from his contemplations.

“Do you willingly enter the service of God?” Father Abbot Dalebert Markwart asked.

The twenty-five responded with a unified “Yes, say I!”

“Show then your desire,” the Father Abbot demanded. “Pass ye the Gauntlet of Willing Suffering!”

The line shuffled forward. “My God, our God, one God,” they chanted, and they lifted their voices even higher when the first of their ranks entered the gauntlet, stepping between two lines of monks, those who remained of the classes of the previous two years, all armed with heavy wooden paddles.

Avelyn heard the slaps of wood, the unintentional groans, even an occasional cry from the younger students near the front. He fell deeper within himself, chanted with all his strength, and listened to his own words, grabbing at his faith and building with it a wall of denial. So strong was he in meditation that he did not even feel the first few blows, and those that slapped against him afterward seemed a minor thing, a momentary pain, lost in the ultimate sweetness that awaited him. All his life, he had wanted to live in service to God; all his life he had dreamed of this day.

Now was his time, his day. He came through the gauntlet without uttering a single sound beyond the range of his controlled, even-toned chant.

That fact was not lost on Father Abbot Markwart, nor on any of the other monks watching the initiation of God’s Year 816. None of the others in Avelyn’s line could make such a claim; not one in several years had walked the Gauntlet of Willing Suffering with so minimal complaint.

The huge stone gates of St.-Mere-Abelle slammed shut with a resounding crash that jolted Annalisa Desbris violently. Her husband held her tight then, understanding her pain, both physical and emotional.

Annalisa knew, as Avelyn had known, that she would never see her son in this world again. She had given him over to the service of God, to her ultimate joy, but still, the very real human pain of final parting tugged at her weak heart, stole the strength from her tiny arms and legs.

Jayson supported her, always. He, too, had tears in his eyes, but unlike Annalisa’s, which were of joy, Jayson’s tears came from a mix of emotions, ranging from simple sadness to anger. He had never spoken openly against Avelyn’s decision, but privately the pragmatic man had wondered if his son wasn’t merely throwing his life away.

He couldn’t say that to frail Annalisa, he knew. A simple word could break her. Jayson only hoped that he could somehow get her home, into her own bed, before she died.

Thoughts of his parents could not hold Avelyn’s attention as the group crossed the windblown courtyard and entered the grand entrance hall of St.-Mere-Abelle. Now, the young man did utter an unintended sound, a gasp of disbelief and delight.

The place was not bright, having only a handful of tiny windows set high up on the tall walls. Torches burned at regular intervals, and the massive beams that supported the hall’s ceiling seemed to dance in their light. Avelyn had never seen a place so huge, could not comprehend the effort that had been expended to put this hall together. His own village of Youmaneff would fit inside this one hall, with room left over to stable the horses!

The tapestries that lined the place were no less magnificent and intriguing, woven into scenes that held a million details in every square foot—sights within sights, subtle lines and smaller images—that caught Avelyn’s eyes and his curiosity and would not let them go. The tapestries covered the walls almost completely, allowing for windows and for racked displays of shining weapons: swords and spears, great axes, long daggers, and a myriad of pole arms with hooked blades and prodding tips that Avelyn did not know. Suits of armor of various designs stood as silent sentinels, every type from the overlapping wooden plates of the ancient Behrenese to the strong metal-plate mail designed for Honce-the-Bear’s Allheart Brigade, the personal guards of the King—whoever that might be at the moment. Along one wall stood a gigantic statue, fifteen feet or more, dressed in a heavy leather jacket, trimmed in fur and set with spiked metal plates and heavy iron rings. A fomorian, Avelyn realized with a very visible shudder, in the typical battle dress of its warlike race. Beside it, dramatically, were two tiny figures, one just over half Avelyn’s height, the other a bit taller, but slender and lithe. The shorter of the pair wore a light leather tunic and arm shields, metal sleeves hooked over the figure’s thumbs and running from wrists to elbow. The red beret gave the figure’s identity away. It was a powrie mannikin, Avelyn realized. The cruel dwarflike powries were also called “bloody caps” for their gruesome habit of dipping their berets, enchanted pieces made of specially prepared human skin, in their victims’ blood until the cap took on—and kept—a shining red hue.

The statue beside the powrie, sporting a pair of nearly translucent wings, had to be a representation of an elf, the mysterious Touel’alfar. Its limbs were slender and long and its armor a silver shining coat of fine interlocking links. Avelyn wanted to go closer to it to study the stern facial features and the incredible craftsmanship of the armor. That thought, and the potential punishment it might bring, reminded the young man of where he was and that many seconds, minutes perhaps, had slipped past him unnoticed. He blushed deeply and lowered his head, taking a quick glance all around. He calmed quickly, though, seeing that all of his classmates were similarly entranced and that the Father Abbot and the other ranking monks seemed not to care.

The initiates were supposed to be overwhelmed, Avelyn suddenly realized, and he looked again around the room, this time more openly, nodding as he began to understand the true nature of the place. The Order of St.-Mere-Abelle was noted not just for its pious and humble priests but also for their long reputation as fierce warriors. The eight years of Avelyn’s pretraining had included only minor instruction in the martial arts, but he had suspected that the physical qualifications of the brotherhood, the ability to fight, would become more prominent once inside the monastery.

To Avelyn, it was more of a distraction than any thing else. All that the gentle and idealistic young man wanted was to serve God, to foster peace, to heal, and to comfort. To Avelyn Desbris, nothing in all the world, not the treasures of a dragon’s hoard, nor the powers of a king, could outweigh that accomplishment.

Now he was on the other side of the great stone gates of St.-Mere-Abelle. Now he had his chance.

So he believed.

CHAPTER 3

The Lingering Kiss

Things quieted quickly in Dundalis. As the days after the patrol’s return stretched out into an uneventful week, and then a second, thoughts of the slain goblin took second place to the very real threat of winter’s onset. There was much to be done: the last harvesting, preparing the meat, patching holes in the cottages, and cleaning the chimneys. Every passing day, danger from the goblins seemed more and more remote; every passing day, fewer and fewer men and women went out of the town to walk a patrol.

Elbryan and his friends, some as young as six or seven, saw their chance unfolding. For the adults, the specter of the goblins brought a sobering wariness and then a troublesome distraction. For the younger villagers, whose imaginations were far livelier and whose sense of adventure hadn’t yet been tempered by any real loss, thoughts of goblin raids brought excitement, a call to arms, a time for heroes. Elbryan and his friends had offered to walk patrols since the first day of the hunting party’s return. Each morning, they approached the village leaders, and each morning, they were politely refused and quickly put to some more mundane task. Even Elbryan, who would be entering the realm of adults that coming spring, had spent almost all the previous week with his head up a dirty chimney.

But the young man held faith and passed his hopes down the line. The adults were tiring of their patrols, he knew, and were growing more and more confident that the goblin incident was a chance thing—a single, unfortunate meeting—and that those creatures which had been chased away would not return to the site of the battle, let alone try to track the humans back to their village, some thirty miles away.

Now, with two calm weeks behind them and no further sightings except for a few wild rumors that were discounted by even the most cautious of Dundalis’ folk, Elbryan recognized the lessening of resistance in his father’s voice. He was not surprised that morning when Olwan, instead of shaking his head, bent low and sketched out in the dirt a rough map of the area, explaining to his son where he and his friends should be positioned.

Elbryan was surprised, though, and pleasantly so, when Olwan then presented him with the family sword, a short, thick blade of two-foot length. It wasn’t an impressive weapon—its blade showed many nicks and more than a little rust—but it was one of the few real swords in the village. “Make certain that every one of your group is well armed,” Olwan said seriously. “And make sure that each knows the value, and the danger, of his or her weapon.”

Olwan knew what this meant to his son, and if he had smiled or let on in any way that the patrols were no longer really necessary, he would have stolen something from Elbryan, a measure of importance that the young man desperately needed to feel.

“Do you think it is wise to let the children go out with weapons?” Shane McMichael asked Olwan, coming up to the large man soon after Elbryan had run off. “Or to let them go out at all?”

Olwan snorted and shrugged his muscular shoulders. “We cannot spare the men and women,” he replied, “and there is the other patrol in the vale, the most likely route for our enemies to take, should they come.” Olwan gave another snort, a helpless sound that surprised McMichael, who had always known Olwan as the coolest and most confident head in ail the village.

“Besides,” Olwan went on, “if the goblins or fomorians get close enough to Dundalis for my son and his friends to see, they will be as well off out in the woods as in the village.”

Shane McMichael did not argue the point, though the weight of it grew steadily on his shoulders. Since Honce-the-Bear had been at peace for many years—and goblins and evil giants receding from the thoughts of most people to become little more than fireside tales—Dundalis had not been built for defense. The village was not even walled, as earlier settlements near the Wilderlands had been, and the folk were not well armed. The hunting party of twelve had carried with them more than half the total real weapons of the hundred folk of Dundalis. Olwan was right, Shane McMichael knew, and he shuddered with the thought; if the goblins got close enough for Elbryan and the others to spot them, then all the village would be in danger.

Olwan started away, and McMichael calmed and moved to follow. He really didn’t think any goblins would come; none in the village except for pessimistic old Brody Gentle spoke of such darkness.

The patrols began that day, with a. score and five youngsters walking the rim of the bowl-shaped vale that held Dundalis. There was one other patrol, a handful of older teenagers, venturing further out, down among the pines and fluffy caribou moss to the northeast. Each of this group nodded respectfully at his younger counterparts as he passed them on the rim; some mentioned that Elbryan’s patrols would serve as their vital liaison with the village proper. After that exchange of compliments, even the passing of endless uneventful hours could not dampen the thrill for the youngsters. Elbryan and his friends were not being left out this time, were not being treated as mere children.

As each day slipped past—the weather growing a bit colder, the wind shifting more to the north—the twenty-five in Elbryan’s group perfected their patrol routes. Elbryan split them into four teams of five and one of three, which would move from group to group gathering information, while he and Pony served as anchor to them all, holding a position along the highest ridge directly north of Dundalis, overlooking the valley of evergreens and caribou moss. There were several complaints about this arrangement at first, mostly from the older boys who thought that they should serve as Elbryan’s second. Some even resorted to teasing Elbryan about his growing relationship with Pony, prompting him to “ride the Pony,” and other such crudities.

Elbryan took it all in stride, with the exception of any insults to Pony, which he promptly informed the teasers would bring them serious and painful retaliation. He didn’t care about their teasing him though, having at last admitted, to himself and openly, that Pony was his best and most-trusted friend.

“Let the children have their fun,” Elbryan, coming into manhood, whispered to Pony as the groups split up.

When he wasn’t looking her way, when he had moved off to set up a windbreak of dead wood, Pony regarded him knowingly, a warm smile spreading over her face.

Something else watched the young man from a perch in one of the thicker pines on the ridge. It moved nimbly from branch to branch, crossing over to nearby trees with barely a whisper. It shadowed Elbryan’s every move, studying the young leader intently.

To Pony and Elbryan, alert as they were, the creature was invisible and unnoticed. Even if they had looked intently the creature’s way, its movements were so fluid and graceful—and always under the cover of pine boughs—that they would have considered the sway of the branches no more than the movement of the wind or a gray squirrel, perhaps.

Another week passed by uneventfully. Work in the village was at full pace, readying for winter. On the ridge and in the vale beyond, the primary enemy became boredom. Elbryan lost half a dozen of his patrol at the beginning of that second week, the youths explaining that their parents needed them about the house and would not let them go out. Elbryan did not miss that every one of those “soldiers” seemed grateful to be relieved of the dull patrols.

Elbryan continued his diligent work, though, reorganizing the routes to cover more ground since he was down to three teams of five, with a couple of messengers.

“We’ll lose Shamus tomorrow,” Pony said as they sat side by side in a hollow on the high ridge, sheltered from the chill wind by a pair of large pines. The day was late, and gray clouds were rolling in to hide the afternoon sun. “His mother told me this morning this would be his last day out.”

Elbryan prodded the ground with the tip of his sword. “His patrol group goes to four, then,” he said matter-of-factly.

Pony recognized the frustration in his voice, though he did well to hide it. Elbryan was watching his first command crumbling about him, his soldiers being taken away so that they could help patch roofs or shore up barns. Pony sympathized with the young man, but logically, this was the best scenario they could have hoped for.

“They are being called back home because no enemy has come,” she gently reminded him. “Better this than for your patrol to have been truly necessary.”

Elbryan looked at her, little luster showing in his normally bright green eyes.

“Or maybe we were necessary,” Pony quickly added, trying to salvage some measure of the young man’s pride. “How do we know that goblins have not ventured near Dundalis?”

Elbryan cocked his head and ran a hand through his thick layers of straight, light brown hair.

“Perhaps their scouts did come near us,” Pony went on. “Perhaps they saw our patrols and realized they would not have an easy time of it against the village.”

“We are just children,” Elbryan said disgustedly.

Pony shook her head. “And all but the smallest of our group is larger than a goblin,” she replied without hesitation, and that truth seemed to lend some credence to her reasoning. “Is not the best army the one so strong that enemies will not dare attack?”

Elbryan didn’t answer, but that familiar sparkle lit up his eyes. He turned back to regard the ground in front of him, and the wild design he was cutting with the sword tip.

Pony smiled warmly, feeling that she had done well. It pleased her greatly to help out Elbryan, to guard his emotions. She didn’t really believe goblins had come near enough to see the patrols, and neither did Elbryan, but at least this way he could hold out some reason to believe his first real effort at something important by adult standards had not been in vain. The simple fact that they could not be absolutely certain offered Elbryan all the encouragement he needed.

Pony dared to reach out then; the connection was too strong to let the moment pass. She cupped Elbryan’s chin in one hand and gently turned him back to face her.

“You have done a wonderful job out here,” she said softly.

“Not alone,” he started to reply, but she stopped him by putting a finger of her free hand across his lips. Only then did Elbryan realize how close they were, their faces barely two inches apart. He felt warm suddenly, a bit dizzy, a bit frightened.

Pony drifted closer. She kissed him! Full on the lips! Elbryan was terrified and thrilled all at once. He thought he should pull away, spit on the ground, and yell “girl poison!” as was the expected response, as had been his response all the other times Pony, or any of the other girls, had tried to kiss him.

He didn’t want to do that; the last notion in his mind was to pull away. He realized then that it had been a long, long time since Pony had tried to kiss him—at least a year. Had she feared his reaction? Had she known he would have spit and yelled out “girl poison,” a chant that would have been taken up by every boy in the village?

Or had she known he wasn’t ready, until now, to be kissed? That was it, the young man decided as the gentle kiss, their closed mouths barely touching, lingered on and on. Pony knew him so very well, better than he knew himself. Their last few days together, alone for four of every five hours, had brought them even closer.

And now this. Elbryan didn’t want it to end. He shifted in his seat, first lifted the short sword, then, realizing that it would be awkward, perhaps even dangerous, dropped it to the ground. He dared to put his arms around Pony’s back, dared to pull her closer, feeling the strangely interesting curves and bumps of her body against his own as they came together. He fought a fit of panic—not knowing what he should do, where he should move his hands, or if he should move his hands at all.

All Elbryan knew was that he didn’t want the kiss to end, that he wanted something more, though he wasn’t really sure what that might be. He wanted to be closer to Pony, physically and emotionally. This was his Pony, his dearest friend, the girl—no, the young woman—whom he had grown to love. He would pass into manhood that spring, Pony into womanhood the following autumn, and soon after, he would ask for Pony’s hand . . .

That notion brought fear and Elbryan tried to pull away—and did break the hold long enough to catch his breath. Again, the fears passed, lost in a swirl of warmth as he looked at Pony’s shining blue eyes, at her smile, as genuine and joyful as anything Elbryan had ever seen. She hardly had to nudge him to get him to kiss her again, and they settled even more comfortably together.

The kiss shifted, from curiosity to urgency, then back to gentleness. Their clothes ruffled and seemed more of an obstacle than a necessity. Though the air was chill, Elbryan had the feeling he would be warmer without them. His hands did move now, as he lost his fear of touching Pony. He caressed her neck, ran his hand down her side and along the outside of her strong leg. He was shocked as her mouth opened a little bit, as he felt her tongue against his lips, so soft and inviting.

The moment, this most precious moment in all of Elbryan’s young life . . .

And then suddenly, it was gone, destroyed by a horrified, and horrifying, scream. The couple jumped apart and to their feet, staring wide-eyed down the long slope to the village, at the swarming forms, at the large plume of smoke—too large to come from any chimney!—rising from one of the houses.

The goblins had come.

Hundreds of miles away, in a windswept, foreboding land called the Barbacan, in a deep cave in a mountain called Aida, the dactyl basked in the sensation of war. The demon creature could feel the screams of those dying in Dundalis, though it had no idea where the battle was being waged. This was an action of a rogue goblin chieftain, perhaps, or one of the many powrie raiding parties, acting on their own initiative, bringing misery to the wretched humans.

The dactyl could not take direct credit, but that mattered little. It had awakened, darkness rising, and already its influence was spreading throughout Corona. Already the goblins, the powries, or one of the other races the demon would claim as minions had felt that awakening and had been given the courage to act.

The creature flexed its great wings and settled back in the throne it had shaped from the obsidian that had formerly served as its tomb. Yes, the dark vibrations were running strong through the stone. The sensation of war, of human agony.

It was good to be awake.

CHAPTER 4

The Death of Dundalis

Elbryan and Pony were stunned and terrified for many seconds. It was too unreal, too beyond their experience and expectations. Images assaulted them, mingling with imagined scenes even more horrifying, and amid all of it welled utter denial, the hope against obvious reality that this simply could not be happening.

Jilseponie moved first, a single, tiny step, her arm reaching out helplessly. That almost involuntary motion seemed to break her trance and she let out a shriek for her mother and ran full out for home.

Elbryan thought to call out for her, but indecision held his voice and kept him from immediately following. What should he do? What were his responsibilities?

A warrior would know these things!

With great effort, Elbryan tore his gaze from the dreadful spectacle below and glanced all around. He should organize his friends—yes, that was the course, he decided. He would gather together his scouts, perhaps even call in the older scouts from the vale, and charge down into Dundalis in tight formation, anchoring the defense.

But time was against him. He glanced about again, turned to the evergreen and caribou moss valley, and started to call out, thinking to bring in the patrol of older men.

Elbryan fell back behind the twin pines, catching the shout in his throat, gasping for breath. Just over the ridge, facing away from him, he saw the nearly bald head, the pointed ears, the chalky yellow skin of an enemy. With trembling fingers, Elbryan retrieved his short sword, and then he sank even deeper into the hollow, paralyzed with terror.

Pony wasn’t armed, having left her club back at the ridge. She didn’t care, for she wasn’t really running into battle.

The girl was running to find her mother and father, to feel their comforting hugs, to hear her mother telling her that everything would be all right. She wanted to be a little girl again, wrapped tight in her bedsheets, and tighter in Mother’s embrace, waking from a nightmare.

This time, though, she was awake. This time, the screams were real.

Pony ran on desperately, blinded by tears. She stumbled to the base of what she thought was a tree, then nearly fainted as it shifted suddenly, as the fomorian giant, huge club in hand, took a long step away from her.

If she had had any breath in her lungs, she would have screamed, and if she had screamed, the giant would have noticed her and squashed her where she stood.

But its focus was the village and not some insignificant little girl, and in a few loping strides it left Pony far behind. She scrambled back to her feet, picked up a couple of rocks of a good size for throwing, and ran on, taking a course that would parallel, but not too closely, the giant. Now, as she entered the area of battle, as she saw the confusion, the fierce fighting, the dead bodies on the road, she was no more a little girl. Now she remembered her training, forced herself to think clearly and concisely. Goblins swarmed everywhere, and Pony spotted at least two other giants, fifteen feet tall and perhaps a thousand pounds of chiseled muscle. Her friends and family could not win! That logical, adult part of Pony—the part that knew that the time of fending off nightmares with bedsheets was long past—told her without doubt that Dundalis could not survive.

“Plan B,” she whispered aloud, using the words to steady her thinking. The rules of survival, taught to every child in Wilderlands settlements, declared that the first priority in any catastrophe was to save the village, if that failed, the next task was to save as many individuals as possible. Plan B.

Pony picked her way around the back of the nearest houses, moving in and out of the shadows. She peeked around the corner and stood transfixed.

On the main road of Dundalis, just on the other side of this house, a fierce battle raged. Pony saw Olwan Wyndon first, standing tall in the middle of the human line, calling out commands, forming the group of twenty men and women into a tight circle as enemies came at them from nearly every direction. Pony’s first instincts were to try and join that battle group, but she quickly surmised that she would never get in. She clenched her fist hopefully as Olwan Wyndon smashed a goblin’s head, dropping the wretch to the dirt.

Then she held her breath as she noticed the man behind Olwan, parrying wildly as two goblins prodded at him with sharp spears.

Her father.

Elbryan held his breath, gasped once, then held it again. He didn’t know what to do, then cursed himself silently for what he had already done!

In the hollow of the twin pines, he had lost sight of his enemy—the first, and often fatal, mistake.

Now he had to work hard to deny his terror, had to climb above the emotion and the physical barrier and remember the many lessons his father had given him. A warrior knows his enemy, locates his enemy, and watches its every move. Silently mouthing that litany, Elbryan inched his face toward the edge of the pine. He hesitated momentarily at the very last instant, certain the goblin was just on the other side, weapon poised to smash him as soon as he peeked around.

A warrior knows his enemy . . .

A sudden shift brought the field beyond the pines back into view, and Elbryan nearly collapsed with relief when he saw the goblin had not moved and was still facing away from him, staring into the northern valley. That relief fast transformed into a sinking feeling as Elbryan realized the meaning of this creature’s positioning. The patrol in the valley had been spotted, perhaps had even been already engaged, and this goblin had been set as sentry, watching for any other potential human reinforcements while its companions sacked the village.

That thought sparked anger in the young man, enough to overcome his fear. He clenched more tightly his short sword and slowly brought one leg up under him.

Without hesitation, for if he paused, he knew his courage surely would falter, Elbryan slipped out from behind the protection of the tree. Half walking, half crawling, he moved closer to the goblin, quickly covering a third of the distance.

Then he wanted to turn back, to run into the hollow and cover his face. The sounds behind him, from his home, bolstered him, as did the smell of burning wood carried by the wind up to the ridge. With a grimace of determination, Elbryan halved the distance to his foe. No turning back now. He scanned the area, and, as soon as he was confident that this creature was alone, he stood up and rushed out.

Five running strides brought him to the goblin, who didn’t hear his approach until the last second. Even as the goblin began to turn, Elbryan’s sword came down hard on its head.

The sword bounced out wide; Elbryan was surprised by the force of the impact and that his sword had not cut into the goblin’s skull. He thought for one terrible moment he hadn’t hit the thing hard enough, that it would turn and skewer him with its crude spear. Desperately, the young man scrambled to the side, trying to ready a defense.

The goblin staggered weirdly, dropped its weapon, and fell to its knees. Its head lolled from side to side. Elbryan saw the bright red gash, the white of split bone, the grayish brain. The goblin stopped moving. Its chin came to rest on its chest, and it held the kneeling pose, quite dead.

Dead.

Elbryan felt his guts churning and labored for his breath. The weight of his first kill descended upon him, bowing his shoulders, nearly driving him to his knees. Again it was the smell of his burning village that cleared his head. He had no time now to ponder, and any sympathetic notions that he might have captured the goblin instead of killing it seemed perfectly ridiculous.

He looked ahead at the evergreen vale and noted to his dismay that a fight was going on down there. Then he looked back at the larger battle for Dundalis.

To where his parents were fighting, to where Pony had run.

“Pony,” the desperate young man whispered aloud, and before Elbryan even consciously knew what he was doing, he saw the trees going past him in a blur as he sprinted down the slope toward Dundalis.

Pony made her way around the house, inching toward the battle, wondering how she might get past the ring of goblins to stand beside her father. A cry of agony within the house froze her in place, and she leaned heavily on the frame for support. She took a moment to consider where she was, whose house this was, and she stifled a sob.

“No time for that,” she scolded herself, and she focused on the battle raging on the road. Again her shoulders sagged, for though many goblins lay dead or dying on the bloodied ground about the ring of desperate fighters, several humans were down as well. And the goblin ranks, for all the carnage, remained deep, and seemed undiminished.

Above it all stood Olwan, proud and strong and unshakable. He clobbered yet another goblin, bashing in its ugly skull, then raised his arm and called out, trying to rally the others. Pony blinked curiously, for Olwan’s arm did not come down, seemed to be going up, up, up. She saw the look of horror and pain that came over the man, then looked higher, past his stretched shoulder, his elbow . . .

The giant’s hand covered the tall man’s entire forearm. Blocked by the wall of the house, Pony couldn’t follow the man’s ascent. She wanted to yell out for someone to help doomed Olwan, wanted to scream simply for the sake of screaming.

And then Olwan came flying back into sight, falling in a broken heap on the road right in the midst of the valiant fighters. Their ranks broke apart. They ran every which way, most getting no more than a couple of strides before being buried under a wave of swarming goblins. Pony lost sight of her father immediately, mercifully. She tried to sort out the mob, saw another person—the woman who had taught her to read and write—get pulled down to the ground, saw the goblin spear fast following. And then Pony turned away, stumbling to the back of the house, holding her churning stomach.

There were no lines of defense anymore, no organized pockets of resistance. Everything was confusion, screams and cries of pain. Pony didn’t know where to turn, where to run. She saw the image of dead Olwan again, and the last glimpse of her father.

She turned back toward the road, hoping that her dad would come for her, would somehow rush out of the jumble and scoop her away from the danger, would make everything better, as he’d always done.

As if in a grotesque mockery of that hope, a goblin marched around that corner, bearing down on the girl. Pony let out a cry, hurled one of her stones at the creature, and ran off.

Anger held her in place just around the back of the house. She stopped and braced herself, measuring the goblin’s footsteps. As it rounded the corner, the girl snapped back her elbow with all her strength, catching the charging creature right under the chin.

Pony spun and jumped on it, flailing wildly with both fists, kicking and kneeing viciously. Stronger than its little body would indicate, the goblin finally pushed her aside and turned its spear.

“Elbryan!”

The call brought the sprinting lad to a skidding halt. He caught the trunk of a young maple and swung about it, turning in the direction of the voice.

Carley dan Aubrey, one of the younger scouts, staggered toward him, his face ashen, both hands clenched firmly to his right side at his waist. Elbryan saw the dark stain near those hands.

“Elbryan!” the nine-year-old boy called again, stumbling forward. Elbryan ran out to meet him, caught him as he fell.

The older boy moved quickly to inspect the wound, forcing Carley’s hands away. Elbryan grimaced, and Carley whimpered and nearly vomited, when Elbryan’s hand brushed against the broken tip of a spear jutting from Carley’s side.

Elbryan pulled back his trembling hand, staring wide-eyed at the bright blood that now covered it. Carley clutched desperately at the wound again, but he could not hope to stem the blood.

Elbryan forced himself to remain steady, to think clearly. He had to get his own shirt off and use it to somehow wrap the wound. And quickly! He tore off his overcoat and pulled open his leather vest, quickly unbuttoning the sleeves of his white shirt. Then he saw the goblin, coming fast, half a spear in its hands. It raised the shaft like a club, bearing down on him.

Elbryan grabbed for his short sword, tried to bring it up in front of him, and fell back as the goblin dove upon him. They came together hard, Elbryan going flat out on his back.

Down they rolled together. Elbryan’s sword was up against the creature’s side, had cut in a bit, but the angle was wrong, and the goblin’s grip surprisingly strong, preventing the boy from driving the weapon home.

Over and over they rolled, tumbling down the slope, punching and thrashing. The ugly goblin face, all twisted teeth and long pointy nose, was barely inches from Elbryan’s face, and closer still when the creature began to butt the boy. Elbryan felt his nose crack, felt the warmth of his blood running. He struggled harder, but the goblin would not let him drive his sword home.

Elbryan tugged more fiercely with his other hand instead, increasing the pace of the roll. He caught his ankles on a tree trunk but kicked off, not daring to stop, and the goblin came right over him. Still the creature held on stubbornly, pulling Elbryan over, and they began to roll sidelong again, heads to feet. On the first roll, Elbryan saw his new advantage, and on the second the young man poked the elbow of his sword arm out so it hit the ground and was braced.

When the goblin came over, its own weight forced it down on Elbryan’s sword.

The creature went berserk, kicking and thrashing, flopping like a landed fish. Elbryan at first tried to defend himself but when that seemed futile, went on the offensive instead, brutally turning and twisting his blade.

The pair rolled hard into the trunk of another tree, and the goblin abruptly stopped its thrashing. Elbryan, dazed, his breath blasted away, nearly fainted. His thoughts came back in a terrifying rush and he tore free his sword and began hacking wildly, cutting the goblin again and again. He crawled out from under the thing, but kept on attacking it, savagely, primally, his blows wrought of sheer terror. Finally he stopped, realizing it was dead, that it could no longer hurt him. He knelt over it, trying to catch his breath, which would not seem to come to him.

Carley dan Aubrey’s whimper brought him back to his senses. He dashed back up the slope, finally getting to the boy.

“Cold,” Carley mouthed quietly. Elbryan fell to his knees, reaching for the wound, gingerly touching the spear and wondering if he should pull it free. He looked at the boy, and he held his breath.

But Carley was dead.

Pony ran off, stumbled and fell, then scrambled on all fours—anything to get away. The goblin was behind her; she could imagine it readying its spear, lining up her vulnerable back. She cried out and fell around a corner, flat on her face. Realizing she hadn’t been hit by anything, she put her feet back under her and ran on.

Around the back of the house, Thomas Ault, Pony’s father, tore his dagger free and let the dead goblin fall to the ground. He looked plaintively at the corner around which his daughter had run, hoping, praying she would somehow escape.

Thomas had done all he could. He felt the sting of the light spears, six of them, in his back, his side, deep in one thigh. He heard the footsteps as the band of pursuing goblins closed the distance to him.

He prayed Pony would get away.

Before Elbryan could start back toward the town, he saw the shadows moving among the trees in the area from which Carley had come. He knew these were not his other friends, knew instinctively the others had fallen. He moved slowly, quietly, away from Carley’s body, taking cover behind a larger tree.

Seven goblins came into sight, trotting easily down the slope. They hooted and laughed when they spotted the dead boy, then hooted even louder when they saw their fallen companion, not even pausing as they passed.

Elbryan wanted to jump out at them, to slash them all. Wisdom overruled his rage, though, and he stayed hidden and let them pass. Then he stalked after them, his bloody sword in his bloody hand, hoping one of the creatures would stray from its friends.

The smoke was growing thicker down in the village now. The screams had diminished, but when he crossed an area that offered him a clear view of Dundalis, Elbryan saw the scrambling forms were still thick about the place.

The young man knew it was hopeless, knew that his village was lost, knew all of his friends, his parents, his Pony, were gone.

Elbryan knew it, yet he did not slow his pace and did not alter his course. He was beyond grief, beyond logic, with no tears to cry. He would go down to Dundalis; he would kill every goblin he could catch.

She saw the dead, saw the dying. She didn’t know why she hadn’t yet been caught, but as she darted from shadow to shadow, from the side of one burning building to the next, she knew that her luck would not hold out for long. All thought of rescuing anyone was gone. All that she wanted now was to get away, far away.

But how? The roads were thick with goblins. Groups of the ugly creatures ran into each house, ransacked the place, and then set it ablaze. They showed no mercy; Pony saw one woman beg for her life, offer herself to the goblins circling about her.

They hacked her down.

The noose was getting tighter, Pony knew. As villagers died, more and more goblins were free to run about. She looked in every direction, trying to find some course out of the town to the trees. But there was no escape, no way to get beyond Dundalis without being seen. And there were other goblins in the woods, coming in a few at a time.

No escape.

Pony squeezed in tight between two buildings and put her head against a wall. She wondered if it would be better to run out into the road and get it over with. “Better that than to wait,” she mumbled determinedly, but she found she could not do it, that her most basic instinct for survival would not let her.

Pony took a deep breath. She felt the heat against her hands as this houses, too, started to burn. Now where could she run?

The girl cocked her head, suddenly realizing exactly where she was. This was Shane McMichael’s house in front of her, Olwan Wyndon’s right behind her. Olwan’s house, Elbryan’s house.

Elbryan’s new house!

Pony remembered the building of the place, only two years previously. The whole village had buzzed about the house because Olwan Wyndon was laying a stone foundation.

Pony fell to her knees and began to scrape the ground at the base of Olwan’s house. Her fingers bled, she felt the heat growing behind her, but she dug on desperately.

Then her hand broke through into an open area. She reached deeper, perhaps a foot and a half down, and her hand met cold, wet ground. Olwan had used large slabs for the base, and, as Pony suspected, the house hadn’t completely settled.

The smoke grew thick about Pony; Olwan’s house, too, went up in flames. Still she dug, widening the hole, trying desperately to squeeze under the slab.

The angry young man didn’t have long to wait. The goblin band, sentries apparently and not part of the attacking force, did not continue down toward Dundalis but split ranks and filtered left and right into the trees.

Elbryan went left, shadowing a group of three. He heard the continuing screams in Dundalis, more of a pitiful weeping now than any cries of resistance. He saw the houses burning, was close enough to realize that his own house was among them.

That only fueled the young man’s outrage. He stalked quietly from tree to tree, and when one of the goblins paused and fell behind the others, he was quickly to the spot.

The kill was swift, a single thrust through the creature’s ribs, but not quiet, for the goblin managed to let out a dying cry.

Elbryan tore free his sword and started to run, but too late. He swiped left and right, picking off a pair of thrusting spears as the two other goblins bore down on him, howling and shouting. Their eyes—so full of glee, so uncaring for their fallen comrade—unnerved Elbryan, and he tried hard not to look at them, tried to concentrate on their stabbing spears.

All the while he was backtracking, realizing he had to flee before the other group answered the howling call. The goblin on his left came in hard and straight. Elbryan snapped his sword over and around the spear, angling it past on his right, and he skittered out to the left, up the slope, gaining the higher ground.

All advantage was lost as the young man stumbled, the loose earth slipping out from under his foot. The other goblin ran around the back of its companion and moved higher, coming in at Elbryan from above.

Desperately, he threw himself backward, put a foot under him, and kicked off, flying past the turning spear of the first goblin and rushing to get out of range of the second. He slashed out with his sword as he careened past, gaining hope as he felt it connect with something solid.

Then the world was spinning as Elbryan bounced and rolled. He finally controlled his slide and tried to angle himself so he could stop his roll and come up in a defensive posture. He expected the goblin—perhaps both of the creatures—to be right behind him.

They weren’t. The one Elbryan had slashed lay very still on the ground—apparently he had hit it harder than he’d believed. The other was also on the ground, squirming and groaning.

The only explanation Elbryan could think of was that it had charged at him as he had leaped away and had slammed hard against the ground or against a tree trunk. Not one to argue with good fortune, Elbryan scrambled to his feet.

Something tapped him on the shoulder, not hard at first, but then he was flying once more, sidelong this time. He hit the ground in a roll but slammed hard against a tree trunk as he came around. Confused and dazed, Elbryan staggered to his feet.

And all hope flew from him as a fomorian giant, holding a club as large as Elbryan’s entire body, casually walked toward him. And Elbryan heard hoots from behind him and knew the other four goblins were on the way.

The young man glanced all around. Nowhere to run, nowhere to hide. He braced himself, used the solid tree as support. When the giant was within one huge stride, Elbryan leaped out, trying to confuse it with sheer savagery. He stabbed and slashed, came in close to the monster’s knees and stabbed again, then rolled right between the giant’s legs.

But the giant had seen the move dozens of times in its battles with little folk. Elbryan got halfway through before the giant clamped his knees together, holding the youth so securely he could barely draw breath. Elbryan tried to stab the monster again, but the giant squeezed even tighter, and all the young man could do was groan. He managed to turn sideways, and from that perspective could see the giant’s club rise up over its head.

A sickening feeling washed over Elbryan. Stubborn to the end, he stabbed again as hard as he could, then closed his eyes.

The air came alive with a strange humming sound. The giant released its grip and Elbryan fell to the ground. He scrambled out, running on for several steps. He heard the continuing whistles and thought for a moment that a swarm of bees had flown up around him. Instinctively he whipped out his hand, and then he cried out for the sudden sting and pulled it back in close.

He turned about, regarding the giant, which was dancing and slapping at the air. Beyond it he could see a pair of the four goblins that were coming in, both of them jerking weirdly and then falling to the ground.

“What?” Elbryan asked in utter confusion. Dots of red, like grotesque chicken pox, covered the giant’s face and arms. Looking closer, and then at his own injured hand, Elbryan realized that these were not caused by bees, but were bolts, small arrows, the likes of which he had never seen.

Scores and scores of small arrows, filling the air all about him!

But they hardly seemed to stop the behemoth. The fomorian charged ahead with a tremendous, hideous howl, its cudgel going high. Elbryan, puny and helpless beneath it, held aloft his short sword, though he could not possibly deflect such a mighty blow.

The next volley was concentrated, sixty arrows flying fast for the giant’s face and throat, sixty bolts that looked indeed like a swarm of bees. The fomorian staggered once, twice, and then again, as the bolts burrowed in, one on top of the other, a dozen on top of the previous dozen. Finally, the stinging ended, and the fomorian tried to move forward, back toward its prey. But before it could get anywhere near to the young man, the giant went down, choking in its own blood.

Elbryan never saw it; he had fainted dead away.

CHAPTER 5

God’s Chosen

Brother Avelyn turned hard on the crank, both wood and man groaning with each rotation. When would that bucket finally appear? the young novice wondered.

“Faster,” insisted Quintall, Avelyn’s work partner and classmate. The class had been divided by birth dates; Avelyn and Quintall had been put together solely because they had been born in the same week, and not for compatibility, either physical or emotional. Indeed, the two seemed obviously mismatched. Quintall was the shortest man in the class of twenty-five, while Avelyn was among the tallest. Both were large boned, but Avelyn was gawky and awkward, whereas Quintall was muscular, a fine athlete.

They were opposites in temperament, as well: Avelyn calm and reverent, always in control, and Quintall a “firework,” as Master Siherton, the class overseer, often appropriately referred to him.

“Is it near?” Avelyn asked after a few more unrewarded turns.

“Halfway,” Quintall answered coldly, “if that.”

Avelyn sighed deeply and put his aching arms into motion.

Quintall offered a disgusted snort; he would have had the bucket up by this time and the pair could have gone off and gotten their midday meal. But it was Avelyn’s turn to crank, and the taskmasters were particular about such things. If Quintall tried to sneak in and push that crank, it would likely cost them both their meal.

“He is an impatient one,” noted Master Jojonah, a portly man of about fifty, with soft brown eyes and rich brown hair that showed not a speck of gray. Jojonah’s skin was tanned and smooth, except for a fan of lines spreading out from each of his eyes—“credibility wrinkles,” he called them.

“Firework,” explained Master Siherton, tall and angular and thin, though his shoulders were wide, protruding many inches from either side of his skinny neck. Siherton’s features befit his rank of class overseer, the disciplinarian of the newest brothers. His face was sharp and hawkish, his eyes small and dark—and smaller still on those many occasions that he squinted ominously at his young students. “Quintall is full of passion,” he added with obvious admiration.

Jojonah regarded the man curiously. They were inside the abbey’s highest chamber, a long, narrow room with windows overlooking the rough ocean breakers on one side and the abbey courtyard on the other. All twenty-four—one novice had been forced to leave because of illness—brothers of the newest class were out in the courtyard, tending their chores, but the focus of the two masters was Avelyn and Quintall, considered the exceptional novices.

“Avelyn is the best of the class,” Jojonah remarked, mostly to gauge Siherton’s reaction.

The taller man shrugged noncommittally.

“Some say that he is the best in many years,” Jojonah pressed. It was true enough; Avelyn’s incredible dedication was fast becoming the talk of St.-Mere-Abelle.

Again, the shrug. “He is without passion,” Siherton replied.

“Without human passion because he is closer to God?” Jojonah replied, thinking that he had finally caught Siherton.

“Perhaps because he is already dead,” the tall man said dryly, and he turned to glare at his counterpart.

Master Jojonah settled back on his heels but met the penetrating stare firmly. It was no secret that Siherton favored Quintall among this most important class, but the man’s overt insult of Avelyn, the choice of every other master—and reportedly of Father Abbot Markwart as well—surprised him.

“We received news this day that his mother died,” Siherton said evenly.

Jojonah looked back at the courtyard, to Avelyn at work as always as though nothing was amiss. “You have told him?”

“I did not bother.”

“What macabre game do you play?”

Again came that annoying shrug. “Would he care?” Siherton replied. “He would say that she is with God now, and so she is happy; and then he would go on.”

“Do you mock his faith?” Jojonah asked rather sharply.

“I despise his inhumanity,” replied Siherton. “His mother has died, yet will he care? I think not. Brother Avelyn is so smug within the cocoon of his beliefs that nothing can unbalance him.”

“That is the glory of faith,” Jojonah said evenly.

“That is a waste of life,” Siherton retorted as he leaned out the window. “You, Brother Quintall!” he called.

Both the novices stopped their work and looked up at the window. “Go to your meal,” Master Siherton instructed. “And you, Brother Avelyn, do come and join with me at my—at Master Jojonah’s chambers.” Siherton pulled back into the hall and eyed Jojonah.

“Let us see if our young hero has any heart at all,” Siherton remarked coldly, and he stalked off toward the stairwell that would lead him down to the master’s quarters.

Jojonah watched him for a long moment, wondering which of them it was, Siherton or Avelyn, who was truly lacking in heart.

“You are using this loss for a most unworthy point,” Jojonah insisted when he caught up to Siherton three levels below.

“He must be told,” Siherton replied. “Let us not miss the opportunity to measure this man in whom we may soon put so much trust.”

Jojonah caught Siherton by the shoulder, stopping him in midstride. “Avelyn has spent eight years proving himself worthy,” he reminded the taller man. “Unbeknownst to him, he has been under constant scrutiny these last four years. What more would Siherton demand?”

“He must prove that he is a man,” the hawkish master growled. “He must prove that he can feel. There is more to spirituality than piety, my friend. There is emotion, anger, passion.”

“Eight years,” Jojonah repeated.

“Perhaps the next class—”

“Too late,” Master Jojonah said quietly. “The Preparers must be selected from this class, or from one of the three previous, and not a man among the seventy-five admitted in the last three years has shown the promise of Avelyn Desbris.” Jojonah paused and spent a long while studying the other man. Siherton knew the truth of Jojonah’s words, and seemed now caught within that truth, helpless in the face of reality. His arguments against Avelyn would be duly noted, but they rang hollow in light of the choices before the abbey. And even with any credible arguments, Siherton’s posture, bordering on anger, on outrage, seemed so out of place.

“Why, my dear Siherton,” Jojonah said a moment later, figuring it out, “you are jealous!”

Master Siherton growled and turned away, heading for the door to Jojonah’s private room.

“Our misfortune to be born between the showers,” Jojonah said, sincerely sympathetic to Siherton’s frustration. “But we have our duty. Brother Avelyn is the best of the lot.”

The words stung Siherton profoundly. He stopped at the door, bowed his head, and closed his eyes, conjuring images of the young Avelyn. Always working or praying; there were no other recollections of Avelyn to be found. Strength, or weakness? Siherton wondered, and he wondered, too, about the potential danger of having one so devout getting involved with the precious stones. There were pragmatic matters concerning the magic which might not sit well in a man so deep in faith, in a man so obviously convinced that he understood the desires of God.

“Father Abbot Markwart is quite pleased with the young man,” Jojonah remarked.

True enough, Siherton had to admit, and he understood that he would not win any debate he might wage against the selection of Avelyn as one of the Preparers. The position of the second Preparer remained wide open, though, and so the tall master decided then and there that he would use his energy to put forth a student better to his liking. Someone like Quintall, a young man full of fire and full of life. And, because of that passion, because of worldly lusts, a man who could be controlled.

He was not surprised; his lip didn’t quiver.

“Pray tell me, Master Siherton, was it peaceful?” he heard himself ask.

Master Jojonah was glad to hear the sympathetic question. Avelyn’s lack of initial response to the news that his mother had died had lent credence to Siherton’s complaints. “The messenger said that she died in her sleep,” Jojonah interrupted.

Master Siherton eyed his peer sternly, considering the lie, for the messenger, a young boy, had only delivered news of the death and had offered no details surrounding it. Master Jojonah hadn’t even conversed with the messenger. In a rare display of sympathy, with Jojonah glaring at him out of the corner of his brown eye, Siherton let it go.

Avelyn nodded, accepting the news.

“You will want to leave at once,” Siherton offered, “to join your father at your mother’s gravesite.”

Avelyn stared at him incredulously.

“Or you may choose to stay,” Jojonah put in immediately, seeing the lure. If Avelyn left St.-Mere-Abelle for any reason, he would have to wait until the following year to enter. His reentry would be guaranteed, but his position as a Preparer—though he had no idea that he would be offered such a position or even that there was such a thing—would be lost.

“My mother is already buried, I assume,” Avelyn responded to Siherton, “and my father has surely left her grave to return home. Given the short time since their departure from St.-Mere-Abelle, he has yet a long road before him.”

Master Siherton squinted ominously and leaned close over Avelyn, glaring openly. “Your mother has died, boy,” he said slowly, accentuating each syllable. “Do you care?”

The words hit young Avelyn hard. Did he care? He wanted to punch out at the tall master for even insinuating otherwise. He wanted to fly into a rage, tear the room—and anyone who tried to stop him—apart!

But that would be a disservice to Annalisa, Avelyn knew, an insult to the memory of the gentle woman. Avelyn’s mother had lived in the light of God. Avelyn had to believe that, or else all of her life—and all of his own life—would be no more than a lie. The reward for such a life, for such a good heart, was a better existence in a better place. Annalisa was with God now.

That thought bolstered the young man. He straightened his shoulders and looked squarely at the imposing Master Siherton.

“My mother knew that she would not make it home,” he said quietly, aiming his words at Jojonah. “We all knew it. She lived on, in sickness, only to see me enter the Order of St.-Mere-Abelle. It was her glory that I join the Abellican Church, and I would be stealing that glory if I left now.” He sucked in his breath, bolstering his declaration.

“The Order of St.-Mere-Abelle, God’s Year 816,” Brother Avelyn said without the slightest quiver in his voice. “That is my place. That is the vision that allowed Annalisa Desbris to pass on peacefully from this world.”

Master Jojonah nodded, seeing the calm and logical reasoning, and at once impressed with, and frightened of, the depth of this young man’s faith. It was obvious that Avelyn had loved his mother dearly, and yet, there was a sincerity in his demeanor. In that, Jojonah could clearly see Siherton’s point. Either Avelyn had a direct line to God or the young man simply had no idea of what it was to be human.

“May I go?” Avelyn asked.

The question caught Jojonah off guard, and as he considered it, he came to realize that Avelyn’s stoicism was, perhaps, not so deeply rooted. “You will be excused from your duties this day,” the master stated.

“No,” Avelyn replied without hesitation. He bowed his head as soon as he realized that he had just spoken against a master’s command, an offense that could lead to exile from the abbey. “Please allow me to continue my duties.”

Jojonah looked to Siherton, who was shaking his head disgustedly. Without a word, the tall master stalked from the room.

Jojonah suspected that young Brother Avelyn should be careful in the coming weeks. Master Siherton would see to his dismissal if given any real cause. The gentle master hesitated for a long while, making sure that Siherton would be far away by the time that Avelyn left the room.

“As you wish, Brother Avelyn,” Jojonah subsequently agreed. “Be away, then. You have a few minutes left for your midday meal.”

Avelyn bowed deeply and exited the room.

Jojonah folded his hands on his desk and spent a long while staring at the closed door. What was it about Avelyn that really bothered Siherton? he wondered. Was it, as Siherton insisted, the young man’s apparent inhumanity? Or was it something more profound? Was Avelyn, perhaps, a higher standard, a shadowy mirror, held up before all the monks of St.-Mere-Abelle, a testament of true faith that seemed so rare in these times, even in the holy abbey?

That thought shook Jojonah as he looked around at his decorated chamber, at the beautiful tapestry he had commissioned from the gallery of Porvon dan Guardinio, among the most respected artists in all the world. He considered the gold leaf highlighting the carved hardwood of the room’s support beams, the rich rug from some exotic land, the cushiony chairs, the many baubles and trinkets on his vast bookshelf, every one of them worth more gold than a common laborer would make in a year.

Piety, dignity, poverty, that was the pledge offered upon entering the Order of St.-Mere-Abelle. That was the standard. Jojonah glanced around the room again, reminding himself that most of the other masters, even some of the tenth-year immaculates, had chambers more richly adorned.

Piety, dignity, poverty.

But pragmatism, too, should be part of that pledge, so said Father Abbot Markwart, and so had declared the abbey’s previous leaders, dating back more than two centuries. In Honce-the-Bear, wealth equalled power, and without power, how could the Order hope to influence the lives of the common folk? Wasn’t God better served by strength than by weakness?

So went the widely accepted argument that allowed for relaxing some aspects of the holy pledge.

Still, Master Jojonah could see why a student such as Avelyn Desbris would so unnerve Master Siherton.

That night, Avelyn retired to his room, thoroughly exhausted, both emotionally and physically. He had spent all his waking hours at demanding work, volunteering for the most difficult parts of each task. He had lost count of the buckets he had cranked up from the well—somewhere near fifty—and had gone right from that heavy work to removing loose stones near to the northern end of the abbey’s top wall, pulling them free and piling them neatly for the masons who would follow the next day.

Only the call to vespers, the ceremony heralding eventide, had interrupted Avelyn’s frantic pace. He went quietly to the service, then skipped his evening meal altogether and went right to his chamber, a five-foot-square cubicle with a single stool, which doubled as a table for Avelyn’s candle, and a cot—little more than a flat board and a blanket—that folded down from one wall.

The work was ended now, and the ache settled in. Despite his weariness, Avelyn Desbris could hardly sleep. Images of his mother flooded his thoughts; he wondered if he might see a vision of her now, a visitation of her spirit before it went to its place in heaven. Would Annalisa come to say good-bye to her youngest child, or had she already said her farewells to Avelyn in the courtyard outside of St.-Mere-Abelle?

Avelyn rolled off the cot and fumbled with his flint and steel, finally getting the candle lit. He glanced around in the shadowy light, as if expecting Annalisa to be standing in a corner waiting for him.

She wasn’t, to Avelyn’s ultimate disappointment.

The young man settled on the edge of his cot, head bowed, hands resting on his sore thighs. He felt the first tears leaking from his eyes and tried to deny them. To cry would be a weakness, Avelyn reasoned, a lack of faith. If what he believed, what he truly held in his heart, could not sustain him in a time of death, then of what value was it? The Abellican Church, the ancient scriptures, promised heaven to those deserving, and who could be more deserving than gentle and generous Annalisa Desbris?

A tear rolled down Avelyn’s cheek, then another. He dropped his head lower, brought his hands up to cover his eyes, his wet eyes.

A sob lifted Avelyn’s bowed shoulders. He tried to deny it, tried to fight back. He recited the Prayer of the Dead, the Prayer of the Faithful, the Prayer of Eternal Promise, all in a row, forcing his voice to hold steady.

Still the tears came; every so often his even tone was broken by a sniffle or a sob.

He went through the recitals again, and again. He prayed with all his heart, wrapping the words around images of his mother, often intoning her name between lines of verse. He was on the floor then, but did not know how he had gotten there. On the floor and curled up like a baby, wanting his mother, praying for his mother.

Finally, after more than an hour, Avelyn composed himself and sat back on the cot, taking several deep breaths to fight away the last of the sobs. He thought long and hard then, considering his grief, searching his soul for the weakness that had come into his faith.

Soon enough, he had his answer, and Avelyn was glad. He was not crying, he realized, for Annalisa, for he did indeed hold faith that she had passed on to a deserved better existence. He was crying for himself, for his brothers and sisters, for his father, for all who knew Annalisa Desbris and would not be graced by her presence in this life again.

Avelyn could accept that. His faith was intact and solid, and so he was not desecrating the memory of his mother. He moved to blow out the candle, then changed his mind and settled back on the cot. Still his eyes searched the corners of the shadowy room for his mother’s spirit.

Perhaps he would find her in his dreams.

Two men walked quietly away from Brother Avelyn’s closed door. “Are you satisfied?” Master Jojonah asked Master Siherton when they were far away.

Indeed Siherton had been pleased to hear Avelyn crying, to know that the too-dedicated young man was possessed of human emotions, but the sound of Avelyn’s sobs had not changed the stern master’s general attitude toward Avelyn. He gave a slight nod to Jojonah and started away.

“I have been given the blessings of Father Abbot Markwart to show young Brother Avelyn the stones,” Jojonah called after him.

Siherton stopped dead in his tracks, fought down the angry protest that rose in his throat, and then nodded again, only slightly, and continued on his way.

It was settled then. Brother Avelyn Desbris would be one of the Preparers.

Avelyn tried to keep his head bowed, his eyes to the floor, as befitted his lowly station, but he couldn’t help notice some of the splendors that surrounded him as he followed Master Jojonah through the winding corridors of the Abbot’s Maze, the most private and revered place in all of St.-Mere-Abelle, and one that a first-year novice would certainly not expect to visit.

Jojonah’s explanation for the tour had been weak, some remark about an area that needed cleaning. After only a few weeks in the abbey, Avelyn knew enough about the routine to understand that students much older and more experienced than he were the normal choice for any tasks, however menial, in the Abbot’s Maze. He also knew that nothing special was going on, that many of the older students would have been available to Master Jojonah.

His questions were kept private though, for it was not his place to ask anything of the masters. Only to obey, and so he was, walking as quietly as he could beside the plump man, keeping his head bowed but still stealing an occasional glance at the splendor: the gold leaf bordering every side door, the wondrous and intricate carvings on every beam of wood, the mosaic tile patterns on the floors, the tapestries, so rich in detail that Avelyn figured he could spend hours and hours lingering over but one of them. Master Jojonah talked constantly, though he said nothing of interest—slight remarks about the weather, a storm that had hit twenty years before, the passing of his favorite baker in the town of St.-Mere-Abelle, a surprisingly off-color remark about the man’s “lusty” wife. None of it diverted Avelyn’ s attention from the wonders of the place, though he did listen somewhat, fearing to miss any questions directed his way.

They stopped before a heavy door—and what a door! Avelyn could not help but lift his eyes at the sight of the thing, at the layers and layers of painted carvings, scenes of battles, of Saint Abelle being burned at the stake, of the healing hands of Mother Bastibule. Scenes of angels conquering demons, of the mighty demon dactyl screaming in agony as its own lava poured over it, consuming it. Scenes of the Halo, the heavenly gift, enwrapping all the others, an oval because of the angle at which it was portrayed. It started, if such a complete thing could be said to start, at the bottom left corner of the door, and led the observer’s eye upward across the portal to the top right. And on the way, as Avelyn’s eyes scanned, it seemed to him as if the history of the world, of the faith, unfolded to him, the images packed so that one led to another easily, with enough distinction so that each made an impact, however brief, like the flowing of time.

He wanted to kneel and pray; he wanted to ask who the artist—or artists, for certainly no one man could have created all of this—might be, but realized before the words left his mouth that any name would be inconsequential for certainly the carvers and illuminators who had done this had done so at the explicit intervention of God. He alone, who called all the men and women of the world His children, might have done this.

“You know of the Ring Stones?” Master Jojonah asked abruptly, and the words sounded sharp and out of place to Avelyn. He nearly jumped, and turned with a start, surprised that a master would be so foolish as to speak in the presence of such beauty.

Then the impact of the question hit him fully.

“You know?” Jojonah asked again.

Avelyn swallowed hard, trying to discern his best response. Of course he knew of the Ring Stones, the heavenly gifts to St.-Mere-Abelle, the source of all the magic in the world. Avelyn didn’t know much, though, just the common rumors about how the stones would fall from the heavens into the hands of waiting monks, to be blessed by the Father Abbot that their special powers be realized.

“We are the Keepers of the Stones,” Master Jojonah said after a moment, Avelyn still making no move to respond.

The young monk nodded slightly.

“It is our most holy duty,” Jojonah said, moving to the door and lifting the heavy latch that held it. Avelyn blinked; amid the wonders of the door, he hadn’t even noticed the huge latch!

“The stones are the proof of our faith,” Jojonah remarked, pushing wide the door.

Avelyn stood as if turned to stone. “The proof of our faith,” he whispered under his breath, hardly believing that a master of St.-Mere-Abelle had uttered those borderline blasphemous words. Faith needed no proof—indeed the very value of faith was loyalty to beliefs without proof!

Of course Avelyn would not protest aloud, and even his silent musings were washed away as the heavy door opened silently, on balanced and oiled hinges, to reveal the greatest splendor of all.

The room inside was well lit, though Avelyn saw no torches and didn’t smell the usual odor of burning wood. They were far below ground in one of the abbey’s interior chambers, so there could be no window. But there was indeed light inside that room, such a light as to make Avelyn think of a cloudless midsummer day. It filled every corner, every crack in every stone, and reflected brilliantly off the glass covers of the many cases set about the room, and off their contents, as well, hundreds and hundreds of polished stones.

The Ring Stones!

Jojonah moved into the room, Avelyn practically stumbling behind him. The young monk made no pretense of keeping his gaze low now, looking left and right as they passed each case, marveling at the gems, the reds and blues, amber-colored stones and violet crystals. One case of a dozen or so smooth stones, a dark gray in hue but somehow seeming even blacker than night, caught Avelyn’s attention and made him shudder, though he did not know why. In another case he saw clear stones—he recognized them as diamonds—and he paused again, and noted that Jojonah, too, had paused, allowing him to linger.

Avelyn studied the way the light worked off the many facets of the diamonds, how it seemed to delve within the stone itself, swirling down to crystalline depths. Then he realized the truth.

“The diamonds are the source of the light,” he said, and he bit his lip immediately when he realized that he had spoken out of turn.

“Well done,” Master Jojonah congratulated, and Avelyn relaxed somewhat. “What do you know of the Ring Stones?”

“They are the source of all the magic in the world,” Avelyn recited.

Jojonah nodded but said, “Not exactly true.”

Avelyn stared at him hard.

“The Ring Stones are the source of all goodly magic,” Master Jojonah explained.

“God-given magic,” Avelyn dared to put in.

Jojonah hesitated—a pause not consciously caught by Avelyn, but one that he would recall in years to come—then nodded. “But there are, too, the Earth Stones, the source of evil magic, the power of the dactyls,” said Jojonah. “They are not numerous, by God’s grace, and can only be used by those demons—who, by God’s grace, are even less numerous!” He ended with a chuckle, but Avelyn was hard-pressed to see any humor in a discussion of the demon dactyls.

Jojonah cleared his throat uncomfortably. “And there is magic in the Touel’alfar, as well,” he said. “In their melodious singing, so it is said, and in the metal their gardens ‘grow’ from the soil.”

“Grow?” Avelyn asked.

Master Jojonah shrugged; it was not important. “Tell me of the Ring Stones,” he prompted. “Who gathers them?”

“The brothers of St.-Mere-Abelle,” Avelyn answered immediately.

“From where?”

“They fall from the sky, from the Halo, into the waiting hands of—”

Jojonah’s chuckle stopped him short. “They fall with a speed greater than that of an arrow in flight,” the master explained. “And they are hot, my novice friend, so hot as to burn the flesh and the bone beneath it!” Jojonah chuckled again as he described to Avelyn an image of a young monk standing in a field, as holed as the cheese of Alpinador, an incredulous look on his face, a group of glowing rocks on the ground behind him.

Avelyn bit hard on his lip. He realized that Jojonah wasn’t mocking him, but could not understand why he was being told these things.

“Where do we get them?” Jojonah asked suddenly.

Avelyn started to say, “The Halo,” but stopped short, realizing that that ground had already been covered. His expression blank, he merely shrugged.

“Pimaninicuit,” Jojonah said.

Avelyn’s expression did not change.

“An island,” the master explained. “Pimaninicuit. That is the only place where the sacred stones may be collected.”

Avelyn had never heard such a thing.

“If you ever utter that name to any who do not know it, without the express permission—no, the express instruction—of the presiding father abbot of St.-Mere-Abelle, all of the powers of the abbey will be put into focus to bring about your execution.”

Avelyn knew why he had never heard the name before.

“When do we get them?” Jojonah asked, changing the subject so abruptly that he had Avelyn thoroughly flustered. Again the young monk could only shrug helplessly, wanting to know but afraid to know. There was something most sacred, yet particularly unmysterious, and thus unholy, in all of this, a tingling of ecstasy combined with a slightly foul taste that Avelyn Desbris could not ignore.

“The stones do not come to ground often,” Jojonah explained, sounding more like a scholar than a priest. “They do not fall frequently, but they do fall regularly.” He led the way to the left-hand wall of the large chamber, and as they neared, Avelyn could see that the murals carved there were, in fact, charts, astronomical charts. Avelyn, who had often spent hours at a time gazing at the wondrous night sky, recognized some of the points. He noted the four-starred girdle of Progos-Behemoth the Warrior, the most prominent constellation in the northern sky, and the arcing stars that marked the handle of the Farmer’s Bucket, the one he had to walk away from his parent’s back door in order to see, for it always lingered right above their roof. Corona, with its Halo, was certainly evident, and prominent, being the center of it all, as Corona was the center of the universe.

Looking closer, Avelyn noted grooves in the wall. At first he thought them the borders of the known spheres, for he had heard theories of the universe as a series of overlapping, interlocking heavenly spheres, the invisible bubbles that held the layers of stars in place. When he realized that most of the grooves were near Corona, connecting the sun and the moon, and the five planets, he came to understand the truth. Those grooves were of a practical and not aesthetic nature, serving the mechanics of the chart so that the heavenly bodies could be kept in motion. Avelyn carefully noted the position of Sheila, the moon, and stared at it long enough to realize that it was indeed moving, ever so slightly, along its path about Corona.

“Six generations,” Master Jojonah explained, after he had given Avelyn several quiet minutes in which to study the fabulous chart. “Or nearly,” he added when Avelyn turned to him. “A hundred and seventy-three years will pass between each of the offerings.”

“Offerings?”

“The stone showers,” Jojonah explained. “Consider yourself blessed, my novice friend, for you live in a time of the showers.”

Avelyn breathed hard and stared again at the chart, as if expecting little lines of falling stones to appear between the Halo and Corona.

“Have you ever witnessed one of the stones at work?” Jojonah asked suddenly, drawing Avelyn from his contemplations. The young man stared at him wide-eyed with hope and eagerness, his hands clenching and opening at his sides.

Jojonah pointed to a case near to the middle of the room, and motioned for Avelyn to approach it. As soon as his back was turned to the master, Avelyn heard a click from the wall and suspected that Jojonah had thrown some sort of lever, probably hidden within the tapestry of the star charts, to unlock the case. The master soon joined him at the case and slowly slid back the glass top.

There were several various stones within, all smooth and polished. Jojonah’s hand reached for one of two of the shiny gray stones. “The soul stones,” he explained. “Hematite, by name.” He held the stone tightly in his right hand, then reached back in with his left and took out a different gem, mostly clear, but with a slight shading of yellow-green. “Chrysoberyl,” he said. “A stone of protection, in this clear form. Always a wise choice when dealing with the dark hematite!”

Avelyn didn’t really understand, but he was too overwhelmed by all of this to think of interrupting with a question.

Jojonah dropped the chrysoberyl into the pocket of his thick robe and moved far from Avelyn, facing the younger man directly. “Count to ten,” he instructed, “that I might have time to cast the enchantment. Then place your hands behind your back and raise your fingers, however many you choose, in a slow and clear sequence of seven distinct numbers. Take care to remember your sequence!”

The master closed his eyes and began to softly chant. Avelyn hesitated for a moment, trying to digest the newest information. He collected himself quickly and did as instructed, alternating the number of raised fingers behind his back. Through it all, Master Jojonah continued his soft chant, his eyes never fluttering, all of his body seeming locked in place.

A moment later, the master opened his eyes. “Seven, three, six, five, five, two, and eight,” Jojonah said, seeming quite pleased with himself.

“You heard what was within my mind!” Avelyn gasped.

“No,” Jojonah quickly corrected. “I left my physical body and ventured behind you. I merely watched as you raised your fingers.”

Avelyn started to respond but held the thought private, though his labored breath and incredulous expression revealed volumes.

“Not so hard a task!” Master Jojonah said suddenly, exploding with delight. “The hematite is a powerful tool, among the most powerful stones of all. Using it to walk out of body barely touches at the edge of its true magic. Anyone trained in the stones could do it. Why even you . . .” Jojonah’s voice trailed off, a tease that anxious Avelyn could not ignore.

“Brother Avelyn,” the master said in all seriousness a moment later, “would you care to try?”

Before he could even begin to consider the offer, Avelyn nodded so forcefully that he was sure he must have looked incredibly simple. His feet, too, were moving before his conscious thought could stop them, as if he were being drawn to the stone.

Jojonah nearly laughed aloud at the spectacle, and held forth the hematite. Avelyn reached for it, but the master pulled it back.

“It is a powerful stone,” the master said somberly, “one that could put you somewhere you do not belong. Take care in your travels, my young friend, for you may soon be lost!”

Avelyn retracted his hand a few inches, wondering if he was being a bit foolish here. The temptation was too strong, though, and he reached out again, and this time, Jojonah let him take the hematite.

Its feel was impossibly smooth, almost liquid. It was heavier than Avelyn had expected, quite solid and dense. He ran his fingers over it repeatedly, felt something deeper within it, a place of mystery, of magic. He looked to Jojonah and saw that the master was clutching the chrysoberyl close to his heart.

“It will prevent our spirits from crossing,” Jojonah explained. “That would not be a wise choice.”

Avelyn nodded and backed off a few steps. Jojonah put his free hand behind his back. “All in your due time,” he said softly. “I will know when you are in the hold of the magic, and then I will begin.”

Avelyn hardly heard him. Already the young monk was falling into the depths of the stone. To his rubbing fingers, the hematite felt truly liquid then, and inviting. Avelyn stared at it for a long while, then closed his eyes, but saw it still. It was expanding before him, engulfing his hands, then his arms. Then he was falling, falling.

He resisted, and the hematite receded dramatically, almost forcing him from the trance. But Avelyn caught his fears in time and started the journey once more.

His hands were gone, then his arms. Then all was gray, then black.

Avelyn stepped out of his body. He looked back and saw himself standing there, holding the stone. He turned back to Jojonah, saw most distinctly the chrysoberyl, fiercely glowing and encasing all of the master in a thin white bubble, a ward that Avelyn knew his spirit could not pass.

He started toward Jojonah, giving the man a wide berth. He felt incredibly light, felt as if by will alone he could rise from the ground and fly.

Behind the master, Avelyn watched the sequence of fingers: one, three, two, one, five.

“Go higher,” he heard Master Jojonah prompt.

Avelyn was surprised that he could even hear the voice in this state. He understood the command and willed himself off the ground, drifting effortlessly toward the ceiling.

“There is no physical barrier that can stop you,” Jojonah remarked. “No barriers at all. Have you seen the roof? There is something on the roof that you should know.”

Despite the thrill, Avelyn flinched as he drifted through the room’s ceiling. He marveled at the loose structure of the wood, at the density of the higher rooms tile floor.

There were several monks, men a few years Avelyn’s senior, in the chamber above. Avelyn felt himself grinning, felt his physical form in the lower room grinning, as he passed, the men totally oblivious of him.

Then the grin was gone. Something tugged hard at the young monk, some dark temptation that he should enter one of these men, that he could push out the host spirit and possess the body!

He was beyond them before that dangerous notion fully registered, drifting higher, through the next ceiling into an empty room, then through that ceiling and the next and the next and the next, this last one much thicker. Then he was outside, though he felt none of the physical sensations, the warmth of the sun or the chill of the ocean breeze. He saw that he was rising above one of the highest spots of St.-Mere-Abelle, coming right out of the roof. Still he went higher, and Avelyn feared that he would never stop the ascent, that he would drift through the clouds, out to the Halo, the stars. Perhaps he would shine in the heavens above, a fifth light on the girdle of Progos-Behemoth!

He dismissed that ridiculous notion and turned his spirit about, looking at the roof of the abbey. From up here, St.-Mere-Abelle appeared as a thick and stretched snake, winding its way along the top of the sea cliff. Avelyn saw a commotion in the courtyard, far to the side, as a group of young monks labored at the well and with the abbey’s horses and mules.

“Come back,” bade a distant voice, Master Jojonah’s voice, reaching Avelyn through his physical form. The disconnection was not complete, the young monk realized, and he shuddered to think of what a complete break from his own physical form might mean.

Shocked back to his senses, Avelyn turned his attention to the high roof directly below him. He had seen this roof before, from one of the higher points of the abbey, but looking on it from this vantage point revealed a most clever design, an image that could not be seen from a lower angle. Carved into the roof were four arms, two sets, hands lifted high, palms open and holding stones.

The journey back was quicker, until Avelyn got into the room directly above the Ring Stone chamber. This time the temptation of the other bodies pulled at him even harder. He felt himself being drawn in. He pictured the hematite as another living being, commanding him, whispering promises of power into his spiritual ear.

Avelyn felt something touch his hand—not his spiritual hand, but the physical one, the one clutching the stone. He sensed the chrysoberyl again, that magical barrier, and then his spirit was pulled to the floor, through the floor, careening back to his waiting body.

Avelyn nearly jumped when he opened his physical eyes again, seeing Master Jojonah so very close.

“One, three, two, one, five,” the young monk said abruptly, trying to satisfy whatever curiosity held the older man.

Jojonah waved his hand and shook his head, uninterested. “What did you see?” he asked.

Avelyn noted that Jojonah held both stones again, though he didn’t remember giving the hematite back to the man.

“What did you see?” Jojonah pressed, moving even closer.

“Arms,” Avelyn blurted. “Two sets, palms open . . .” Before he could finish, Jojonah fell away, gasping, laughing, crying all at once. Avelyn had never seen such a display, couldn’t begin to decipher it.

“How?” Avelyn asked with enough force to bring Jojonah back to his senses. “The stones,” Avelyn clarified when he had the man’s attention. “How could this be?”

Jojonah launched into a rushed explanation, more the regurgitation of a prepared speech than anything spontaneous. He talked of the humours of the body joining together with the alien humours of the stones to create the seemingly magical reaction. He even compared what had happened to Avelyn with the tablets given to a monk with a stomachache to induce a belch or a fart.

As he listened, Avelyn felt the mystery melting around him. For the first time since they had entered the room, there was no reverence in Master Jojonah’s voice, just the dry lecturing tone of an instructor. Avelyn didn’t buy into it, any of it. He could not explain what had just happened to him, but he knew instinctively that this talk of “alien humours” belittled the experience. There was indeed a mystery here that no tumble of fancy words could lay bare; there was something here of a higher order: Master Jojonah had called the stone showers “offerings,” and to Avelyn, that description seemed exactly wrong. “Graces” was a more appropriate term, the young monk decided there and then. He glanced around the room again, from stone to stone, his reverence of these gifts from God tenfold what it had been when first he had entered the chamber.

“You should be among those select few who make the journey,” Master Jojonah declared, and the weight of the statement drew Avelyn back to him.

“To Pimaninicuit,” Jojonah explained, his grin widening as Avelyn’s brown eyes widened. “You are young and strong and full of God’s voice.”

Tears collected in Avelyn’s eyes and began to stream down his face at the mere thought that he might be among the chosen few to get so very close to the greatest gift of God.

Jojonah dismissed him then and he left the room as if in a trance, overwhelmed indeed.

When he was gone, Master Jojonah replaced the stones, closed the case, then went to the wall and moved the hidden switch to lock it fast. All the while, the master considered the weight of what he had witnessed. A first-year novice should not have been able to activate the magic of the stone, despite what he had told Avelyn about hematite. Even if a novice had managed to fall into the magic, the control should have been above him, a quick and random out of body experience, culminating with a gasping, disbelieving, thoroughly overwhelmed young man.

For Avelyn to control the magic enough to get behind Jojonah’s back and see the finger sequence was incredible. For the young man to use the stones and drift out of the room, out of the abbey, and see the design on the roof was truly amazing. Jojonah would not have believed it possible. The master paused and lamented his own weakness. He had been in St.-Mere-Abelle for more than three decades, and had only been able to use the hematite that way for the last three years!

Jojonah pushed his own self-pity away and smiled about Avelyn. The young monk was a good choice, a God-given choice indeed, to go to Pimaninicuit.

CHAPTER 6

Carrion Birds

She came back to consciousness never expecting to see the wide sky again. She opened her blue eyes even as she moved her hands in frantic waves, trying to rid the small hole of the thick odor of charred wood.

A slanting ray cut in through the smoke, a single shaft of light that beckoned the girl back to the land of the living. She followed it as if in a dream, gingerly reaching up to touch the piece of lumber that had fallen to partially block the hole.

The wood was warm. Jilseponie understood then that she had been unconscious for a long time. She found she could put her arm against the beam firmly as long as she kept her sleeve between tender flesh and the wood.

The girl pushed hard, but the beam would not give. Stubborn as ever, summoning her rage to bolster her muscles, Pony set her legs under her as firmly as she could and pushed again, with all her might, groaning with the strain.

The sound of her own voice stopped her cold. What if the goblins were still out there? She settled back and sat very still, listening intently, not even daring to breathe.

She heard the cawing of the birds—carrion birds, she knew. But nothing else came to her—not the whimper of a survivor, not the whining, grating voice of a goblin, not the guttural grunts of the fomorian giants.

Just the birds, feeding on the bodies of her fallen friends.

That horrid thought set Pony into violent motion. She set her legs again and pushed with every ounce of strength she had, groaning but too angry to consider the implications of her noise should the goblins still be around.

The beam lifted an inch and shifted to the side, but Pony could not maintain its weight and it came down heavily, with a decidedly final thud. Pony knew that she could not move it again from this new angle, and so she didn’t even try. Now she squirmed and squeezed. She got her arm through, then her head and one shoulder, and held there for a moment, trying to catch her breath, so relieved to have her face, at least, out in the open sunlight once again.

That relief lasted only until the girl glanced around. This was Dundalis—she knew that logically—but it was no place Pony had ever seen before. All that remained of Elbryan’s house was a few beams and the stone foundation; all that remained of Dundalis was a few beams and a few stones.

And bodies. Pony only saw a couple from this angle, a goblin and an older woman, but the stench of death hung as thickly in the air as the smoke from the fires. A substantial voice within Pony’s head told her to crawl back into the hole, to curl up and cry, perhaps even to die, for death—be it heaven, be it empty blackness—had to be preferable to this.

She spent a long while halfway in and halfway out, teetering on the edge of hysteria, of hopelessness. She made up her mind simply to crawl back in, but something, some inner resolve the young woman did not yet understand, would not let her.

Again came the wriggling, the tearing of clothes and scraping of skin, the frantic pull and twist that, at last, freed her from the hole. And then came the next long pause, lying on the ground on her back, her thoughts swirling down a multitude of paths, every one of which seemed to lead to no place but despair.

With great effort, Pony pulled herself up from the ground and walked from between the piles of rubble that had been the houses of Olwan Wyndon and Shane McMichael. The main road remained, crushed stones and packed dirt carefully edged for drainage, and that alone confirmed to Pony that she was indeed in Dundalis, in the remains of what had been her home. Not a single structure stood. Not a single person or even a horse remained alive. Nor were there any living goblins or giants, Pony realized with small relief. Only the vultures, dozens and dozens, some circling overhead, most on the ground feasting, tearing at skin that had been warm to Pony’s touch just the day before, pecking at eyes that had locked with her own, shared gaze and shared thought.

Pony turned with a start, visualizing the fight on the road, the last she had seen of her father. There were the bodies; she saw Olwan, crumpled and broken in the same spot where she had seen him fall. And then she could look no more, fearing that she would find Thomas Ault, her father dear, among the dead. Of course he was dead, Pony told herself, and so was her mother, and so was Elbryan, and so was everyone.

The girl, feeling so helpless and so little, nearly fell to the ground, but again that stubborn instinct kept her uptight. She noted the great numbers of dead goblins, even a couple of giants. One group in particular, a pile of many monstrous corpses together in the road, posed a curious riddle. They had fallen as if they had formed a defensive ring, yet there were no human bodies near them. Just the goblins and a lone giant, slumped together, soaked in blood from the many small wounds on each corpse. Pony thought she should go closer to investigate, but she hadn’t the stomach.

She stood and stared, and a numbness came over her, stealing her emotions. The riddle was lost, for Pony was too exhausted to pause and ponder it, to pause and think of anything—too defeated and bedraggled to do anything except stagger out of the village, moving south along the road, then turning west at the first fork, moving toward the dying sun.

Subconscious instinct alone guided her. Weedy Meadow was the closest village, but Pony really didn’t think that the place would be any different. Surely all the world had fallen to ruin; surely all the people were dead, were being pecked and torn by vultures.

Sometime later, as dusk descended, Pony’s senses warned her that she was not alone. To the right, she saw a slight shiver of one small bush. It could have been a ground squirrel, the girl reasoned, but she knew in her heart that it was not.

To the left came a titter, a tiny voice whispering softly.

Pony kept moving straight ahead. She cursed herself for not having had the wisdom to collect a weapon before leaving Dundalis. It wouldn’t matter, she quickly reminded herself, and perhaps this way, defenseless, the end would come more quickly.

So she went on, stubbornly, looking straight ahead, ignoring any signals that she might not be alone, that goblins might be behind every tree, watching her, laughing at her, taking good measure of her, perhaps even arguing among themselves over which one would be given the pleasure of the kill—and the pleasures that might come before the kill.

That thought nearly dropped Pony to the ground, reminded her of Elbryan, of the moments before the disaster, of the kiss . . .

Then she cried. She walked straight ahead, kept her shoulders squared.

But she could not deny the tears, and the guilt and the pain. She slept fitfully at the base of a tree, in open view right beside the road, shivering from the cold, from the nightmares that she feared would haunt her forever.

Those dreams were mercifully gone when she awoke, and no images could she conjure of the village, of her family and her friends. All that the girl knew was that she was out on the road somehow, somewhere.

She knew that she was in pain, physical and emotional, but the reason for the latter escaped her conscious memory. She didn’t even know her own name.

The giant was there, facedown in the blood and dirt, in the same place Elbryan had last seen it, just a few feet from where he had fainted. At that horrible moment, the monster had been lifting its club to squash Elbryan; now it was dead.

And so were a dozen other goblins, scattered all about the area. Elbryan sat up and rubbed his face, noting the cut and dried blood on one of his hands. His thoughts careened suddenly back to Pony and the kiss at the twin pines atop the ridge. Then they came full force back to the present, through those minutes of horror—the goblins in the woods; poor Carley; the smoke from Dundalis; Jilseponie running, running for the town, screaming every step. It had all been so unreal, had all happened much too quickly. In the span of a few unbelievable minutes, Elbryan’s entire world had been thrown down.

The young man knew all that, as he sat in the dirt, staring curiously at the somehow dead giant. He knew nothing would ever be as it had been.

He struggled to his feet and approached the fomorian tentatively, though he realized from the amount of blood and from the absolute stillness of the creature that it was certainly dead. He moved to the head and knelt, studying the many wounds.

Puncture wounds, as from arrows, only much smaller. Elbryan recalled the humming sound; he conjured an image of buzzing bees. He found the nerve to inspect more closely, even to put his thumb on the edge of one prominent wound and push the skin back.

“No bolt,” he remarked aloud, trying to make sense of it all. Again he thought of bees—giant bees, perhaps, that stung and stung and flew away. He sat back again and began a quick count, then shook his head helplessly when he realized the giant had at least twenty such wounds on its exposed face alone and no doubt countless others all over its fifteen-foot frame.

The young man simply had no answers now. He had thought himself dead, and yet he was not. He had thought Dundalis doomed . . .

Elbryan scrambled to his feet, did a quick check of the dead goblins in the area. He was somewhat surprised, and a bit humbled, to find that even the two he had struggled against, even the one he had thought slain by his own sword, also showed many mysterious puncture wounds.

“Bees, bees, bees,” Elbryan chanted, a litany of hope, as he dashed from the area, down the slope toward Dundalis. The words, the hopes, fell away in a stifled gasp as soon as the village, the charred rubble that had been the village, came into view.

He knew that they were dead, all dead. Even from this distance, fifty yards from the northernmost point of the village, Elbryan felt in his heart that no one could have survived such a disaster. His face ashen, his heart pounding—but offering no energy to arms that hung slack at his side or to legs that seemed suddenly as if they each weighed a hundred pounds—the young man, feeling very much a little lost boy, walked home.

He recognized every body that had not been caught by flames—the parents of his friends; the younger men, just a few years older than he; and the younger boys and girls who had been taken from patrol by their parents. On the charred threshold of one ruin, he saw a tiny corpse, a blackened ball. Carralee Ault, Pony’s cousin, Elbryan realized, for she was the only baby in town. Carralee’s mother lay facedown in the road, just a few feet from the threshold where lay the baby. She had been trying to get back to Carralee, Elbryan understood, and they had cut her down as she had watched the house, her house, burn down about her baby.

Elbryan forced himself to stay away from such vivid empathy, realizing that he could easily lose himself in utter despair. The task became all the harder as he approached one large group of slain goblins and giants on the road, as he walked past the area of heaviest fighting, as he walked past the body of Olwan, his father.

Elbryan could see his father had died bravely, and understanding his father’s stern and forceful way, he was not surprised. Olwan had died fighting.

But that mattered not at all to Elbryan.

The boy staggered on toward the ruin of his own house. He snorted, a crying chuckle, as he saw that the foundation, of which his father was so proud, was intact, though the walls and ceiling had collapsed. Elbryan picked his way into the still-smoldering ruin. One of the back corners had somehow escaped the flames, and when the roof had fallen in, it had angled down, leaving a clear space.

He pushed aside a timber—gingerly, when he heard the remaining roof groan in protest—and went down to his knees, peering in. He could make out two forms, lying against the very back corner.

“Please, please,” Elbryan whispered, picking a careful path to that spot.

The goblin, the closest form, was dead, its head bashed. Unreasonable hope pushing him on, Elbryan scrambled over the thing to the next body, sitting in the very corner.

It was his mother, dead as well—of smoke, Elbryan soon realized, for she had not a wound on her. In her hand she clutched her heavy wooden spoon. Often had she waved that thing at the children, Elbryan and his friends, when they were bothering her, threatening to warm their bottoms.

She had never used it, Elbryan only then remembered. Not until this day, he silently added, looking at the slain goblin.

All the images of her in life—waving that spoon, shaking her head at her impetuous son, teasing Olwan, and sharing a wink with Jilseponie as if they knew a secret about Elbryan—came flooding back to the boy in an overwhelming jumble. He moved in further and sat beside his mother, shifting her stiffening form that he might hug her one final time.

And he cried. He cried for his mother and father, for his friends and their parents, for all of Dundalis. He cried for Pony, not knowing that if he had rushed into town as soon as he had awakened, he would have spotted the battered girl stumbling down the south road.

And Elbryan cried for himself, his future bleak and uncertain.

He was in that corner of his house, that tiny link to what had been, cradling his mother, when the sun went down, and there he remained all through the cold night.

CHAPTER 7

The Blood of Mather

“The blood of Mather!” scoffed Tuntun, an elf maiden so slight of build that she could easily hide behind a third-year sapling. Tuntun’s normally melodic voice turned squeaky whenever she got excited, and several of the others cringed and some even put their hands over their sensitive, pointed ears. Tuntun pretended not to notice. She batted her huge blue eyes and her translucent wings, and crossed her slender arms imperiously over her tiny, pointy breasts.

“Mather’s nephew,” replied Belli’mar Juraviel, never taking his gaze from Elbryan as the boy moved about the ruins of his house. Juraviel didn’t have to look Tuntun’s way to know her pose, for the obstinate elf struck it often.

“His father fought well,” remarked a third of the gathering. “Were it not for the fomorian—”

“Mather would have slain the fomorian,” Tuntun interrupted.

“Mather wielded Tempest,” Juraviel said grimly. “The boy’s father had nothing more than a simple club.”

“Mather would have choked the fomorian with his bare—”

“Enough, Tuntun!” demanded Juraviel; even in a shout, the elf’s voice rang like the clear chime of a bell. It didn’t bother Juraviel, or any of the others, how loud their conversation had become, for though Elbryan was barely fifteen yards away from them, they had erected a sound shield, and no human ear could have discerned anything more than a few chirps, squeaks, and whistles, sounds easily enough explained away by the natural creatures in the area. “Lady Dasslerond has declared this one a fitting choice,” Juraviel finished, calming himself. “It is not your place to argue.”

Tuntun knew she could not win this debate, so she held fast her defiant pose and began tapping her foot on the ground, all the while staring at young Elbryan—and not liking what she saw. Tuntun had little fondness for the big, bumbling humans. Even Mather, a man she had trained and had known for more than four decades, had more often than not driven her away with his pretentious purpose and stoicism. Now, looking at Elbryan, this sniveling youngster, Tuntun could barely stand the thought of seven years of training!

Why did the world need rangers, anyway?

Belli’mar Juraviel suppressed a chuckle, for he liked seeing Tuntun flustered. He knew the maiden would make his life miserable if he embarrassed her now, though, so he leaped up high, his little wings beating hard, lifting him a dozen feet from the ground; he came to rest on a low branch, a better vantage point for watching the movements of this boy who would replace Mather.

Mercifully, Elbryan’s grief had brought with it exhaustion, and the boy had found some sleep. He remained in the house, cradling his mother, gently stroking her hair even after the first waves of slumber had come over him. He awoke with the dawn—and with resolve.

He came out of the house, eyes still moist with tears, his mother’s body in his arms. Now Elbryan steeled himself against the scene of devastation. He found strength in duty, and that duty lay in burying the dead. He put his sword in his belt, found a spade, and began to dig. He buried his parents first, side by side, though the task of filling the grave, of putting cold dirt on the bodies of those whom he had most loved, nearly destroyed him.

He found Thomas Ault and several other men next, and only then did the already weary youngster realize the scope of his task. Dundalis had been home to more than a hundred folk; how long would it take to bury them all? And what of those youngsters who had been slaughtered on the hill? And of the other patrol, who had battled in the wide pine valley among the caribou moss?

“One day,” Elbryan decided, and even his own voice sounded strange to him in this surreal situation. He would spend just this one day gathering the bodies, collecting them for a mass grave. That would have to suffice.

But then what? Elbryan wondered. What might he do after the task was completed? Where might he go? He thought of Weedy Meadow, a day of hard marching. He thought of pursuing the goblins, if he could find any tracks. Elbryan shook that away immediately, knowing the rage within him, the hunger for revenge, could cloud his judgment, could consume him. His next task was clear to him, for the moment at least, and though it pained him immeasurably to think of success, he knew he had to find the body of Jilseponie Ault, his dear Pony.

And so he searched, pulling corpses from the ruins of houses, collecting the fallen and laying the bodies side by side on the field that had been Bunker Crawyer’s corral. Half the day slipped by, but Elbryan had no thoughts of food. His search for Jilseponie grew more agitated as the hours slipped by. Soon he was bypassing the closest bodies, leaving them where they lay, focusing his search, though he realized that in his desperation, he was, perhaps, being inefficient and he had little time to waste. Such a scene of carnage would no doubt bring other scavengers—great cats and bears, perhaps—and Elbryan couldn’t be sure that the goblins wouldn’t return. So he ran on, hauling bodies, peeking under rubble, kicking aside piles of dead goblins to see who might be underneath. He tried to keep a mental note of his macabre collection, tried to match it against the people of Dundalis by sorting their names house by house.

The task overwhelmed him; he couldn’t be sure, couldn’t even be certain of the identity of so many of the charred bodies. One of them must have been Pony.

By mid-afternoon, Elbryan knew he was defeated, knew he could not hope to properly bury all the corpses. He had two score lined up in the field, and so he decided to bury them alone. The rest . . .

Elbryan sighed helplessly. He took the spade, went to the field, and began to dig. He transferred the grief, rising again within him, into rage, and went at the earth as if it, and not the goblins, had assaulted Dundalis, had stolen from him everything in the world that was familiar and comforting. Everything, everyone that he loved.

His muscles complained, but he didn’t know it; his stomach groaned from lack of food, but he didn’t hear it.

Even Tuntun was impressed by his stamina.

Elbryan lay down to sleep at the base of the ridge that night, outside Dundalis. “Pony,” he said aloud, needing to hear a voice, any voice, even his own.

The elves quietly encircling him paused and cocked curious ears. Tuntun thought the boy might be calling to his mount, but Juraviel, who had been more attentive to the boy and his relationships, knew the truth.

“Please don’t be dead,” Elbryan said to the quiet wind. He closed his eyes, wet again with tears for his mother and father, for all his friends and all his community. “I can survive this,” Elbryan said determinedly, “but only with you.” He lay back on the ground and crossed his forearms over his face. “I need you, Pony. I need you.”

“A very needy young boy,” Tuntun remarked.

“Some sympathy,” Juraviel scolded.

A short distance away, Elbryan sat bolt upright, confused.

Juraviel glared at Tuntun, for the female’s sour attitude had forced the words out before any sound screen could be cast up.

Elbryan drew out his short sword, glancing warily into the shadows. “Come out and face me!” he commanded, and there was no fear in his voice.

Tuntun nodded. “Oo, so brave,” she said sarcastically.

Juraviel responded with a nod of his own, but his admiration was sincere. The young man, so suddenly no more a boy, had passed through grief and through fear. He was indeed brave—it was no act—and would willingly face whatever enemy he found without fear of his own death.

After a few moments, Elbryan’s nerves began to wear thin. He moved to the nearest tree, stalked about it, then darted to the next. The elves, of course, had little trouble keeping ahead of him, silent and out of sight. After a few minutes, the young man began to relax, but, exhausted though he was, he realized he should not remain so vulnerable here out in the open. He couldn’t think of any defensible spots nearby, but perhaps he could strengthen this one. He went to work quietly, methodically, using the lace of his shirt, his belt, anything he could find to secure saplings into snares.

The elves watched every move, some with respect, some with a hugely superior attitude. Elbryan’s traps couldn’t catch a squirrel; certainly any elf could run into one, untie it before it ever went off, then reset it as he scampered out the other side!

“Blood of Mather!” Tuntun remarked more than once.

Juraviel, Elbryan’s chief sponsor with Lady Dasslerond, took it lightly. He remembered Mather at the start of the legendary ranger’s career, a bumbling boy no more adept and probably not even as resourceful as this Elbryan.

Within the hour, Elbryan had done all he could—and that was not much. He found a tall pine with low-hanging branches and slipped underneath them into the natural tent. Only the keenest of eyes could have picked him out within that blocking canopy, but of course, his field of vision likewise was severely limited. He put his back to the tree trunk, put his sword across his lap. Nagged by a distinct feeling that he was not alone and believing that he would be safe if he could just make it to the dawn, he tried hard to stay awake. But weariness overtook him, caught him where he sat, and brought his eyelids low.

The elves gradually closed in.

Something brought Elbryan awake. Music? A soft singing he could not quite discern? He had no idea how long he had slept. Was morning close? Or had he slumbered right through the next day?

He forced himself to his knees and crawled to the edge of the overhanging canopy, carefully pushing aside one of the branches.

The moon, Sheila, was up, but not yet directly overhead. Elbryan tried to calculate the duration of his rest, knew it had been no more than a couple of hours. He paused and listened hard, certain there was something out there beyond his vision.

A soft melody vibrated in his ear, somewhere just below his consciousness. Quiet and sweet were the notes, but that did little to comfort Elbryan.

It went on and on, sometimes seeming to rise, as if his enemies were about to rush out at him from the shadows but then it diminished to near nothingness once again. Elbryan clutched the sword hilt so hard his knuckles whitened. It wasn’t Pony out there, he knew; it wasn’t anything human. And to the young man who had somehow survived a goblin raid, such a conclusion meant it could only be one thing.

He should have stayed hidden. Rationally, Elbryan knew his, best defense lay in concealment, the best he could hope for against returning goblins, was to keep as far away from them as possible. But thoughts of his slain family and friends, of Pony, spurred him on. Despite very real fears, Elbryan wanted revenge.

“I told you he was brave,” Juraviel whispered to Tuntun as Elbryan slipped out from under the pine boughs.

“Stupid,” Tuntun corrected without hesitation.

Again Juraviel let the insult to Elbryan pass. Tuntun had thought Mather stupid, as well—at first. Juraviel motioned to his companions and started away.

The teasing fairy song, remaining at the very edge of his consciousness, led Elbryan on for many minutes. Then abruptly it was no more, and for Elbryan, the sudden silence was like waking up from a dream. He found he was standing in the middle of a nearly circular clearing, a small meadow ringed by tall trees. The moon was above the easternmost boughs, casting slanted rays upon him, and he realized how foolish he had been—and how vulnerable he now was. Ducking low, he started for the edge of the clearing but stopped almost immediately and stood up straight, eyes wide, mouth hanging open.

He spun in a complete circle, watching as they stepped into the clearing’s perimeter, dozens of creatures of a type he did not know. They were no taller than he and couldn’t have weighed close to his ninety pounds. They were slight of build, delicate, and beautiful, with angled features, pointed ears, and skin that seemed almost translucent in the soft light.

“Elves?” Elbryan whispered, the thought coming from somewhere far back in his memories, the stuff of legends so remote the flustered young man had no idea what to make of these creatures.

The elves joined hands and began to walk in a circle about him, and only then did Elbryan realize they were indeed singing. The syllables came clear to him, though they joined into words he could not understand, distant melodic sounds he somehow recognized as part of the earth itself. Soothing sounds, and that made defiant Elbryan panic even more. He glanced all around, tried to focus on individual creatures that he might discern their leader.

Their tempo increased. Sometimes they held hands, and other times they let go long enough for every other elf to turn a graceful pirouette. Elbryan couldn’t focus; every time he sorted out an individual, some movement at the edge of his vision, or some higher note in the chorus, distracted him. And by the time he looked back to the original spot, the individual elf had blended away, for surely they all looked alike.

The dance intensified, the pace, the spins. Now whenever the elves broke apart for their pirouettes, those not spinning lifted off the ground as if by magic—for Elbryan could not see their delicate wings in the moonlight—floating and fluttering to land back in place.

Too many images assailed poor Elbryan. He tried to push them away, closed his eyes, and several times took up his sword and started a charge, meaning to break through the ring and run off into the forest. Every attempt proved futile, for though he started straight, the young man inevitably turned with the flow of the dancers, going around in a circle until the multitude of images and the sweet melody distracted him and defeated him.

He realized then he had dropped his sword and thought it might be a good idea to pick it up. But the song . . .

The song! There was something about it that would not let him go. He felt it, a tender vibration all along his frame, more than he heard it. It caressed him and beckoned him. It brought images of a younger world, a cleaner and more vibrant world. It told him these creatures were not of the evil goblin race; these were friends to be trusted.

Elbryan, so full of grief and rage, fought that last notion fiercely and so remained standing much longer than usual for a mere human. Gradually, though, his resolve drained away and so did his strength. He accepted the invitation of the soft earth.

He was lying down; that was the last thought that came to him.

“Blood of Mather,” muttered Tuntun as the elvish caravan started off, Elbryan moving with their line on a floating bed woven of silken strands, feathers, and music.

“You keep saying that,” replied Juraviel. As he spoke, the elf fingered a green stone, serpentine, feeling its subtle vibrations. Normally such trivial magic would prove useless against one as wise as Tuntun, who had seen the birth and death of several centuries, but the female was clearly distracted by her distaste for this night’s work.

“I shall keep saying it!” Tuntun insisted, but her bluster was lost in the whoosh of a sapling. The agile elf managed to slip her foot out of Elbryan’s belt snare and come dropping back to the ground, though even with her wings fluttering hard, she hit rather unceremoniously.

Her glare at Juraviel was almost threatening as laughter erupted about her. She knew, as did all the gathering, that there was no possible way she could have stumbled into such a coarse trap had not a bit of magic been worked.

It wasn’t hard for Tuntun to guess who bad worked it.

CHAPTER 8

The Preparer

The schedule was grueling, designed to find weakness and break those who were not fit for the daily rigors of the Order of St.-Mere-Abelle. For the four chosen Preparers candidates, Avelyn and Quintall, Thagraine and Pellimar—two students from the class of God’s Year 815—life was even more difficult. In addition to their daily duties as first and second-year students at the abbey, they were given the extra chores of preparation for their journey to Pimaninicuit.

After vespers, their classmates knelt to pray for one hour, spent an hour with their letters, then retired early to meditate and sleep, to reinvigorate their bodies for the tasks of the next day.

But after vespers, the four Preparers began a four-hour regimen, each with an appointed master. They studied the Halo, the charts that determined the astronomical data which would indicate the time of the showers. They learned of seamanship, of how to navigate by the stars of the night sky—and of how those stars would change when the ship carrying the monks crossed certain latitudes. They learned how to tie ropes in a variety of ways, knots necessary for the many uses aboard a sailing vessel. They learned sea etiquette, the rules of the wide waters, and they learned, most of all, the properties of the various stones and of how they must prepare the stones immediately after the shower.

For Avelyn, the night lessons were the promise of his greatest aspirations. He was with Master Jojonah most nights, and Avelyn lived up to his reputation as the finest student to enter St.-Mere-Abelle in many decades. After only two weeks, his predictions of astronomical shifts were perfect, and within the first month, he could recite all the known magical stones, from adamite to turquoise, their reputed properties, and the greatest known magical effects which had been brought about by each.

Master Jojonah watched the young brother with mounting pride, and Avelyn recognized that the older man considered him a protégé. There was security in that, Avelyn came to realize, but also responsibility. Some of the other masters, Siherton in particular, watched him closely, very closely, seeking an excuse to berate him. It seemed to Avelyn as if he had fallen into the middle of a running rivalry between the two older men.

That bothered the young monk profoundly. To see such human frailty in the masters of St.-Mere-Abelle touched the very core of Avelyn’s faith. These were men of God, the men closest to God, and such petty actions on their part diminished the very meaning of the Abellican Church. All that should have mattered was the retrieval of the stones. Toward his fellow Preparers, young men he would compete against for the coveted two positions of those who would actually step onto the island of Pimaninicuit, Avelyn felt no rivalry. He exalted in their successes as much as in his own. If they proved the better, he believed, then that was obviously God’s will. The proven better two must go to the island; all that mattered was the success of the journey, the retrieval of God’s highest gift to humanity.

It quickly became apparent to the watching masters that Avelyn Desbris would be one of the two. During the long hours put in at night, not one of the other three came close to him; they were still mired in charting the stars when Avelyn had moved on to the specific humours that caused the “magical” reaction, having already passed through the recognition of the stones by touch as well as sight and the recognition of their potential intensity by their brightness, shape, and hue. After only five weeks of a four-year training program, the first position of Preparer was nearly secured. If Avelyn did not take ill, the competition to go onto the island of Pimaninicuit had been narrowed to three monks fighting for one slot.

The daytime training was not as easy or as inspiring for Avelyn. He found the many prayer rituals boring, even trite, in light of the revelations he was finding every night. The candle ceremonies, the water bucket lines, the stone carriers bringing material to the newest sections of the abbey, the gift of the class of God’s Year 816, simply did not measure up against the mysteries of the God-given stones. Worst of all, and most intense of all, was the physical training. From sunrise to noon each day, with only an hour break—half for a meal and half for a prayer—the students assembled in a courtyard for a lesson in the martial arts or ran barefoot along the rough walls of the abbey or swam in the frigid waters of All Saints Bay. For months they learned to fall and roll; they hardened their bodies by slapping, slapping, slapping one another until their skin grew less sensitive. They walked through attack and defense routines, slowly, endlessly, building in their sore muscles memories of the moves. For the first year, they would study barehanded techniques, punching and grappling. After that, the monks would move on to weapon mastery. And through it all, bare-handed and with weapons, they would square off against each other, pounding on each other relentlessly. Physical perfection was the goal; it was said that a monk of St.-Mere-Abelle could outfight any man alive, and the masters seemed determined to keep that reputation intact.

Avelyn was not the worst of his class, but he was certainly not near the best: Quintall. The short, stocky man went at the martial training as eagerly as Avelyn went at the nighttime studies. As the year progressed, as Avelyn further separated himself from the other three candidate Preparers, he came to dread his daytime matches against any of them, particularly Quintall. There was supposed to be no anger toward an opponent, only respect and mutual learning, but Quintall growled whenever the masters paired him against Avelyn.

Avelyn understood the man’s motives. Quintall was carrying over the nighttime rivalry. He could not beat Avelyn at the Ring Stone studies, but he gained a measure of superiority during the day. In most of the maneuvers, the monks were supposed to pull their punches, but Quintall often blasted the breath from Avelyn; there was no striking above the shoulders allowed, but more than once, Quintall knifed a “serpent hand” across Avelyn’s throat, dropping him to his knees, gasping for breath.

“Is this how you plan to get to the island?” Avelyn quietly asked after one such mishap. The slips had become too common; Avelyn honestly believed Quintall meant to eliminate the competition.

The look the stocky man gave him in reply did little to allay the monk’s mounting suspicions. Quintall’s grin was certainly as far from Godlike as anything Avelyn had ever seen, and the fact that their training with weapons, where wounds could easily become more severe, was not far away, brought goose bumps to the scholarly young man.

What bothered Avelyn even more was that if he could recognize what was going on here, then so could the masters, who watched every move of every student so closely. The Order of St.-Mere-Abelle took its physical training seriously; perhaps Avelyn was expected to defend himself against such tactics. Perhaps this training was not so far removed from the nighttime training, which Avelyn considered more important. If he couldn’t survive in the courtyard of the abbey, after all, what chance did he have on the high and wild seas?

He watched Quintall walk away from him, his stride so confident, even cocky. Avelyn folded his hands and bowed his head, closed his eyes and began to plot his defense for the next time he and Quintall were paired.

All the troubles of the day were lost each night when Avelyn went to his true work, usually under the tutelage of Master Jojonah. Sometimes that work entailed exhaustive study, reading text after text and reciting procedures so many times in rapid succession that Avelyn would often continue reciting them after he had gone to sleep. Other nights Avelyn and Master Jojonah would simply spend on the roof, huddled against a chill ocean breeze with no fire between them. They would sit and stare at the stars. An occasional question might pass between them, but otherwise their vigil would be as silent as it was dark. Master Jojonah’s instructions were vague at best, but Avelyn came to understand them in his heart. He was to watch the night sky, to learn every twinkle of light, to become so familiar with the visible stars that he would not only know their given names but also might create pet names of his own for them.

Avelyn loved those nights. He felt so close to God, to his dead mother, to all humanity, living and dead. He felt a part of the larger and higher truths, a oneness with the Universe.

But the quiet awe of stargazing placed a distant second on Avelyn’s preferred list of duties. His real zest and heart came shining through on those nights he and Master Jojonah worked with the stones. There were nearly fifty different types at the abbey, each with its own particular properties, and each individual stone with its own particular intensity. Some stones had multiple uses—hematite, for example, could be used for simple out-of-body experiences, for possession of another’s body, for domination of another’s spirit, and also to heal another’s physical wounds.

Avelyn knew all the uses of all the stones, and gradually he was coming to sensitize his fingers to the magical humours within any stone he touched. Handed two similar stones, Avelyn could quickly discern which was the stronger.

Jojonah nodded on each occasion as if expecting that of any student, but in truth the master was again amazed by the young man’s prowess. There were in the abbey no more than four other monks, three of them masters and one Father Abbot Markwart himself, who could so distinguish magical intensity, and that fact had been the determining factor in Dalebert Markwart’s ascension to the highest rank, for his chief rival could not determine magical intensity in individual stones.

And here before Jojonah’s astonished eyes was a young novice, a man of only twenty winters, performing feats that would tax the Father Abbot of St.-Mere-Abelle to the very limits of his powers!

“The night is cloudy,” Avelyn dared to note, one dreary and cold November evening as he followed Master Jojonah up the winding staircase of a tower, toward the perch where they would normally sit and study the stars.

Master Jojonah kept quiet and continued on his way, and Avelyn knew better than to press the point.

Avelyn was even more surprised, when he came to the tower top, to find Master Siherton and the Father Abbot waiting for them. Siherton held a small diamond, and from it came enough light for Avelyn to discern the man’s features clearly. The young man bowed low and kept his gaze on the floor stones even when he straightened, focusing his attention on the joints among the rocks, each black line seeming so distinct in the harsh diamond light. He had been in St.-Mere-Abelle for several months and had only gazed upon Father Abbot Markwart a handful of times, usually at vespers, when the older leader would sometimes come forth and oversee the celebration.

The three older men moved to the edge of the tower and talked among themselves. Avelyn tried hard not to eavesdrop, but he did catch snatches of the conversation, mostly Siherton complaining vigorously that this was against strict procedure. “This is neither a requirement nor a sensible test for any first-year student,” the tall and hawkish master argued.

“Not a test, but a show,” Jojonah argued, unintentionally lifting his voice.

“A show-off, more likely,” sneered Siherton. “The place has already been secured,” he went on. “Why must you press on with it?”

Jojonah stamped his foot and pointed an accusing finger at Siherton; Avelyn was quick to look away from that uncomfortable sight. How it bothered him to see masters bickering! Particularly when he realized that they were arguing over him!

Now Avelyn began to recite his evening prayers so that he might hear no more. He did catch one reference by Master Jojonah to the morning routine, something about its being too dangerous.

Finally, Father Abbot Markwart halted the conversation with an upraised hand. He led the two masters back to Avelyn and bade the young man to look up at him. “It is unusual,” he said calmly. “And know you, Masters Siherton and Jojonah, that it is neither a test nor a show and irrelevant to the decisions to be made concerning Pimaninicuit. Suffice it to say that it is for my pleasure, for my curiosity.”

He focused on Avelyn then, his face serene, comforting. “I have heard much about you, my son,” he said quietly. “Your progress has been monumental in Master Jojonah’s estimation.”

Avelyn was too awestruck to beam.

“You have used the stones?”

It took a long moment for Avelyn even to register the question. He nodded dumbly.

“You have walked high with hematite, so says Master Jojonah,” Abbot Markwart went on. “And you have lit the hearths of many rooms with the small celestite crystals.”

Avelyn nodded again. “The greatest was the hematite,” he managed to say.

The Father Abbot smiled gently. “Satisfy my curiosity,” he bade Avelyn. He held out his left hand and opened it to show Avelyn three stones: malachite, ringed with various shades of green; shining, polished amber; and a silvery piece of chrysotile, the largest of the three resembling a sheet of straight bars, long and narrow lying side by side.

“Do you know them?” Markwart asked.

Avelyn sorted them out in his mind. He did indeed know the magical properties of these three, though those properties seemed oddly disparate for Father Abbot Markwart to be presenting them together. He nodded.

Markwart handed him the stones. “Do you feel their intensity?” he asked, looking hard into Avelyn’s eyes. He needed to know the truth, Avelyn realized. Markwart needed to be absolutely certain.

Avelyn fell into the stones, closed his eyes, and passed the items one at a time into his free hand that he might weigh their magical strength. He opened his eyes a moment later, staring hard, at the Father Abbot, and nodded again.

“Why must we use such a combination?” Master Jojonah dared to interrupt.

Father Abbot Markwart, his eyes glowing fiercely in the diamond light, waved a hand to silence the master. Nonetheless, Jojonah began to protest again, but Markwart cut him short.

“I warned you of the conditions!” the old Father Abbot growled.

Avelyn swallowed hard; he had never imagined such ferocity coming from the gentle man, the most Godly man in all the world.

“I’ll not allow the ruby to be used anywhere near St.-Mere-Abelle.” Father Abbot Markwart went on. “I’ll not take such a chance for the sake of your student’s pride.” He turned back to Avelyn and smiled again, but there was little gentle or comforting in that hungry grin. “If Brother Avelyn cannot utilize the simple stones I have given to him, then he has no right even to hold this one.” He ended by bringing forth his other hand, turning it over, and opening it to reveal the most beautiful, perfect jewel that Avelyn had ever seen.

“Corundum,” the Father Abbot explained. “A ruby. Before I give this to you, understand that what I ask of you is dangerous indeed.”

Avelyn nodded and reached out for the jewel, too stunned to fully appreciate the gravity in the old man’s voice. Markwart handed it over.

“The puzzle is before you,” the Father Abbot explained. “There are no ships in. Sort it out.” With that, he walked to the far edge of the tower and motioned for the two masters to join him.

Avelyn studied them intently. Father Abbot Markwart appeared wickedly intense, the gleam in his eyes seeming almost maniacal, and certainly frightening. Master Siherton wouldn’t even look his way, and Avelyn could sense that the man desired his failure. Master Jojonah was the most intense, but in a kinder way. Avelyn could smell the man’s fear—fear for Avelyn’s safety—and only then did the young monk appreciate the weight of this performance and the danger.

“Sort it out,” the Father Abbot Said again urgently.

Avelyn bowed his head and considered the stones. The ruby was thrumming in his hand, its magic intense and straining for release. Avelyn knew what he could do with that jewel, and when he stopped to consider the implications for the other monks if he used the ruby first, the puzzle seemed not so difficult. Father Abbot Markwart had pointedly mentioned that there were no ships in; Avelyn knew where he was supposed to go. Malachite, amber, serpentine, ruby, in that order.

Avelyn paused and considered the sequence and the implications. He would have to have not one but two other stones already in use when he called forth the powers of the ruby. He had once used two stones together—a hematite and a chrysoberyl, that he might walk out of body with no urge to take possession of any form he passed. But three?

Avelyn took a deep breath, consciously keeping his eyes from the eager gazes of the onlookers.

Malachite first, he told himself, and he walked to the outer edge of the tower, overlooking the sea, black and thunderous a hundred yards below. Avelyn clutched the malachite firmly, felt its magic tingling and coursing through his hand, then his arm, and into all his body. And then he felt lighter, strangely so, almost as light as he did when spirit-walking with hematite. He went over the tower’s edge with hardly a hesitation, his body beginning a gentle, controlled fall.

Avelyn tried not to think of the reality of his position as the tower walls slipped past his descending form. The cliff wall below the tower was less smooth and far from sheer, and the young monk had to constantly push himself away, angling down and out from the abbey.

As he neared the pounding surf, Avelyn shifted the amber into the hand holding the malachite and brought forth its powers as well.

He touched down easily atop the surf, berating himself for not simply walking his body horizontally across the cliff to land atop the wharf instead. No sense in worrying about that now, he decided; so he kept the malachite functioning until he caught his balance, then, with a deep breath, let it go.

Only the amber was functioning now, and it kept him above the water. With another deep and steadying breath, his confidence in the stone growing, Avelyn walked out across the dark waters, his feet barely making the slightest depression on the rolling surface.

He looked back over his shoulder several times as he moved out from the abbey. He had to get far enough away so that using the ruby would not pose any risk to the structure, and even farther than that, considering the angle of the tall tower, if he wanted the two masters and the Father Abbot truly to witness the demonstration.

Now Avelyn called upon the serpentine, a stone he had never before put to any real test. He knew its reputed properties, of course, but he had never attempted to use them. Master Jojonah had done so once in Avelyn’s presence, when he had retrieved a jewel from a hot hearth, and the young monk had to focus on that now to take faith that the serpentine would protect him.

All too soon, the moment was upon him. He was far out from shore, standing firm on the rolling waves, the serpentine shield strong about him. Avelyn put the ruby in his hand.

“He might have slipped under the waters,” Siherton said dryly. “A great and difficult task we will have in retrieving the stones.”

Father Abbot Markwart chuckled, but Master Jojonah didn’t appreciate the levity. “Brother Avelyn is worth more to us than all the stones in St.-Mere-Abelle combined,” he asserted, drawing incredulous looks from both his companions.

“I think, perhaps, that you have become too close to this novice,” the Father Abbot warned.

Before the old man could go on, though, his breath was stolen away as a tremendous fireball erupted out at sea, rings of searing flames spreading out wide from a central point that the three knew to be Avelyn.

“Pray that the serpentine shield was in full!” Markwart gasped, thoroughly stunned by the intensity and size of the blast. The ruby was strong, but this was ridiculous!

“I told you!” Master Jojonah said over and over. “I told you!” Even Siherton had little in the way of rebuttal. He watched, as impressed as his companions, as the fireball widened and churned, as the ocean hissed in protest so loudly that the three could hear it clearly, as the top waters turned to steam and rose in a thick fog. Brother Avelyn was strong indeed!

And probably dead, Siherton realized, though he was too shaken to make the point at that moment, if Avelyn had concentrated so much of his energy into the ruby; then likely he had let the serpentine shield slip. Then likely he was now a charred thing, drifting to the bottom of the harbor.

The three waited a long time, Jojonah growing ever more concerned, but Markwart resignedly saying, “A pity,” many times, and Siherton seeming on the verge of a chuckle.

Then came a sound not so far below them, a deep breath as one might take after great exertion. They rushed to the edge and peered over, Siherton holding the diamond low, focusing its light downward to reveal a haggard-looking but very much alive Brother Avelyn, the malachite clenched tightly in one hand, his other hand working at the wall, pulling his nearly weightless body upward. Avelyn’s brown robes were tattered and dripping; he had the stench of burned hair about him.

He got near the tower’s lip and Jojonah pulled him over.

“Some of the flames got through,” a shivering Avelyn explained, bowing his head in shame, holding his arms wide to display the damage to his robe. “I had to let go of the amber’s power briefly and dunk myself.”

Only then did Jojonah realize how blue Avelyn’s lips appeared. He looked sharply at Siherton, and when the master didn’t respond, Jojonah snatched the diamond from him. The light went out for just a moment, then returned, brighter than ever. And warmer. Jojonah held the diamond close to Avelyn, and the young monk felt its warmth flowing into his aching, frozen form.

“I am sorry,” Avelyn said to Father Abbot Markwart through chattering teeth. “I have failed.” He held his hand out limply, returning the four stones.

Father Abbot Markwart burst out into the most heartfelt laughter Avelyn had ever heard. The cackling old man pocketed the four stones, then clenched his empty fist, and from a ring on his finger, set with a tiny diamond, he brought forth a light of his own. He motioned for Siherton to follow and started for the stairs.

Master Jojonah waited until the pair had gone, then lifted Avelyn’s head so the young brother could look directly into his soft brown eyes. “You will be one of the chosen pair who go onto the island of Pimaninicuit,” he said with all confidence.

He led Avelyn down from the tower then, to the warmth of the lower levels. Avelyn undressed and wrapped a blanket about himself, then sat alone with his thoughts in front of a blazing fire. Though the trial of the four stones, the high wall, and the cold sea had exhausted him, he did not sleep that night.

CHAPTER 9

Touel’alfar

It was warm; Elbryan felt that first, felt a soft, moist sensation gently touching all his skin. Gradually his consciousness came floating back to him, as if from a far distant place. He spent a long while lying very still, bathing in the comforting sensation, the warmth, holding that clear consciousness away. For the boy who had just witnessed such carnage and loss, the semiconscious state was preferable.

It wasn’t until a memory of Dundalis, of his dead parents, slipped through his defenses, shocking away the quiet and the calm, that he opened his olive green eyes.

He was on a mossy bank, a gentle slope that put his head comfortably above his feet. A warm fog hung thick about him, caressing his body and dulling his senses. Visibility was but a few feet and Elbryan, shuffling up to his elbows, soon realized that sound traveled little farther than that, caught up and deadened in the tangible mist. He was in a forest, he understood—he was ankle deep in fallen leaves. Elbryan’s instincts—something about the air, perhaps, the aroma—told him this was not the slope leading out of Dundalis up to the ridgeline, the slope where he had met the . . .

The what? Elbryan wondered, having no explanation of who or what those delicate winged creatures might be.

Despite the bruises from his fights with the goblins, the minor wounds, and the discomfort of the night spent in the corner of his ruined house, the young man felt no pain, no soreness in his limbs. He sat up straight, then rolled to put his legs under him. Gradually he came up in a crouch, studying the area intently, trying to get some bearings on where he might be.

The forest was an old one, judging from the gnarled and twisted trunks of those nearby trees he could discern through the mist. The sun seemed a gray blur above him, a lighter spot in the sky. “West,” Elbryan decided after studying it for a moment, his instincts, his internal directional sense, sorting things out. The boy believed the sun to be in the west, halfway from noon to sunset

He didn’t have much time before the night settled around him. He stood up, but stayed low, feeling vulnerable despite the thick mist. His reasoning told him to get out of that fog so that he might survey the area, but his physical senses did not want him to leave the soothing mist.

He overruled the physical and started up the slope, thinking to get above the gray blanket. He moved quickly, stumbling often and cursing himself silently for every stick-snapping sound. He climbed within the fog for only a few minutes and came out of it so suddenly he nearly stumbled again from the shock. At the same moment that the air grew clear about him, strong winds buffeted him—not gusts but a continual blow. Elbryan looked down the slope curiously, just the few feet to the unmoving mist. It appeared to him as if the mist were somehow blocking, or at least escaping, the winds, but how could that be?

Elbryan’s eyes widened with yet another unexplainable mystery as he continued to survey the ascent before him, going up, up, up from his position, dwarfing him, making him feel totally insignificant and tiny. He knew that he was nowhere near Dundalis; this mountain was nothing like the gentle, tree-covered hills of his homeland. He was on the western face of but one mountain in a great, towering range, looking down at a mist-shrouded vale, oval-shaped and nestled between the many overlooking peaks. Not so far above him, Elbryan could see the snow on this mountain and on all the others, a whitecapping that the young man suspected might be perpetual.

He shook his head helplessly. Where in Corona was he? And how had he come to this place?

The young man’s eyes opened even wider then, and he glanced all around frantically. “Am I dead?” he asked the wind.

No answer, no hint, just the murmur, an endless string of mysterious whispers.

“Father?” Elbryan cried, and he scrambled three steps to the right, as though that might make some difference. “Pony?”

No answer.

His heart was racing, blood pumping furiously. Soon he was gasping for breath in utter panic. He started to run, first left, then up, then, when that course proved too difficult, back to the right, all the while calling out for his father or mother or for anyone.

“You are not dead,” came a sweet, melodic voice from behind. Elbryan paused for a long while, catching his breath, composing himself. Somehow he knew the speaker was not human, that no human voice could chime so sweetly, so perfectly.

Slowly, concentrating on his breathing more than anything else, Elbryan turned.

There stood one of the creatures he had seen in the glade, a bit shorter than he and probably no more than three-quarters his weight. Its limbs were incredibly slender, but they weren’t bumpy and bony like Jilseponie’s had been when she was much younger. This creature’s limbs didn’t look skinny, any more than did the supple branches of a bending willow. Nor did this creature, so tiny, seem weak. Far from it; there was a sureness, a fluid solidity to the creature that warned Elbryan this tiny foe would be more difficult than any of the goblins he had battled, perhaps more difficult even than the giant.

“Come back down where it is warmer,” the creature bade Elbryan; “into the mists where the wind does not blow.”

Elbryan looked back at the vale—and realized for the first time that no treetops were poking through the gray canopy, as if all the trees had stopped at exactly that level. Elbryan had the distinct feeling the mist and the treetops were somehow connected.

“Come,” said the creature. “You are not dead and are not in danger. The danger has passed.”

Elbryan winced at the reference to the tragedy of Dundalis. The way the words were spoken, however—plainly and without any apparent deception—allowed Elbryan to relax somewhat. Instead of sizing up the diminutive creature as a potential enemy now, he regarded it in a different light. He noticed for the first time how delicate and beautiful this one seemed, with angular features perfectly sculpted and hair so golden that even Pony’s thick, lustrous mane could sparkle no brighter. It was as if the being shone of its own accord, an inner light making the flowing hair glow and shimmer. The creature’s eyes were no less spectacular, two golden stars, they seemed, bright with childish innocence, yet deep with wisdom.

The creature started down the slope but stopped at the very edge of the fog, realizing the young man was making no move to follow.

“Who are you?” came the obvious question.

The creature smiled disarmingly. “I am Belli’mar Juraviel,” it answered honestly and motioned again toward the mist, even took another step down, so that its shins disappeared into the grayness.

“What are you?” Elbryan said with more confidence. He suspected the creature would confirm it was an elf, but he realized even such an honest and expected answer would give him little information, for he really didn’t know what an elf was.

The creature stopped again and turned back to regard him. “Do you know so little?”

Elbryan glared at Juraviel, in no mood for cryptic talk.

“The world is a lost place, I fear,” Juraviel went on. “To think we have been forgotten in a mere century.”

Elbryan’s scowl melted away in curiosity.

“You really do not know?”

“Know what?” Elbryan snapped back defiantly.

“Of anything beyond your own race,” Juraviel clarified.

“I know of goblins and of fomorian giants!” Elbryan insisted, his voice and his ire rising.

Juraviel had a response for that, a remark concerning the relative unpreparedness of Dundalis in the face of such knowledge. If this boy knew of the evil races, then why was his village so utterly ill equipped to deal with a simple raiding party? The elf politely kept the question to himself, though, understanding the wounds were too raw in this young one. “And do I fit into your knowledge of such creatures? Am I goblin or fomorian?” Juraviel asked calmly, that melodic voice alone destroying any possible comparisons to the croaking and growling monsters.

Elbryan chewed on his lip for a moment, trying to find an appropriate response. Finally, he shook his head.

“Come,” Juraviel bade him, the diminutive fellow turning again toward the mist.

“You haven’t answered my question.”

When Juraviel turned back this time, his expression was more stern. “There is no answer that can be conveyed with simple words,” he explained. “I could tell you a name, and you might have heard the name before, but that will give you little of the truth and more of the myth.”

Elbryan cocked his head, obviously lost.

“Your prejudices twined with the name will conflict with your perceptions,” Juraviel went on. “You asked me my own name, and that I willingly gave, for the words ‘Belli’mar Juraviel’ bring no preconceptions with them. You asked what I am, and that I cannot tell you. That is something Elbryan Wyndon of Dundalis must learn for himself.”

Before the startled young man could even ask how Belli’mar Juraviel might have come by his name, the creature turned and strode into the mist, disappearing from sight. Elbryan rocked back on his heels, fumbling with his thoughts. Then he realized that he was alone again, and utterly lost. His choices were simple, and there seemed none better than following this creature, whatever it might be.

Elbryan sprinted down the slope, back into the grayness, and found a smiling Juraviel waiting for him just a few feet beyond the mist’s edge. At first, Elbryan wondered why he hadn’t seen the figure from outside the mist, then he realized that he could not see the trees from out there, either, though they were tall and thick about him now, just five steps in.

Too many questions, the young man decided, and he didn’t even want to know the answers at that moment, his curiosity overwhelmed.

Juraviel walked down the slope at an easy pace, Elbryan right behind him. Not so far down, they moved beneath the misty canopy, and the forested valley came clear to Elbryan. Again he was amazed. He felt warm and serene, despite all that had happened, despite his very real fears. He didn’t feel lost anymore and if he was dead—and he was again beginning to believe that to be the case—then death was not so bad!

For the forest, this place, was more beautiful than anything young Elbryan had ever seen. The undergrowth was lush and thick but seemed to part before them as they made their way along smooth trails that always seemed as if they would end just a few feet in front of the pair but went on, apparently in any direction that Belli’mar Juraviel chose. The creature wasn’t following a trail, Elbryan believed, but was making one, walking as easily and openly through the underbrush as a man might wade through a shallow pond. As soon as he recovered from that spectacle, Elbryan was overwhelmed again, this time by the myriad vivid colors and delicate aromas, by the chirping of countless birds, the winsome song of an unseen brook, the bleating of some distant creature. The whole place was a song; Elbryan’s every sense was on its edge, and he felt more alive than he had ever felt before.

His mind fought against that perception He forced himself to remember Dundalis, to replay the horror, that he might find a fighting edge. He thought of escape, though he knew not where he might run, or even why he would wish to. He looked at the low branches of a nearby tree and visualized a weapon he could fashion from one of them, though a weapon, any weapon, would surely seem out of place here. His stubbornness held for many minutes, a testament to the young man’s strong willpower. But even the memories of the recent tragedy could not hold firmly to Elbryan as he walked for the first time through the forest that was home to the elves, to Belli’mar Juraviel’s folk. Dark thoughts could not be sustained in the place where Juraviel’s people danced and played.

“Can you at least tell me where I am?” a flustered Elbryan asked some minutes later, Juraviel going along as if in a trance, ignoring the young man completely.

After a dozen more skipping steps, the creature paused and turned. “On your maps, if it is on your maps, this place is named simply the Valley of Mists.”

Elbryan shrugged; the name meant nothing to him, though he was glad to learn that it might be on some map, at least. If that was true, then he probably was not dead.

“Truly, it is Andur’Blough Inninness, the Forest of Cloud, though few of your people would recognize that name, and those who did would not likely admit it.”

“Do you always talk in riddles?”

“Do you always ask foolish questions?”

“What is foolish about wanting to know where I am?” Elbryan asked angrily.

“And so I have told you,” a calm Juraviel replied. “Does that change anything? Do you feel comforted now, to know that you are in a place that you do not know?”

Elbryan growled softly and brought both his hands up to ruffle his light brown hair.

“But then,” the elf went on in condescending tones, “humans must name everything, must map it and place it in some tidy little package and category, that they believe they have found some measure of control over what cannot be controlled. A false sense of godliness, I suppose.”

“Godliness?”

“Arrogance,” Juraviel clarified. “My young human!” he said suddenly, excitedly, clapping his delicate hands together in mock glee. “You are in Andur’Blough Inninness!”

Elbryan screwed up his face and shrugged.

“Exactly my point,” Juraviel said dryly, and started on his way.

Elbryan sighed and followed.

Half an hour passed uneventfully, Elbryan walking and looking about, constantly awed by the beauty and the richness of Andur’Blough Inninness. Mostly, though, the boy’s gaze drifted back to the curious creature leading him.

“Do those work?” he asked on impulse, blurting out his thoughts before he even realized he was speaking.

Juraviel stopped short and turned to regard the obviously embarrassed Elbryan, standing perfectly still on the trail and pointing forward at Juraviel.

Juraviel’s smile calmed Elbryan considerably. “A logical question,” the creature remarked, understanding Elbryan’s curiosity, and then he added, with exaggerated relief, “at last.”

Elbryan’s expression soured.

“But why would you wish to know?” the ever-elusive Juraviel answered. “To gain advantage in a battle, perhaps?” He quickly added, “Not that you and I shall ever battle, of course,” as soon as he noticed Elbryan’s muscles go tense.

That declaration relaxed the young man, and so, of course, Juraviel put in, “Except during . . .” and then paused and let the teasing thought hang empty in the air.

Thoroughly flustered, feeling very out of place both physically and emotionally, Elbryan took a deep breath and removed himself from his anxiety—as simply as that. He merely let his fears and dark thoughts fall somewhere behind him, concentrating only on the present. It might have been resignation, a simple conclusion that he could do nothing about anything anyway, but to Juraviel, the obvious change that came over the boy was promising. Certainly an emotional detachment would prove healthier for this young human who had been through so much and who had so many more trying experiences ahead of him.

With a widening smile, Juraviel started his wings fluttering, bent his knees, and leaped into the air, a half jump, half flight to the lowest branch of a nearby maple.

“They work,” Juraviel announced, “for short hops and to break a fall. But, no, we cannot fly as do the birds.” He came back to the ground, his face suddenly serious as he contemplated his own words. “A pity.”

Elbryan nodded, in full agreement. How wonderful it would be to fly! He imagined the wind, the green treetop canopy speeding below him . . .

“Your time here will not be unpleasant unless you make it so,” Juraviel announced immediately and grimly before the grin could even begin to spread across young Elbryan’s face.

Elbryan stared at the creature curiously, caught off guard by the sudden change of demeanor.

“Know that there are those among my people who do not believe you belong,” Juraviel went on, his voice stern. “There are those who do not see in you the likeness of Mather.”

“I know of no person by the name of Mather,” Elbryan replied with all the courage he could muster. Again came that feeling of detachment, summoned consciously, an attitude that he had nothing to lose, had already lost all there was.

Juraviel shrugged, a fitting little movement of his slender shoulders. “You shall,” he promised. “Hear me now clearly, young one. You are not a prisoner, yet you are not free. As long as you remain in Andur’Blough Inninness, your conduct must be controlled, as your training shall be guided?”

“Training?” Elbryan started to ask, but Juraviel didn’t pause long enough to hear him.

“Stray from the rules at your own peril. Ask not for a second chance when the harsh justice of the Touel’alfar falls upon you.”

The threat was open and clear. Elbryan, with that typical Wyndon pride, squared his shoulders and tightened his jaw, a movement that Juraviel seemed to take no note of whatsoever. The name Juraviel had given his people, Touel’alfar, had a distinctly familiar ring, and Elbryan was certain he had heard it in conjunction with tales of the elves.

“You may rest now,” Juraviel finished. “I will show to you your duties with the rising of the sun.”

“And rest well,” he finished, his voice grim and somber, “for your duties are many and will weary you indeed!”

Elbryan wanted to shout out that he would do as he pleased, when he pleased. He wanted to proclaim his independence loudly and openly, but before he got the first stuttered word out of his mouth, Juraviel hopped into a short flight once more. The delicate creature stepped lightly onto a branch and jumped again immediately, disappearing into the thick brush so completely and easily that Elbryan blinked and rubbed his eyes.

He stood there, in the valley of Andur’Blough Inninness, doubting what he had seen, doubting all that had happened. He wanted his mother and his father. He wanted Pony, that they might have another chance to warn the village before the goblin darkness descended. He wanted . . .

He wanted too much, all at once. He sat down right in the dirt at his feet and fought hard against his emotions, for he did not want to cry.

From Juraviel’s perspective, the first meeting had gone quite well. He knew there would be many doubts raised about Elbryan, particularly by Tuntun, and he knew how difficult Tuntun could be! But after speaking with the boy, Juraviel was even more convinced that this was indeed the true bloodline of Mather, and an appropriate ranger-in-training. Elbryan had that same impish quality about him as Mather, a love and luster of life, lurking just below the surface. The boy could control it, could find that necessary place of detachment . . . and yet, Elbryan could not resist the question about the wings. He had to know, and then, when he did know, he couldn’t help but imagine the wonder of soaring through the air. Just by the expression on Elbryan’s face, Juraviel had read the boy’s every wonder-filled thought and had relished each of them as much as had Elbryan.

It was good that the boy could think such things at this darkest time in his life, was good that he could press on logically, stoically. Tuntun was wrong, Juraviel knew without any doubt at all; this one had character.

Elbryan wanted to eat, or fall asleep, even looked for a place, a moss bed, perhaps, where he might lie down. That notion was lost along with so many others, fleeting thoughts banging into a wall of images. Andur’Blough Inninness, with all its sounds and colors, all its vivid images, called to him, teased him. Juraviel had said nothing about his remaining where he was, so Elbryan got up, brushed himself off, and started walking again among the trees.

He spent the remainder of the afternoon caught up in the sights and smells. He found a stream filled with yellow fish that he did not know, and watched them for more than an hour. He spotted a deer, its long white tail bobbing, but as soon as he tried to get closer, it caught wind of him and leaped away, disappearing as completely as Belli’mar Juraviel had into the shadows.

For all the sights of that wondrous afternoon, for all the relief of existing simply in the present and not in the most terrible past or the uncertain future, Elbryan was even more greatly overwhelmed as dusk descended.

The hole opened in the middle of the fog that covered the elven valley, showing the deep blue sky. Slowly that hole widened, all sides drawing away evenly, perfectly, and Elbryan, watching in sheer amazement, knew that something supernatural, some magic, guided the mist. Soon the sky was clear above him, the first stars twinkling into view.

Elbryan ran about in search of an open meadow, wanting to see this spectacle more clearly. He found a hillock, bare of trees, and scrambled up its side, stumbling more than once, for his eyes remained fixed on the sky.

The fog had receded now to the edges of the vale, and there it hung, blurring the dark shadows of the towering mountains, blurring the boundary between earth and sky. Elbryan had stopped at the top of the hillock, but he felt as if he were still going up, still ascending to those brilliant, twinkling dots. There was a music that swelled about him, he suddenly realized, a beautiful harmony, and it, too, seemed to draw him higher to walk among the stars, to dwell in their light and mystery. Questions too profound flitted about his consciousness.

He knew not how many minutes, perhaps even hours, had passed when he at last came from that trance. The night was dark about him; his neck ached from holding the position for so long.

Though he was back on earth, spiritually, the music remained, soft and wonderful, emanating from every shadow, from every tree, from the ground itself.

No horrible memories could come to him while he was listening to that elvish song, no fears could gain hold. Slowly, determinedly, Elbryan moved down the hillock, looking back often to the sky. Then he forced himself to stare at the darkest spot he could find, that his eyes could adjust more completely.

He paused and very carefully turned a circuit, listening intently, trying to focus on the sound. His direction chosen, he started off, determined to find the singer.

Many times that night, Elbryan believed that he was close. Many times, he rushed around a bend in the trail or jumped out from behind a tree, expecting to catch an elf at song, and once he thought he glimpsed the light of a distant torch.

The song was strong, though not loud, with many voices joining in, but Elbryan never caught a glimpse of any of the singers, saw no elf nor any other creature the rest of that night.

Juraviel found him at dawn, curled in a hollow at the base of a wide oak.

It was time to begin.

PART TWO

PASSAGE

Often I sit and stare at the stars, wondering, wandering. They are to me the shining symbol of all the unanswered questions of human existence, of our place in this vast sky, of our purpose, of death itself They are sparkles of unanswerable wonder, and, too, the beacons of hope.

The night sky is what I liked most about my years in Andur’Blough Inninness. At dusk, when the fog rolled back to the forest edge, it shrouded the known world, blocked the stark mountain shadows in soft and subtle mystery, and the stars came out shining clearer than anywhere else in all the world. That magical mist drew me up—my spirit and even my physical body, it seemed—into the heavens, above the tangible world, that I might walk among the stars and bathe in the lights of mystery, in the secrets of the universe unveiled.

In that elven forest, under that elven sky, I knew freedom. I knew the purest contemplation, the release of physical boundaries, the brotherhood with all the universe. Under that sky that posed to me so many questions, I dismissed mortality, for I had become one with something that was eternal. I had ascended from this temporary existence, from a place of constant change to a place of eternity.

An elf may live for a handful of centuries, a human for a handful of decades, but for both that is but the start of an eternal journey—or perhaps a continuation of a journey that had begun long before this present conscious incarnation. For the spirit continues, as the stars continue. Under that sky, I learned this to be true.

Under that sky, 1 talked to God.

—ELBRYAN WYNDON

CHAPTER 10

Made of Tougher Stuff

Elbryan rolled his breeches up over his knees—not that the worn and ragged pants would stay that way for long!—and touched the dark water with his toe.

Cold. It was always cold; the boy didn’t know why he even bothered testing it each morning before plunging in.

From somewhere in the thick brush behind him, he heard a call, “Be quick about it!” The words were not spoken in the common tongue of Honce-the-Bear but in the singsong, melodious language of the elves, a language Elbryan was already beginning to comprehend.

Elbryan glared over his shoulder in the general direction of the voice, though he knew he would not see one of the Touel’alfar. He had been in Andur’Blough Inninness for three months, had watched winter settle over the land just outside the elven valley and in a few places within the enchanted vale. Elbryan didn’t know exactly where Andur’Blough Inninness was located, but he suspected they were somewhere in the northern latitudes of Corona, beyond the Wilderlands border of Honce-the-Bear. By his reckoning, the winter solstice had passed, and he knew Dundalis, or what was left of the village, was likely under several feet of snow. He remembered well the hardships, and the excitement, of Dundalis in the winter, the gusting wind throwing icy particles against the side of the cabin, the piles of blowing snow sometimes so deep that he and his father had to break through a drift just to get outside!

It wasn’t like that in Andur’Blough Inninness. Some magic, probably the same enchantment that brought the daily blanket of fog, kept the winter season much warmer and more gentle. The northern end of the valley was carpeted by snow, but only a few inches, and the small pond up there was frozen solid—Elbryan had once seen a handful of elves dancing and playing on the ice. But many of the hardier plants had kept their summer hue, many flowers still bloomed, and this reedy bog, the one place in all the valley that Elbryan had truly come to hate, had not frozen. The water was chilly, but not more so than it had been on the first day Elbryan had been told to go in, back when the season was still autumn.

The boy took a deep breath and plunged one foot in, held the pose for a moment until the numbness took away the sting, then dipped in his second foot. He picked up his basket, cursed when one pant leg slipped down into the water, then waded out through the reeds. The cold mud squishing through his toes felt good, at least.

“Be quick about it!” came the predictable call again from the brush, and it was repeated several times, sometimes in elven and sometimes in the common human tongue, by different voices in different places. The elves were taunting him, the boy knew. They were always taunting, always complaining, always pointing out his all too numerous shortcomings.

To his credit, Elbryan had pretty much learned to ignore them.

Parting one patch of reeds, the boy found his first stone of the day, bobbing low in the water. He scooped it out and dropped it into his basket, then moved along to a group of nearly a dozen bobbing stones. He recognized which ones were too high in the water, and plunged them under, trying to saturate the spongelike rocks a bit more before taking them out. When he squeezed them, extracting the now-flavored liquid, the elves would inevitably complain about how little he had collected.

It was yet another part of this unchanging daily ritual.

Soon the basket was full, so Elbryan hauled it back to the bank and collected another one. Thus it went for the bulk of the morning, for the bulk of every morning: the boy moving carefully about the chilly bog, collecting ten baskets of milk stones.

That was the easy part of Elbryan’s day, for then he had to haul the heavy baskets, one at a time, nearly half a mile to the collecting trough. He had to be fast, for he could lose precious time at this point and then would have to suffer almost continual insult from the unseen elves. “Five miles laden, five miles empty,” was the way Belli’mar Juraviel had described this part of his work. Ironically, the laden section of each trip seemed the easiest to Elbryan, for the elves often set traps for him on the journey back to the bog. These weren’t particularly nasty traps, designed more to embarrass than to injure. A trip line here, a disguised patch of slick mud on a corner there. The worst part of falling victim to one of the snares was hearing the laughter as he tried to extract himself from whatever had hold of him, be it a thorny bush or some of those silken elven strands, which, Elbryan found out soon enough, could be made as sticky and clingy as a spiderweb.

He got his reward for his morning’s toils when he returned to the bog to collect the tenth loaded basket. There, every day, he would eat his midday meal—though at first, it was usually halfway through the afternoon before Elbryan got a chance to taste it. The elves would set out a grand table, steaming stew and venison, sometimes roasted game fowl, and piping hot tea that warmed the boy from his head to his cold toes. Always it was a hot meal they set, and Elbryan soon understood why. The elves would put the food out at exactly the same time every day, but if he was not fast enough, “tolque ne’ pesil siq’ el palouviel,” or, “the steam would be off the stew,” as one particularly nasty elf, a deceivingly delicate maiden named Tuntun, had often chided him.

So Elbryan ran, stumbling with his ninth basket, knowing that any stone he dropped into the dirt would be useless for that day. Carefully placing the basket at last at the trough, the boy then sprinted full out the half mile back to the bog. He ate a cold lunch every day at first, but gradually, as the terrain became more familiar and his legs became stronger, as he grew to recognize and thus avoid many of the devilish elven traps, he graduated to warm food.

This day, Elbryan resolved, that tea would burn his tongue!

He put the ninth basket down by the trough right on schedule, took one deep breath, clearing his thoughts and remembering the last layout of the elvish obstacle course. For only the third time in all these weeks, the lunch had not yet been set out when Elbryan had collected the ninth basket. On those first two occasions, the hopeful lad had fallen victim to ever more cunning elvish traps. “Not this time,” he said quietly, determinedly, and he started his sprint.

He spotted mud at one sharp bend; without slowing, Elbryan leaped atop a stone at the elbow of the trail and skipped off it, landing beyond the slick area. With the aid of a slanting sunbeam poking down through a break in the leafy boughs, he then spotted a series of nearly translucent trip lines, of height ranging from ankle to knee, blocking one long straight section of the trail. Elbryan considered veering off the trail, crashing through the brush, then slowed, thinking he should just walk past this obvious trap.

“Not today,” Elbryan growled, and he put his head down and ran on, full speed. He found his visual focus quickly, locking his eyes upon a point just one step ahead, and high-stepped his way through the region, getting his feet up over every single trip line.

Laughter trailed him as he sped away, and Elbryan sensed that there was some measure of admiration in it.

Within a couple of minutes, his goal—the bog, the basket, the meal—was in sight, down the last stretch of path. Here, high stones lined both sides of the trail, making passage off the path nearly impossible unless Elbryan took a circuitous route quite deep into the underbrush.

He slowed to a near walk, opting for caution and understanding that an extra few seconds would make no difference in the quality of his meal.

They had dug a pit—how could they have done that so quickly?—and had cleverly covered it with a layer of dirt and fallen leaves, supported by a trellis of woven sticks. Despite the addition of the pit, the path appeared almost exactly the same as it had on all of his previous returns.

Almost exactly.

Elbryan crouched and tamped down his feet, thinking to take a few running strides and then leap the trap. He stopped before he had really begun, though, catching the sound of a soft titter on the breeze.

A smile widened on the boy’s face. He wagged his finger at the underbrush. “Well done,” he congratulated, then he moved to the edge of the apparent pit and pulled aside the phony trellis.

The real pit, he discovered was several feet beyond the apparent pit. He would have leaped clear of the phony, only to drop heavily into the real one.

Now it was Elbryan’s turn to laugh, as he discerned the dimensions of the true trap, then easily leaped it, leaving the last few feet of the path, the last expanse to the food, open to him.

“Not this time!” he yelled loudly, and there was no return laughter from the brush, no sound at all. “Ne leque towithel!” he repeated in elvish.

Elbryan slowly passed the last tree, home free, so he thought.

Something zipped by him, just under his chin. He heard a thud at the side and turned to see one of those tiny elvish arrows half buried in a tree. A second bolt whistled behind him, turning him with a start, and only when Elbryan noticed the silvery filament trailing this arrow did he understand what was happening.

There came a third and a fourth, all dangerously close.

“Not fair!” the boy yelled, trying to move—and discovering that the sticky strands were already grabbing at him. He looked at the brush helplessly, at the steaming stew, just a few strides away.

More arrows whistled past, each trailing a strand, each tightening the web about Elbryan, holding him from his meal.

“Not fair!” he yelled repeatedly, tearing at the strands. He managed to pull a few down—a couple of arrows came out of the tree, other strands pulled free of the arrow fletchings—but that helped only a little, as the now-loose strands clung to the boy’s clothing, entangling him even more.

Another arrow came by and slashed across Elbryan’s forearm as he struggled. His protest came out as a snarl, words stolen by the stinging pain, and he stopped his thrashing and clutched at his arm.

“Cowards!” he yelled in total frustration. “Goblinkin! Only a coward would shoot from the boughs. Only a coward of goblin heritage would attack someone who has no weapons with which to strike back!”

The next arrow razored painfully across the back of his neck, drawing a line of bright blood.

“Enough!” came a stern voice from the brush, a voice that Elbryan recognized—and was certainly glad to hear.

Protests, laughter, taunts all came back in reply from, many different places.

“Enough, Tuntun!” Belli’mar Juraviel demanded again, and the elf came forth from the brush, moving to young Elbryan. Tuntun, bow in hand, came out from across the way and moved quickly to follow on Juraviel’s heels.

“Calm, my friend,” Juraviel prompted poor Elbryan, the boy thrashing about and only entangling himself even more. “The strands will not let go until Tuntun commands them.” Juraviel turned and glared at the female then, and she sighed resignedly and muttered something under her breath.

Almost immediately, the strands began to fall from Elbryan, except for those still tight in the line from the tree to the brush where Tuntun had tied them off, and those which the young man had inadvertently twisted and turned about his limbs. Finally, with Juraviel’s help, Elbryan got free, and he immediately stormed up to Tuntun, his green eyes flaring dangerously.

The elf looked up at him calmly, smiling, perfectly relaxed.

“I earned that meal!” the boy stormed.

“So go and eat it,” Tuntun replied, and snickers came at Elbryan from every bush. “You needn’t worry that it will burn your tongue.”

“Elbryan,” Juraviel warned when he saw the boy ball his fist at his side. Tuntun held up a hand to her elvish companion, silently bidding Juraviel to let her take care of this situation. Juraviel knew what was coming, and though he did not like it, for he thought it too soon in the boy’s training, he did on some levels agree that the lesson might be necessary.

“You want so badly to strike me.” Tuntun tittered.

Elbryan fumed but couldn’t, in good conscience, punch this diminutive creature, half his weight, if that, and a girl besides!

Tuntun’s bow came up, faster than Elbryan could follow, and the elf let fly an arrow, down the path. It struck the bowl of stew, overturning it and making a mess of the meal. “You’ll get nothing more this day,” Tuntun said sternly.

The knuckles on both of Elbryan’s hands were white by this point, and the muscles along his jaw strained taut. He started to turn away, thinking that he had to hold his control, had to let all the insults pass, but before be got halfway around, Tuntun slapped her bow across the back of his head.

Elbryan let fly a wide-arcing left hook as he spun back toward the elf. He missed miserably, Tuntun ducking low under the predictable blow, and kicking him twice in rapid succession, once on the inside of each knee.

Elbryan stumbled and squared himself; Tuntun tossed her bow aside, held up both her empty hands, and motioned for Elbryan to come on.

The boy paused. The forest was silent, totally silent, about him, and Juraviel made not a move nor any indication of how Elbryan should proceed.

It was his choice to make, he realized, and so he crouched low, hands out wide, feeling his balance on the balls of his feet. He waited, and waited some more, until Tuntun relaxed, and then he sprang like a hunting cat.

He caught the air, nothing more, and didn’t even realize that the elf was not in front of him until he heard wings fluttering behind him and felt a series of sharp punches on the back of his head.

He wheeled, but Tuntun turned with him, staying behind him and punching out a veritable drum roll on his upper back. Furious, Elbryan finally launched himself sideways, putting some ground between him and his elusive opponent.

“Blood of Mather!” Tuntun said sarcastically. “He fights as any lumbering human might!”

Juraviel wanted to respond that Mather had fought the exact same way in the first years of his training, but he let it pass. Let Tuntun have her fun this day, the elf decided; that would make his victory all the sweeter when Elbryan finally proved himself.

On cue, Elbryan came back in, measuring his steps this time, not taking his eyes off the dancing elf. Tuntun was on the ground again, swaying slowly, hands waving before her.

Elbryan saw an opening and let fly a combination—left jab, step, and right cross. He meant to retract the left, which missed, that he could roll his shoulders and put some weight behind the right. He meant to do a lot of things, to follow the combination with a shoulder tackle or another quick one-two if the opportunity presented itself. He found, however, that as soon as his left arm extended, his fist flying so tantalizing near Tuntun’s swaying head, that his moment of control had passed.

Tuntun turned in accord with the punch, her head fading back across to Elbryan’s right, her right hand catching the boy’s wrist and pushing outward, her left hand coming back in and catching the outside of his elbow, driving in.

As Elbryan’s arm locked, and before he could even step in and begin the cross, Tuntun turned her right wrist over and down.

Elbryan had no choice but to follow, scampering out to the left a step before tumbling hard to the ground, crashing into one nearby bush. To his credit, he didn’t fight the roll or even try to break his fall. He went right over and came back out low, scrambling for Tuntun’s legs.

The elf straightened and stiffened, and leaned forward over the lunging boy’s head and shoulders.

Tuntun’s strength surprised Elbryan, for he could not break the elf’s position, and then he was surprised even more as Tuntun locked her hands together and brought them down hard onto the tender area just below Elbryan’s right shoulder blade.

The boy felt the strength leave that side of his body. He staggered down again, was barely even conscious that his hold on the elf was broken. He noted the elf’s spring, heard the wings fluttering. He went up fast to his knees, realizing that he was vulnerable. He heard a snicker, then felt the explosion as Tuntun, half turning and landing easily on one foot right between the boy’s ankles, let fly a kick with the other, up between Elbryan’s thighs to catch him right in the groin.

The boy went down hard, clutching and groaning, feeling suddenly weak and nauseous.

“Tuntun!” he heard Juraviel protest, and it seemed to him as if the elf’s voice had come from far away.

“He fights like a human,” Tuntun answered indignantly.

“He is a human!” Juraviel reminded.

“All the more reason to kick him hard.” The laughter from the forest was painful to Elbryan, at least as much as his wounded groin. He remained on the ground for a very long time, eyes closed, curled in a fetal position.

Finally, he opened his eyes and rolled to find Juraviel alone standing near him. The elf offered a hand, but Elbryan stubbornly refused, struggling shakily to his feet.

“Suffer the barbs, my young friend,” Juraviel offered. “They are not without merit.”

“Lick a bloody cap,” Elbryan cursed, a common insult among humans, but one referring to powries. Elbryan hardly knew what a “bloody cap” was, and so the meaning of his own curse was lost on him.

It wasn’t lost on Juraviel, though, for the elf had battled the fierce, evil powries many times over the centuries. Recognizing the boy’s ultimate distress and embarrassment, Juraviel generously let the insult pass.

Elbryan walked a crooked path to the food and stubbornly salvaged what he could. That done, he hoisted the last basket and started back the half mile to the trough.

Juraviel followed silently, some distance behind. He wanted to make the most of Tuntun’s painful lesson, but he wasn’t sure that Elbryan was in any frame of mind to learn.

Titters came at Elbryan from the shadows several times as he walked. He ignored them, didn’t even hear them, lost in his self-pity, consumed by frustrated rage. He felt so alone and isolated, felt as if he would have been better off had these vile elves not come and rescued him from the fomorian.

Back at the trough, Elbryan began his more difficult work. He took up one of the saturated stones and squeezed it with all his strength over the trough. When the porous thing was light once more, the flavored bog water extracted, Elbryan tossed it near the basket and took up the next. All too soon, before he had even finished with the first basket, his forearms ached from the effort.

Juraviel walked past Elbryan to the trough and dipped his cupped hands in. He stared at the water for a moment, eyeing its hue, then sniffed its delicate bouquet. The combination of bog water and milk-stones, as the elves called them, produced some of the sweetest juices in all of Corona. From this raw product, the elves would make their intoxicating wine, Questel ni’touel to the elves, but known to the wide world simply as “boggle.” The swamplike connotation of the name was usually completely lost on the humans, who thought the term a mere reference to their state of mind after but a few sips of the potent liquid. Not that many humans had ever tasted the elixir, for the elves did not deal openly in the juice. Their contacts in the wide human world were discrete and few, but the elves did enough trading so that they could bring desired items, curiosity pieces mostly, and a sampling of songs of the few human bards who could bring them pleasure, into their valley.

“A good take today,” Juraviel commented, hoping to draw the boy from his sour mood.

Elbryan grunted and did not reply. He took up another stone, held it high over the trough and squeezed with all his might, hoping to splash the juices enough to wet Juraviel.

The elf was too quick and wary for that.

Juraviel nodded at the surprising effect, though, taking note of the boy’s gain in strength after just a few short weeks. He thought to leave Elbryan then, but decided to try one last time to calm the boy, to put a positive meaning on the embarrassing and painful lesson. “It is good that you have such spirit,” Juraviel said, “and better still that you keep it under such control.”

“Not so tight a rein,” Elbryan replied, growling with each word. To accentuate his point, Elbryan lifted the next stone, and, instead of holding it over the trough, hurled it into the brush nearby, an act of defiance and of finality. Even if he went and retrieved it, the liquid within the stone had been tainted and was no good.

Juraviel stared solemnly at the spot where the stone had bounced for a long moment. He tried to view things through Elbryan’s eyes, tried to sympathize with the frustration, tried to remember the terrible tragedy the youngster had suffered just this past season.

It was no good. For whatever had happened, today and in the days and weeks before, this stubborn behavior could only lead to disaster. Juraviel turned on Elbryan swiftly and suddenly, wings lifting the elf into a short hop. One hand grabbed the back of Elbryan’s hair, the other cupped under the boy’s chin, and though Elbryan, at least as strong as the elf, got his arms up to defend, when Juraviel turned his arms, turned Elbryan’s head, the boy had no chance to resist. Juraviel took full advantage, put Elbryan off balance and kept on twisting, angling the boy over the trough. Quite a bit of juice might be ruined, but Juraviel figured the loss was worth it.

He put Elbryan’s head under the liquid, brought him up, sputtering, then dunked him again. The third time, he held the boy under for what seemed like minutes, and when he brought Elbryan up and subsequently let him go, the stunned boy fell to the ground, gasping desperately.

“I am your friend,” Belli’mar Juraviel said sternly. “But let us both understand the situation from the proper perspective. You are n’Touel’alfar, not of the People. You have been brought into Andur’Blough Inninness to be trained in the way of the rangers. This is fact; it has begun and there can be no turning back. If you fail in this, if you do not prove yourself worthy of elven friendship, you cannot be let out into the world with the knowledge you have attained of our home and of our ways.”

Even as Elbryan started to protest, horrified at the thought of becoming a prisoner, Juraviel finished grimly, “Nor can you stay.”

Elbryan’s thoughts shifted to the illogic of it all. He couldn’t leave, and he couldn’t stay. How could that be?

The boy’s jaw drooped as he realized the only remaining possibility, as he considered that Tuntun would carry out his execution, if Juraviel would not, without hesitation.

Humbled, he said not a word, but went right back to his work, as Juraviel left him.

That night, Elbryan sat upon the bare hillock that he claimed as his own, under the starry canopy, alone with his thoughts. Images, memories of the time of his past life, a few weeks that sometimes seemed as a few minutes and other times a few centuries, careened about the edges of his consciousness. He tried to concentrate on the present, on the simple beauty of the starry sky, or on the future, the questions of infinity, of eternity. Inevitably, though, that led Elbryan to thoughts of mortality and thus to the recent fate of his family and friends.

Piled in the emotional jumble were Elbryan’s mixed feelings concerning the elves. He did not understand these creatures, so gay and full of almost childish spirit at one moment, so deadly and stern at the next. Even Juraviel! Elbryan had thought the elf his friend, and perhaps Juraviel was, in his own inhuman way, but the ferocity and ease with which Juraviel had put the boy under the trough water was amazing and frightening. Elbryan had always thought himself a bit of a warrior. He had killed goblins, after all, though his body was far from maturity. Yet measured against the speed and agility of the elves, the fluidity of their movements, substituting perfect balance for lack of weight and strength, Elbryan truly felt a novice. Juraviel, lighter and smaller, had put him down with astounding ease, a simple movement for which Elbryan had no counter.

So now here he was, in a land enchanting and terrifying, sharing the forest with these creatures that he could not understand and could not defeat. Sitting on that hillock that night, Elbryan felt as if he were alone in the universe, as if everything around him—the world and the elves, the goblins that had attacked Dundalis and the folk he had known in the village—were but a dream, his dream. Elbryan realized the arrogance of that notion, an almost sinful pride, but he was so much out of control, so insignificant, so vulnerable, that he suffered the barbs of his conscience for the sake of his sensibilities.

On that hillock, under that sky, Elbryan dared to play God, and that emotional game allowed him to sleep finally in peace and to wake with the determination to go on, with the gritty confidence that today, this day, he would eat hot stew for lunch. He collected his baskets and ran for the bog.

And when he slipped back beside the tenth and last basket, he saw steam still rising from his tea.

It was difficult, exhausting work, repeated every day, endlessly. But it was not without its benefits. As the weeks became months, and they became a year, and then two, Elbryan was hardly recognizable as the short gangly boy that Jilseponie had once beat up. His legs grew strong and agile from carrying loads and dodging traps. His chest and shoulders grew broad and thick, and his arms, particularly his forearms, bulged with iron-hard muscles.

By the tender age of sixteen, Elbryan Wyndon was stronger than Olwan had been.

And Olwan had been the strongest man in Dundalis.

CHAPTER 11

Cat-the-Stray

“Corner table, Cat,” called Graevis Chilichunk, the barkeep and proprietor of Fellowship Way, reputedly the finest inn in all the great city of Palmaris. Fellowship Way, or the Way, as it was commonly called, was not a large establishment, boasting only a dozen small, private rooms and a single common bedroom in the upstairs guest quarters, and a tavern that could hold no more than a hundred, and that with most folks standing. But Graevis, a fat, balding man, perpetually smiling, full of laughter and cheer and with the warmest of hearts, had made the place the best of the cheapest, so to speak. The noble visitors to Palmaris mostly stayed at the more haughty establishments, those near or within the duke’s castle, but for those who knew, for the lesser merchants and the frequent wanderers, there was no better place in the world than Fellowship Way. In the Way, a single piece of silver would get you a hot meal, and a mere smile, whether you were a paying customer or not, would coax from Graevis or from most of the other usual patrons or workers a marvelous tale. In the Way, the hearth was always blazing, the beds were always soft, and the song was always loud.

The young woman sighed deeply, paused a moment, then consciously worked hard to erase the perpetual frown from her face as she made her way to the three men calling her from the corner table. She was aware of their eyes upon her as she approached; always the men looked at her that way. She was in her mid-teens, but had the shapely body of a woman five years older. She was not tall, just four inches above five feet, but that only made her golden hair appear even thicker and longer. She brushed at it and shook it as she crossed the room, for with her sweat and the grease from the meal she had just helped prepare, it clung uncomfortably to her neck.

“Ah, the pretty lady!” one of the men cooed. “Be a good girl for me,” he added, winking lewdly.

The young woman—Cat-the-Stray, she was called by the folk of the Way—tried unsuccessfully to hide her scowl. She caught herself quickly, though, and covered it with a smirk she thought must have appeared, at least a little, as a smile. Not that the seated drunk was even looking at her face; his eyes never seemed to angle quite that high.

Another deep breath steadied her. She thought of Graevis, dear Graevis, the man who had rescued her from a past she could not remember, the man who had taken in a broken little girl and, with his warm smile and warm heart, helped her to heal, at least enough so that she had become functional once again. Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed the movements, a dance they seemed, of Pettibwa Chilichunk, Graevis’ boisterous wife. When she had first come to know the woman, Cat had thought her simple. Pettibwa was forever laughing, dancing with her tray from one table to the next. She got pinched at every stop, hugged by every patron who left at night, but she never seemed to care. Indeed, Pettibwa loved every moment of it. If she had a free hand when a man pinched her on her ample buttocks, she would pinch him right back; often she would grab a man along the path of her table-to-table dance and sweep him with her across the room. And it was all done in such good fun that neither Graevis nor any suitor of her unsuspecting dance partner ever seemed to care.

It took grim Cat a long while to learn the truth of Pettibwa. The woman was not simple, far from it. Pettibwa just had an unrivaled love of life and of other people.

Cat loved her—as much as she had loved her own mother, she believed, for though she could not remember her own mother, she couldn’t imagine loving anyone more. Sometimes that thought only made the young woman even sadder than usual.

She took the order from the three—no surprise here, just three more mugs of the cheapest ale—then turned to the bar. She stopped short when the winker gave her rump a solid slap, and she stood there, suffering their laughter. She wanted to turn and lay him out flat on the floor, and anyone who had witnessed Cat’s temper knew that she could have done it easily enough, but her eyes met the gaze of Graevis, soaking in his smile. By all his motions—bobbing head, sparkling brown eyes—he was silently telling her to let it pass.

Not that Graevis wouldn’t protect her. He had taken her in, heart and soul, and loved her at least as much as he loved his own son, the surly Grady. No man would ever take advantage of Cat while Graevis drew breath—and Pettibwa, too, for that matter—but in the Way, a slap on the rump was not to be made into a big deal, especially not considering the everyday actions of the boisterous proprietress.

The young woman didn’t look back as she made her way across the crowded floor to get the drinks.

“Take it as a compliment, me deary,” Pettibwa remarked in her “commoner accent,” as she strolled to the bar beside her adopted daughter.

“I shall have to wash my dress in the morning,” Cat-the-Stray replied, her speech not as stilted as the older woman’s, though it hinted at her four years with the Chilichunks.

“Bah, ye’re always so serious!” Pettibwa replied, pinching the young woman’s cheek. “Sure’n ye’ve come to know the feelings ye stir in menfolk.”

The young woman blushed and looked away.

“No, ye’re not a pretty one, now are ye?” Pettibwa cooed with smiling sarcasm, stroking Cat’s hair. “If only ye’d smile, me girl, then all the world’d be smiling back at ye.”

The young woman closed her eyes and felt the gentle, unthreatening stroke on her hair. Had her mother done it that way? She sensed that her hair had been much shorter then, back when she was young and all the world seemed a great adventure, back when the devils were just fireside stories to make your skin tingle or imagined demons upon whom children could wage war.

The moment ended all too soon, Cat-the-Stray tuning back to the bustle of the lively room about her. She offered a meek smile and a nod to Pettibwa who returned them with a wink. The older woman collected her tray and rushed away, blending into the continuing party just a step from the bar.

“If he’s to bother ye, ye just be letting me know about it,” Graevis said to her as he put the three ales in front of her. “Ye’re not to play with him if ye’re not wanting to.”

Cat-the-Stray nodded and smiled weakly again. She knew that Graevis spoke truthfully; she, and not the patrons, was in control in here. But she knew, too, the atmosphere of the Way, and the last thing in the world the young woman wanted was to make things difficult for Graevis and Pettibwa, her saviors.

She took up her tray and weaved across the room, getting back to the corner table with hardly a drop spilled. Master Wink-and-Slap twisted his face at her again and gave a breathless burst of laughter, his throat no doubt numb from the drink. “Might that we be getting together when the hearth’s burning low,” he stated more than asked. “I’ve a gold piece to be rid of.”

Again that hoarse laughter, this time accompanied by the other two.

Cat ignored it and methodically placed the mugs on the table.

“Two gold, then, and ye best be worth it,” the dirty man offered, and when Cat continued to ignore him, he roughly grabbed her by the arm.

Her other hand came across, hooked his thumb, and bent it back over his wrist so quickly that the man, senses blurred by drink, hardly understood what was happening. Suddenly he was off balance, and then he was sitting on the floor, the pretty barmaid gliding out of reach. His friends howled with glee.

Cat suffered his insults, but couldn’t dismiss the realization that Pettibwa would have handled it differently, better. Pettibwa would have proclaimed that two gold was an insult to a woman of her talents, and might have gone on to insist that she would never bed a man, no matter the money, who did not understand the meaning of the word “bath.”

Pettibwa would have extracted herself delicately, subtly, turning the joke back on the rude man, making him the fool but with such cunning that he probably wouldn’t even realize it until she was across the room.

Now, the man continued sputtering. Cat caught the word “whore,” and then she was not surprised to see Graevis, several of the other regulars in tow, crossing the room, their faces suddenly grim.

Cat suffered the inevitable apology, the insincere man only offering it at the end of his twisted arm. The young woman pointedly turned away then, not wanting to watch as Graevis none too gently threw the drunk out into the street, and then pushed his two wretched friends out behind him.

Perhaps worst of all for the young woman were the host of other eager young then ready to defend her honor, offering everything from a thrashing of the man to his very life. One in particular, handsomely dressed and well groomed, with light brown eyes that sparkled with intelligence and a calm demeanor that hinted at good breeding, nodded the young woman’s way and smiled slightly, an invitation for Cat to name him as her champion. She eyed the young man for a long moment—the way he sat, the way he moved—and she had no doubt that he was well trained in the use of the slender sword that hung comfortably at his hip. On a single word from her, he would thrash all three of the drunks to within an inch of their lives.

Cat knew it, and knew that many others would have defended her as well. That should have come as a compliment, but Cat-the-Stray hated being the center of attention, hated the patronizing, the would-be heroes, who, with the sole exception of Graevis, wanted exactly the same thing as the bounced drunk. Their course was more gentlemanly, less straightforward, but their goal through honor, Cat knew, was precisely the same as the drunk had attempted through offered gold.

She worked for another hour, and when her smile did not return, Graevis graciously bade her to take an early night. Cat resisted, fearing that her leaving would only put more work on Pettibwa’s shoulders, but the older woman pooh-poohed that notion and almost forced Cat through the side door, into the family’s private chambers. Cat looked back appreciatively, and over Pettibwa’s large round shoulder, she saw again the handsome well-dressed young man, watching her go, lifting his glass of wine in apparent toast to her.

She scurried away, suddenly uncomfortable.

All the bustle of the common room disappeared as soon as the heavy door was closed, leaving the young woman in happy solitude—almost, for a moment later, she noticed that Grady Chilichunk was in the house, moving about his little room.

Cat sighed again; the last thing she wanted now was to spend any time near Grady. He was a handsome man of thirty years, nearly twice Cat’s age, with sharp brown eyes. Physically, by all accounts, he was the image of his father in Graevis’ younger days, but by Cat’s estimation, Grady could not have been more different than Graevis in temperament. Since her first days in the house, Grady had made the young woman uncomfortable. Not in a lewd way, like the drunk in the bar, or even in a teasing way, like the handsome young man. In four years, Grady had never once looked at the flowering young woman lustfully. To Cat-the-Stray, his adopted sister, he was always polite, too polite. Stiff even, and as the young woman had grown wiser to the ways of the world, she came to understand that Grady saw her as a threat to what he considered his rightful inheritance.

It wasn’t that Grady honestly cared for Fellowship Way. He was hardly ever in the place. He liked the money the establishment brought in, though, and the young woman already understood that if Graevis and Pettibwa left Fellowship Way to her, even partially, Grady would not be pleased.

“What are you doing in here?” he asked, coming from his room. His proper speech rang in sharp contrast to the Street dialect of his parents. Grady saw himself as above that lowly station, Cat understood. He fancied himself an important man, and frequented the more expensive establishments near the duke’s castle, and had even been in the castle on many occasions. It struck Cat that he must know the well-dressed gentleman in the bar; perhaps the man had even come to the Way on Grady’s invitation.

“Have you no work?” he snapped at her.

Cat-the-Stray bit her lip, not liking his condescending tone. “I’ve done more this one night than you have in the last two seasons,” she replied.

Grady glared, at her. “Some were made to work in life,” he began evenly, “others to live and enjoy.”

Cat decided that it wasn’t worth arguing. She shook her head, tossed her apron to the back of a nearby chair, gathered up her cloak, and headed out into the Palmaris night.

A chill breeze was blowing off the gulf, moaning as it wound its way past the many two- and three-story houses of the great city. Palmaris was second in size in all the Kingdom of Honce-the-Bear only to Ursal, the throne seat, further upriver, though neither were reputedly as populous as the great, crowded cities of the southern kingdom of Behren. To Cat-the-Stray, who had grown up on the edge of the Wilderlands, in a village where ten people together was considered a crowd, the place had, at first, been overwhelming. Even now, after nearly four years in Palmaris, when she knew every street, where to go, where to avoid, and when the dark image of the great Masur Delaval and the smell of brine and the wind filled with crisp wetness had become very familiar to her, she could not consider the place her home. Even now, surrounded by the love of the Chilichunks, the place was not home, could never replace the fleeting image of a cabin that she held so dear. She loved Graevis and Pettibwa, even Grady, but they were not, could not be, her parents, and Grady would never take the place of a true friend she sensed that she had once known.

Cat-the-Stray winced as the thoughts careened back in time. She had blocked away so much, could only remember fleeting images, a certain look, a kiss that she wasn’t even sure had really happened. And the name, all the names, were gone from her mind—that was the worst thing of all! She could not remember her friend’s name, could not remember her own name!

“Cat-the-Stray,” she whispered distastefully into the cold night air, watching the mist of her breath float away, and wishing the title would go with it. It had been given to her affectionately, she knew, and with all sympathy for her pitiful predicament, and so she had not argued.

The young woman made her way around the back of the inn, down a dark alley that inspired no fear, and up a gutter, to the one section of Fellowship Way’s roof that was not slanted. The lights of Palmaris spread wide before her, the lights of the night sky wide above her. This was her secret place, her place of contemplation. She came up here as often as her duties allowed to be alone with her memories, to try to piece together who she was and where she had come from.

She remembered wandering into a village, dirty and wounded, covered in soot and blood. She remembered the tender manner in which she had been brought in, followed by relentless questions that she could not answer. Then came the long journey, tagging along with a merchant caravan that had swapped crafted items to the people of the small frontier village in exchange for pelts and great trees that would be used as masts for the sailing ships built in Palmaris. Graevis Chilichunk had been on that caravan, coming north to the Wilderlands to pick up some very special wine, boggle by name. He had taken to the poor lost girl—he was the one who had given the girl the name of Cat-the-Stray—and the villagers had been more than willing to part with the orphan and with many of their own weaker folk, since they were in fear of a raid similar to the one that had sacked the neighboring settlement, Cat’s settlement.

Cat rested back against a sooty chimney, the warm bricks taking a bit of the bite from the night chill.

Why couldn’t she remember the name of her village or of the one where Graevis had found her? On several occasions, she had started to ask Pettibwa and Graevis about it, but every time she had stopped short, some part of her fearing to remember. Neither of her adopted parents pressed her to remember; Cat had overheard them talking one night, making a pact that they would let the girl heal in her own time. “Perhaps she will never remember,” Pettibwa had said. “Perhaps that would be better.”

“And she’s got her new name now,” Graevis agreed. “Though if I’d’ve thinked it would stick, I’d’ve chosen differently!”

And they laughed, and it was not in any way an insult to the girl, just their joy at being able to help one so in need.

Cat loved them with all her heart. Now, though, she was beginning to think it was time for her to figure out who she was and where she had come from. She looked up at the sky. Some streaks of clouds had moved in, giving a different perspective to those stars still visible. It was often possible to look at familiar things in a different way, Cat realized. She let the night canopy absorb her, used it to filter back through the painful barriers. She had seen this sky all her life and used that commonality to recall another place.

She remembered running up a forested slope, looking back to her village, nestled in a sheltered vale, and then turning her gaze above it, to the southern sky, to the faint colors of the Halo.

“The Halo,” Cat-the-Stray muttered, and she realized that she had not seen the phenomenon since she had come to Palmaris. Her face screwed up with concern. Did such a thing as the Halo even exist, or was her memory a mere fantasy?

If it did exist, then her memory was correct, then she had found yet another image of her lost life.

She considered going back into the Way and inquiring about this Halo right then, but her concentration was broken by a sharp, metallic sound.

Somebody was climbing up the gutter.

Cat did not get overalamed—until she saw a familiar dirty face come over the edge of the roof.

“Ah, me lovely,” said the drunk from the bar. “So ye come up here to meet with me.”

“Be on your way,” Cat warned, but the man rolled up over the edge of the roof and started to rise.

“Oh, I’ll be having me way,” he said, and then Cat heard yet another man coming up the gutter, and realized she was in trouble. They had followed her, all three, and she knew well enough what they meant to do to her.

Quick as her namesake, the young woman leaped across and put her knee heavily into the drunk’s chest, knocking him flat to the roof. She slapped away his grabbing hands, then slugged him twice in the face.

Then she was up, meeting the second intruder with a foot in his face as his head came above the roof edge. His head, snapped back; he started to say something in protest, and Cat kicked him again, right in the jaw.

With a groan, he fell away into the blackness, dropping heavily atop the last of the three, then both of them going down hard to the cobblestones. Two kicks and two down, but it had taken too long. Even as Cat started to turn back for the first, the drunk’s arms came about her and locked about her chest, squeezing her tight.

She felt his hot breath on her neck, smelled the stench of the cheap ale. “There, there, me pretty one,” he whispered. “If ye’re not to fight me, ye’ll like it all the more.”

He nibbled her earlobe, or tried to, but she snapped her head back hard into his face, stunning him.

The one memory that Cat-the-Stray held completely from her past was not an image or a name, but a feeling, a deep frustrated rage. She let that memory out now, on the roof of Fellowship Way in Palmaris. She let all the tears and all the unanswered screams come out, channeled them into a level of violence that the drunk could not have foreseen.

Her hands raked at his arms; she stuck one arm between her torso and the drunk’s arm, and let her legs fall out from under her, twisting and squirming.

“Might be more the fun if ye fight!” the drunk squealed, but he wasn’t paying attention and had let the young woman get her face close to his clenched hands.

Cat-the-Stray clamped her teeth over one of his knuckles and bit him hard.

“Ah, ye whore!” he yelled, and lifted his other hand to pound her.

But he had broken his grip, and Cat turned and ducked, accepting the blow across the back of her shoulders, not even feeling it through the turmoil of her emotions. She came around and up and right back in, clawing at his face, raking for his eyes. He pulled her hands out wide, and she used the opening to head-butt him again.

She tore her hands free and grabbed him by the hair. He punched her hard on the side of the head, but she only loosed a feral scream, and tugged down hard with both her hands, while she jumped and curled one leg. She heard the crack of bone as her knee connected with his face. He shot back up straight, then fell over backward, but Cat was not done with him.

She came in hard, screaming all the while, driving her knee into his throat.

“Enough!” he whined, gagged. “I’ll let ye be.”

That wasn’t the point; Cat would not let him be. She hit him a score of heavy blows; she kicked him, she bit him, she clawed him. Finally, battered and bleeding from a dozen wounds, he managed to get to his feet and he ran headlong to the ledge and dove right over it.

Following across the roof, Cat noticed that there was a light below in the alley. She came to the edge, expecting one of the man’s companions to be coming up the gutter, and hoping that to be the case.

She stopped, taken fully by surprise. The drunk lay very still, groaning softly, blood running from his many wounds and from the side of his broken head. The man she had kicked from the gutter was down as well, sitting against the building wall across the alley, one hand supporting him, the other clutching his shin. The leg had splintered in the fall; Cat could see the jagged edge of a bone poking through the skin.

The third drunk was up, hands high above his head and facing the wall directly below Cat, a sword’s pointed tip tight against the middle of his back.

“I heard a scream,” said the handsome man from the Way, the one with the sparkling light brown eyes, the one with the purest white smile. “I took my leave soon after you departed,” he explained, “figuring there was nothing left in the place worth watching.”

Cat felt the blood rushing to her face.

“Some hero I prove to be,” the man said, bringing his sword back in a salute to the young woman. “By my eyes, it seems as if I saved these three!”

Cat-the-Stray had no idea what to respond to the gallant man. Her rage bubbled away, and she turned from the alley, walking back into the solitude of the darkened rooftop.

After a few uncomfortable minutes, the man called up to her, but before she could answer, she heard a commotion as several others, Graevis among them, came rushing into the alley.

Cat-the-Stray didn’t want to face them. She was embarrassed, she was ashamed, and she just wanted to be left alone. That was not possible, she realized, nor could she slip down the other side of the building without having half of Palmaris searching frantically for her. She took a deep breath and moved to the gutter, then down, meeting the eyes of no one, falling into the bosom of Pettibwa as soon as she spotted the woman, and whispering for Pettibwa to please take her to her room.

CHAPTER 12

The Windrunner

The hours were endless, up before the dawn and not to bed again until the midnight hour had passed. Brothers Avelyn, Quintall, Pellimar, and Thagraine learned to survive, even thrive, on no more than four hours of sleep. They were taught the deepest forms of meditation, where a twenty-minute break afforded them all the recuperation they needed to press on with their training for several more hours. They studied with their respective classmates throughout the day, learning their religious duties and expectations, the day-to-day functions of the abbey, and the fighting techniques. After vespers, the training shifted to lessons concerning the sacred stones—the collection process, the preparation ceremony immediately after collection, and the various magical properties of each type of stone. In addition, all four were taught the ways of the sea, spending many hours on a small boat rocking in the waves on the rough, frigid waters of All Saints Bay.

Avelyn could not keep up with his three companions in the matters of fighting or seamanship; and in the religious training, the young brother grew more and more frustrated. It seemed that as every ceremony became ingrained within him, it lost a bit of its mystery, and thus, its holiness. Were the fifteen Holy Orders of God, the rules of righteousness, truly God inspired, or were they merely rules of keeping order within a civilized society? Such questions would have broken Avelyn were it not for the training after the sun had set. For in the Ring Stones, the young man found his ideals satisfied. The mysteries of stone magic could not be explained away by human desires of control and order. To Avelyn, these stones were truly the gift of God, the magic of the heavens, the promise of eternal life and glory.

So he suffered the brutal hours of the day, the fighting in which Quintall almost always bested him. By the beginning of the third year, the level of jealousy among the four began to rise noticeably. Avelyn and Thagraine had been formally named as the Preparers, the two monks who would leave the chartered ship and go onto the island of Pimaninicuit to collect and prepare the stones, while Quintall and Pellimar would remain aboard, going onto the island only should one of the chosen pair falter. Sea journeys were not considered safe in God’s Year 821, the year of the stone showers, and replacements might become necessary.

Quintall was easily the best of the four in matters of martial arts. The man was impossibly strong, his stocky frame and low center of gravity giving him the leverage he needed to punish Avelyn endlessly. On more than one occasion, the lanky Avelyn was convinced that Quintall meant to kill him. What better way to get to Pimaninicuit?

The thought was more than a little unsettling to gentle Avelyn Desbris, and he thought it ironic that Quintall’s anger was no more than proof that he, and not the stocky, ferocious man, was the better choice for Pimaninicuit. Avelyn knew in his heart that if the situation were reversed, if Quintall and not he had been chosen to go to the island, he would support the man with all his heart, taking his comfort in the fact that he was allowed to go on the journey and holding faith that the masters, and not he, were better judges of the students. Besides, at night, and especially on those occasions when the chosen students actually handled the stones, Brother Avelyn easily proved that he was the proper choice. By the fourth year, none, not even the masters, could bring forth the stone magic more completely, more effortlessly, than Avelyn. Even skeptical Master Siherton, whatever reservations he continued to hold about Avelyn as a fellow human being, had to admit that the man was the obvious choice, the God-given choice, for Pimaninicuit. Siherton maintained his tight bond with Quintall and lobbied for the younger man to be included—as Thagraine’s replacement and not Avelyn’s. By the third year, Master Siherton also became invaluable as a mediator between the two rivals from the class of God’s Year 816, coaxing Quintall into easing up on his jealousy of Avelyn.

The first three months of God’s Year 821 were full of excitement and anticipation throughout St.-Mere-Abelle. Nearly every day—when the weather was calm enough for the younger monks to go out into the courtyard—the students would glance repeatedly at the dark waters of All Saints Bay, shaking their heads whenever an iceberg floated by but always remarking that it would not be long. As Bafway, the third month, whose end marked the spring equinox, neared, the whispers became a contest to see who might first spot the square sails of the chartered ship.

Bafway proved to be a long, uneventful month. The spring equinox passed, and every time the weather seemed to be improving, another cold front would sweep down from Alpinador, chopping the waters of All Saints Bay into frothing, threatening whitecaps.

As the fourth month, Toumanay, slipped past, the quiet whispers became open discussions, with even the older brothers—even some of the masters—joining in, the older and more experienced holy men admitting that this was indeed a blessed time and a ship was indeed on its way to St.-Mere-Abelle. The only secret remained the subsequent destination of that ship, for only the masters and the four chosen monks knew the magical name Pimaninicuit.

Brother Avelyn’s thoughts were full of that island and of the long voyage ahead of him. He hardly considered the dangers, though he knew from his studies that on several occasions, the monks who had set out for Pimaninicuit had never returned, taken by storms or powries or by the great serpents of the Mirianic Ocean. Even on successful voyages to Pimaninicuit, more often than not, one or more of the four monks did not return, for disease was a very real fact of life aboard ship. What Avelyn focused on, therefore, was the destination, the isle itself. From the texts he had studied, he conjured images of lush gardens and exotic flowers, pictured himself standing in a garden with multicolored stones raining down around him, divine music playing in the air. He would run barefoot through the stones, would roll in them, would bask in his God.

Avelyn knew the absurdity of his fantasy, of course. When the showers arrived, he and his fellow Preparer would be hidden underground, sheltered from the pelting meteors. Even after the showers ceased, the pair would have to wait some time before handling the heated stones, and then the work would be too furious and desperate to pause and contemplate God.

But for all the harsh reality, for all the possibilities that he would not survive, Avelyn watched the watery horizon for hint of those square sails most intently of all. To his thinking, this was the pinnacle of his existence, the greatest joy that a monk of St.-Mere-Abelle might know, the closest, before death, that he could ever get to his God.

Toumanay was less than half finished when the two-masted caravel appeared, gliding swiftly through the choppy waters to the sheltered harbor before St.-Mere-Abelle. Avelyn spent the entirety of the morning in silent prayer, as instructed, and was shaking so badly when he was at last summoned to Father Abbot Markwart’s chambers that Master Jojonah had to lend him a supporting arm. The other three chosen were already in the spacious office when Avelyn and Jojonah arrived. All of the masters of St.-Mere-Abelle were there, along with the Father Abbot and two men Avelyn did not know, one tall and slender, the other shorter, much older, and so skinny that Avelyn wondered if he had eaten in a month. Avelyn quickly discerned that the taller man was obviously the captain of the chartered vessel. He stood with an air of superiority, posture perfect, hand on gilded rapier. He had a garish scar running from ear to chin that seemed to Avelyn somehow gallant, and, unlike his scruffy companion, he was clean shaven except for a neatly trimmed mustache, rolling out from the sides of his mouth and curling up. His eyes were dark brown, so dark that the pupil was hardly distinguishable from the iris; his hair was long and black and curly, and under one arm he had tucked a great hat, with an upturned brim and a feather on one side. The rest of his dress, though weathered, was rich, particularly a golden brocade and jewel-studded baldric. That garment held Avelyn’s attention acutely, for he sensed that at least one of those jewels, a small ruby, was more than ornamental.

Avelyn tried not to stare, confused as to why this man, who was not of the Order of St.-Mere-Abelle, was in possession of a sacred stone—and right in front of Father Abbot Markwart! Surely the Father Abbot and the masters recognized the jewel for what it was.

Avelyn calmed quickly; surely they did recognize the jewel, and apparently, it did not bother them. Perhaps, the younger brother reasoned, the stone had been given as payment for the ship, or perhaps it had only been loaned, a helpful tool for the perilous voyage. Avelyn shook it all away.

The older man caught Avelyn’s attention only because of his constant squinting, his bulbous eyes darting about nervously from man to man, head bobbing and trembling on his turkey neck. His clothing seemed nearly as old as he, worn out so badly in many places that Avelyn could see the darkly tanned skin beneath. He was dirty and gray, his hair cropped short and badly trimmed, and his beard untended. Avelyn had once heard the term “salty dog” in reference to seamen, and he thought that appropriate indeed for this one.

“Brother Quintall, Brother Pellimar, Brother Thagraine, and Brother Avelyn,” the Father Abbot said, indicating each monk, and each, in turn, bowing to their guests. “I give you Captain Adjonas of the good ship Windrunner, and his first hand, Bunkus Smealy.” The proud captain made no motion, but Bunkus bowed to each in turn so violently that he nearly toppled, and would have, had it not been for his proximity to Father Abbot Markwart’s huge desk.

“Captain Adjonas knows your course,” Markwart finished, “and you may trust that his is the finest ship on the Mirianic.”

“The tide will be favorable an hour after the dawn,” Adjonas said in a clear and strong voice—a voice befitting a man of his station, Avelyn thought. “If we miss the tide, we will lose an entire day.” The stern man steeled his gaze upon each of the four monks, letting them know right up front that the ship was his domain. “That would not be a wise thing to do. We shall be running against the weather at least until we have turned south of All Saints Bay. Each day we spend this far north brings the very real chance of complete ruin.”

The four young monks exchanged glances; Avelyn was sympathetic to the captain’s wishes and actually took some comfort in the man’s commanding, if cold, demeanor. He saw that his three companions apparently didn’t share his feelings, for Quintall openly scowled as if he were offended by a mere ship’s captain speaking so forcefully to him.

Father Abbot Markwart, also sensing the sudden tension, cleared his throat loudly. “You are dismissed,” he said to the four, “to an early meal and to your rooms. You are excused from all your duties this day, and all the ceremonies. Make your peace with God and prepare yourselves for the task before you.”

They left the office then, unescorted, and Quintall began openly complaining even as the door shut behind them.

“Captain Adjonas will be in for a long journey indeed if he thinks that he commands,” the stocky man said, to the nodding replies of both Thagraine and Pellimar.

“It is his ship,” Avelyn said simply.

“A ship bought,” Quintall replied immediately and brusquely. “Adjonas commands his crew to execute the task they were paid to do, but he does not command us. Understand that now. On the Windrunner, you and Thagraine answer only to Pellimar, and Pellimar answers only to me.”

Avelyn had no response to that. The pecking order for the voyage had indeed been determined in just that manner. While Thagraine and Avelyn, as Preparers, were paramount to the mission, Quintall and Pellimar had been given higher positions on the voyage to and from Pimaninicuit. Avelyn could accept that. If things got rough out on the seas, as expected, Quintall, the most physically impressive of the four, would be best prepared to handle any situation.

Avelyn left the group then, heading for his room as the Father Abbot had ordered. He was some distance down the corridor and still he heard complaining near the Abbot’s door. He suspected that Quintall and the others kept up their complaining for some time, long after he was kneeling beside his simple cot, falling deep into important prayer.

The morning ceremony was the grandest event that Avelyn had seen in his four and a half years at St.-Mere-Abelle. More than eight hundred monks, every member of the Order, including four score who were not living at the abbey any longer but were serving as missionaries all along All Saints Bay, lined the docks, lifting their voices in common song. The bells of the abbey pealed repeatedly, drawing curious onlookers from the nearby village of St.-Mere-Abelle. The ceremony began before dawn, intensified as the sun glistened on the horizon across the waters, then went on and on, one prayer after another, each song louder than the previous.

The four crewmen of the Windrunner’s boat, which was bouncing noisily against the wooden dock, sat through it all with smirking faces, thoroughly amused and certainly not impressed. As the day brightened, Avelyn could see the rest of the thirty-man crew lining the deck of the caravel, the ship resting at anchor some fifty yards out in the harbor.

The sailors cared nothing for this all-important mission, Avelyn realized, beyond their payment of gold—and whatever other trinkets Father Abbot Markwart had included in the bargain. Avelyn considered again the sacred stone woven into Captain Adjonas’ baldric, and the thought disturbed him more than a little. If the man, like his crew, was so obviously nonreligious, then he should not possess such a gem, not for any reason.

This was just the first hint, Avelyn understood, and he began to suspect that the long voyage—they were expected to be away for near to eight months—would be trying in more ways than physical.

First hand Bunkus Smealy interrupted the ceremony an hour or so after the dawn, calling out in a crusty voice, “Time for going!”

Father Abbot Markwart, closest to the craft, looked at the man, then turned back to the suddenly quiet gathering. He motioned to Siherton, and the hawkish master led the four chosen brothers to the edge of the dock. “Go with God’s graces,” he said to each as he stepped into the rolling craft. Avelyn nearly fell over the side, and banged his leg hard against the edge of the dock. He caught the look that crossed between Quintall and Siherton. Quintall seemed disgusted, but Siherton was unbending, silently imparting to the aggravated Quintall that his duties were paramount to his personal feelings.

Avelyn watched that stare, and the return look Quintall offered to the master, and he understood that, while Quintall hated him and was jealous of him, the man would indeed protect him at all costs on the journey to and from the island.

Or at least, to the island.

Songs followed them out across the harbor, and Quintall led them up the netting to the deck of the Windrunner, where Captain Adjonas, face as stern as ever, waited.

“With your permission, sir,” Quintall said evenly, as he had been instructed. Adjonas gave a curt nod, and Quintall paced by him, the other three monks in tow.

Avelyn remained at the taffrail—an ornate railing about waist high that encircled the stern deck—for some time, watching the walls of St.-Mere-Abelle diminish, as the drifting voices raised in joyous song faded. Soon the rugged hills of the coast were but a gray blur and the Windrunner, whose mainmast had appeared so tall and impressive in the sheltered harbor, seemed a tiny thing indeed, dwarfed by the overwhelming power of the vast Mirianic.

CHAPTER 13

Running Fast Down a Long,
Long Road

Elbryan froze as he heard the crusty snow crunch under his feet. His breath came slow and steady, and he let that sensation spread throughout his tense body, easing muscles, finding a solid harmony, a more perfect balance. He could see the deer’s shoulder over the next rise. Its head had not come up; it had not heard the slight noise.

That slight noise had sounded so clearly to Elbryan!

The young man paused then to consider the extent of his progress. Only the previous autumn, his fourth in Andur’Blough Inninness, he had not been able to get within fifty feet of such a wary creature. Only the previous autumn, he would not even have noticed his last slight misstep. The elves had worked him hard, very hard. He continued his daily gathering of the milk-stones, though now he ate a hot meal every time, easily avoiding even the most cunning of the elvish traps. No longer was the rest of the day his own, though, for the elves had filled his afternoons and early evenings with lessons on the ways of beast and plant. He had learned to identify the various plants and their properties, often medicinal. Elbryan had learned to walk nearly silently—though he still thought himself clumsy when measured against the graceful elves! He had learned truly to understand and recognize the perspective of those animals watching him, that he might better blend into the forest background. He had learned to observe the world through the senses of each animal, understood now each creature’s fears and needs. To a squirrel and a rabbit, he could become perfectly unthreatening, coaxing the beast to feed right from his hand. And to a deer, perhaps the most skittish creature of all . . .

He was barely a half dozen steps away, unnoticed, on open ground.

His focus went back to the task at hand, to the six most difficult steps of all. He considered the air around him, the slight breeze in his face. Winter was still present in this part of Andur’Blough Inninness, but its grip was fast loosening. The deer was having little trouble finding grass through the spotty layer of snow, and its treasurelike find had it, perhaps, a little less alert than usual.

Elbryan couldn’t suppress his widening smile. Eagerness welled within him, the very real hope that this time he would touch that animal. He took another step, then another.

Too quickly, with too little time to find his center of balance.

The deer’s head came up, ears twitching, scanning; Elbryan’s smile vanished. He went forward with all speed, scrambling over the low ridge. He dove and reached, desperate to slap the creature, though he knew perfectly well that this kind of closing rush was not what Juraviel and Tuntun wanted from him.

Would his victory prove tainted?

The point was moot, anyway, for Elbryan never got close to touching the elusive deer. A single great leap sent the beast flying away, disappearing so quickly into the twigs and branches of the forest lining the small meadow that it was lost to Elbryan’s sight before he ever recovered from his lunging roll.

The young man shifted to a sitting position and sagged on the wet ground. Juraviel came to him at once, the elf grinning and nodding. “Elu touise!” Juraviel exclaimed and patted the young man on the back. “So very close!”

“I lost control,” Elbryan said despondently. “At the last, and most crucial moment, my eagerness overcame my movement.”

“Ah, but you miss the point,” the elf replied. “You kept control for all this time, closing perfectly.”

“I did not touch the deer!”

“But you have approached the goal,” Juraviel cried. “You have just begun, my young friend. Think not of the failure but of the triumph. Never have you gotten this close; but you shall again, and when you do, you will know better and will temper your eagerness.”

Elbryan looked at the elf long and hard, glad for the words. Put in that manner, this was indeed a day of celebration. He hadn’t touched the deer, that was true, but his progress beyond his last few fumbling attempts was marked.

Just as the young man’s smile began to widen, Tuntun came out of the brush, walking back from the spot where the deer had disappeared. She moved right in front of Elbryan and put her tiny hand up to his face.

He smelled the scent of deer on her fingers.

“Blood of Mather.” Tuntun snorted sarcastically as she moved away, the all too familiar phrase that Elbryan had grown tired of years before. He looked back at Juraviel for support and found that the elf was working hard to hide his grin.

Elbryan sighed deeply. He tried to keep a perspective on his gains. Could any of the men of Dundalis, could his own father, have ever gotten that close to a deer? Still, Elbryan wasn’t among those folk anymore, and in measuring his progress in all areas but physical strength against the elves of Andur’Blough Inninness, he felt a novice indeed. It was hard for the young man to appreciate all he had learned when he considered all he had left to learn.

Juraviel offered him a hand, and Elbryan took it, though in truth the elf could do little to help the large man rise. There was very little boyishness left in Elbryan’s frame. He stood three inches over six feet, tall and muscular, and his two hundred and twenty lean, strong pounds put him at more than three times the weight of the average elf. Not that Juraviel and the others weren’t strong; it constantly amazed Elbryan how much power an elf packed into its tiny frame, power he felt all too often in the sting of a practice sword’s strike during his sparring sessions!

Together, with Tuntun nearby but comfortably—for herself and for Elbryan—out of sight, the pair enjoyed the fine day as they made their way to the southern end of the enchanted valley, the area of Andur’Blough Inninness where winter had never found a hold. They chatted easily, Juraviel doing most of the talking, explaining this plant and that, talking of ways to bind a wound, then shifting the subject back to where Elbryan had performed well and where he had failed in his quest to slap the deer. Such were Juraviel’s methods, his enchanting and engrossing conversation techniques, that Elbryan hardly realized this to be perhaps the most important part of his training, these daily chats, anecdotal and enjoyable.

They walked down confusing trails, often branching, seeming to go in circles, seeming as if they merely ended until that apparent end was reached. Elbryan still could not navigate this area, but he was gaining some understanding. Juraviel let him lead often and corrected him whenever he went wrong—which was not often any longer—and soon the pair came into the low dell called Caer’alfar: Elvenhome. It was a place of thick grass and lines of trees, with houses built in the boughs above the ground. It was a place of flowers and song, where the forest was not so thick and the sky could be seen from many vantage points. This was the very center of the mist that blanketed Andur’Blough Inninness during the light of day, and yet Caer’alfar was rarely covered, a small hole remaining in the gray canopy, unnoticeable from anywhere but this low meadow, that the elves might enjoy the sun as well as the stars.

Dozens of elves were about this day, some sparring with practice weapons, others dancing. Some rested back against the trees or lay comfortably in the soft grass, drinking their sweet Questel ni’ touel wine. Here and there debates sprang up concerning the value of the spirits and what they should bring in trade, for the spring caravan would soon depart, a group of elves going to their secret contacts in the frontier villages.

All in all, the peaceful scene struck a chord in Elbryan about how out of place he was, and yet, he somehow felt as if he belonged. He had been coming into Caer’alfar regularly since the turn of the year, and now the elves hardly gave him a thought as he walked in. No longer was he an outcast—he even joined in their nightly party of song and dance—and yet, he was so obviously different. For Elbryan, his entire existence seemed as it had been on those occasions many years back in Dundalis when his father and mother invited friends to the house. Sometimes Elbryan would be allowed to stay up late, sometimes he would even be allowed to join in their dice games for a bit before retiring. How grown up he had felt! And yet, he was not really a part of that game, of that group. His parents and their adult friends had accepted him with smiles that he now realized were somewhat condescending.

So it was with the elves. He could never truly be one of them.

He and Juraviel continued their conversation until Tuntun walked by, eyeing Elbryan derisively and tapping her smooth cheek and chin. Elbryan understood—so did Juraviel—and the elf motioned for the young man to go to his place. Above all else, the elves were meticulous about grooming. Elbryan was expected to bathe daily, to keep his clothing clean, and since his beard was splotchy and uneven, not yet that of a man, to keep his face clean shaven. That was the one task which always seemed to elude the young man—until Tuntun inevitably pointed it out—although, with the impossibly fine-edged elven knife, shaving was neither painful nor troublesome.

Elbryan moved grudgingly to his lodging, a low, wide house on the bottom boughs of a thick-limbed elm. He collected his bowl, towel, and knife, but before he began, remembered that he had not yet asked Juraviel when they would again stalk a deer, something the eager young man greatly wanted to know.

He slipped down from the tree house and moved about Caer’alfar, spotting Juraviel talking with another elf across the way. Elbryan smiled sneakily and went into a crouch. Perhaps the only creature more difficult to surprise than the wary deer was the forest elf! Using all his skills, the young man picked his way through the trees, scampering across the opening, finding cover wherever he could. The other elves took little notice, hardly caring for his games, and Juraviel and his companion remained apparently oblivious.

Elbryan put his back to a tree barely a dozen feet from the pair and considered his next move.

“Within six strides,” Juraviel was saying in the elven tongue. “Perhaps five. And the deer did not notice.”

“Well done!” the other congratulated.

Elbryan nearly fainted away. He recognized the voice, melodic and higher pitched than Juraviel’s, as that of Lady Dasslerond, the High Lady of Caer’alfar and of all Andur’Blough Inninness.

And she was speaking of him! Elbryan held steady his breath, paying close attention, for though he could understand the melodic language, many individual words might elude him if he was not careful. With Lady Dasslerond speaking of him, the young man didn’t want to miss a thing.

“In the fighting, too,” she went on, “he is losing much of the clumsiness that comes with his human heritage, and what a combination of power and grace he shall be when one of his stature learns to wield the sword as an elf!”

Elbryan peeked around the tree to see Juraviel nodding his agreement. He forgot all about his game of surprising the pair then; and used his stealth ability to extract himself from the area, return to his tree house—which was closer to the ground than the sky—to shave and to prepare himself for his next sparring session, one he suddenly intended to win.

Early that evening, Elbryan walked onto the low meadow, ringed by tall, thick pines and capped by the starry canopy. He carried only a long smooth pole, his weapon. The elf was already there, and Elbryan breathed a sigh of relief when he noted that it was not Tuntun waiting for him.

He could never catch Tuntun off her guard; she relished the sparring matches, acting as if they were her personal forum for punishing the young man. After his first few encounters with the surly elf, Elbryan had wondered what it was that so prompted her desire to punish. Soon enough the young man had realized that it was for no particular act but merely because he was not elvish.

His opponent this night was Tallareyish Issinshine, an older and calmer member of the elvish band. He was a quiet sort and rarely talked with Elbryan, though, according to Juraviel, Tallareyish had the finest singing voice in all of Andur’Blough Inninness. Elbryan had sparred with him only once, very early in his training, and had been put down rather easily.

“Not this time,” the young man muttered under his breath as he walked determinedly to the center of the meadow. He moved to a spot five feet from the sprite and bowed low, as did Tallareyish, in respect.

Elbryan presented his long pole horizontally in front of him; the elf responded by crossing his two smaller poles, replicas of slender elvish swords, in the air before him.

“Fight well,” Tallareyish said, the proper beginning.

“And you,” Elbryan answered, and on he came, full of fury and determination. His skills had improved, so he had heard Juraviel say, and now he meant to show how much.

He started with a cunning feint, boring in, mock spear leading, as if he meant to overrun the diminutive elf, and then pulling to an abrupt stop and swishing his weapon hard to the side. He had to guess, of course, which way agile Tallareyish would spin, and even though he guessed correctly that the elf would go to his right, his swipe was batted aside, not once but three times, before it ever got close to hitting the mark.

Tallareyish came right back in, wooden swords dancing and weaving, cutting figure eights and then darting straight ahead suddenly, viciously. Elbryan could not watch them and try to react. He had to anticipate, and so he did, flipping his spear over one hand counterclockwise and then back again, then again clockwise, then back the other way. He hardly saw the elf’s attacks, but he took comfort in the clicking sounds as the twirling pole picked off each one.

“Well done!” Tallareyish commented, pressing the attack with every word.

Elbryan’s green eyes sparkled with pride. He kept his focus, though, and knew that he had to get off the defensive posture. He had spent many hours with Juraviel playing the game the elves called pellell, resembling something close to a three-tiered chess match, and he had learned well the value of taking the initiative. At this point, Tallareyish was playing white, pressing the attack, but Elbryan meant to reverse that.

Over went his spinning pole, clockwise to his right, then it went over again, and then a third time, Elbryan sliding his foot further to the right with each spin. Tallareyish turned in pursuit and came forward, one step, left foot. Elbryan tensed.

Another step, right foot.

Elbryan caught his long pole in both hands to stop its spin. He threw it out diagonally to his left, then let go with his left hand, planted the pole against his right hip with his elbow, and swept it back across in front of him, forcing Tallareyish to fall a step to the side, forcing the elf’s wooden weapon away.

The eager young man rushed through the opening, shuffling a few steps past Tallareyish’s right flank, then cut a swift pivot, grabbing his pole down low with both hands and sweeping it back.

It swished through the air, hitting nothing, and Elbryan’s eyes widened in shock as he came to realize that Tallareyish had followed his move perfectly, had run out right behind him. Elbryan was not surprised, therefore, when the elf’s poles smacked him, but not so hard, on the rump and the back of the knee. His leg nearly buckled, but he managed to swing about, his pole, still flying in a desperate, wide arc.

Tallareyish ducked low under it and double-poked his weapons, stabbing at the young man’s belly twice, though neither connected. The elf came forward suddenly, furiously, as Elbryan halted the flow of his pole and snapped it back to the ready, a beautiful recover.

And one that might have worked against a human or a goblin. Tallareyish, though, was diving low before the pole ever got back in front of Elbryan. The elf went into a headlong roll, right between the young man’s widespread legs, came up to his feet behind the yelling and turning Elbryan, and reversed his momentum, stabbing both his poles back over his shoulders.

Elbryan was already into his responding turn but not far enough, and the elf’s blades poked him hard in the kidneys. Waves of pain buckled the young man’s legs. He continued to swing, but he was down on one knee then, and his blurred vision didn’t even register that Tallareyish had moved again.

The next hit, a heavy slash, caught the young man across the shoulder blades and laid him out facedown on the wet grass.

Elbryan lay still for a long, long while, his eyes closed, his thoughts whirling. He had come in so full of hope, and had gone down so very hard.

“Well done,” he heard above him—Juraviel’s voice. The young man rolled over and opened his eyes; he was surprised to find that Tallareyish was no longer there, that Juraviel was apparently speaking to him, was, for some reason that Elbryan could not understand, congratulating him.

“Do you often salute corpses?” Elbryan asked sarcastically, each word strained from the pain.

Juraviel only laughed.

“I heard you,” Elbryan said accusingly.

The elf stopped his grinning and painted a serious expression, understanding the sudden gravity and frustration in the young man’s tone.

“You and Lady Dasslerond,” Elbryan clarified. “You said that I had come far in fighting as well.”

Juraviel’s expression hardly changed, as if he didn’t understand the point Elbryan was trying to make.

“You said that!” the frustrated young man accused.

“Indeed,” replied Juraviel.

“But here I am.” Elbryan spat, pulling himself to his knees and tossing aside his pole—a useless piece of wood, by his current estimation. He flinched as he straightened and grabbed at his kidney.

“Here you are,” Juraviel agreed, “fighting better than any, Tuntun included, would have believed possible.”

“Here I am,” Elbryan corrected grimly, “spitting grass.”

Juraviel laughed aloud, something the young man obviously did not appreciate. “Two in three,” the elf remarked.

Elbryan shook his head, not understanding.

“Tallareyish’s maneuver,” Juraviel explained. “The roll through your legs. Two in three attempts, it will work; the third equals complete disaster.”

Elbryan quieted and considered the thought. He didn’t like his odds in that prospect—only one in three—but the mere fact that he had forced Tallareyish into so desperate a routine—and any routine that held a reasonable chance of utter failure was indeed desperate—surprised him.

“And of the two that work, only half will gain a solid strike,” Juraviel went on. “Even worse, you have now seen the ‘shadow dive,’ as we call it, and you will never, ever be taken by it again.”

“Tallareyish was worried,” Elbryan said quietly.

“Tallareyish was nearly beaten,” Juraviel agreed. “You executed the plant of your staff on hip perfectly, and your step timing was without error. Even in running behind you was Tallareyish forced off his balance; that is why his passing strikes were of little consequence. Your turn, and subsequent blows, would have forced a close-quarters parry, at the very least, and no elf desires that with one of your size and strength.”

“So he dove ahead,” Elbryan concluded.

“He was stumbling anyway,” Juraviel explained. “And only that stumble allowed your mighty swipe to go over his head.” The elf gave a chuckle. “Had it connected, I fear that Tallareyish would still be lying facedown on the field!”

Elbryan managed a smile. To think that he had almost won! To think that he had put one of the agile elves off his balance!

“When first we began the sparring, any elf in Caer’alfar could defeat you easily, with hardly any effort,” Juraviel said. “We drew lots each night to find your opponent, for none, other than Tuntun, wanted to waste time in battling you.”

Elbryan chuckled, not surprised that predictable Tuntun enjoyed issuing the beatings.

“Now your opponents are selected carefully, as we bring to you different fighting styles, ones that we believe will offer you the greatest challenge. You have come far.”

“I have far to go.”

Juraviel would not argue the point. “You heard my conversation,” he replied. “Our Lady was not exaggerating when she spoke of your potential, my young friend. With your great strength, and the elven sword dancing style, you will be the match of any man, of any elf, of any goblin, of any fomorian. You have been with us only four years and a season. You have time.”

That last sentence brought a strange feeling over Elbryan. He was indeed grateful for the kind and optimistic words, and felt better, much better, about his loss to Tallareyish. But now something else tugged at him and put him on edge. What might come next for him? Elbryan had come to think of his life with the elves as a permanent arrangement, had figured that he would live in Andur’Blough Inninness for the rest of his mortal days. The notion of going out from the enchanted valley, perhaps of walking with his own kind again, scared him.

But also intrigued him.

Suddenly the world seemed much wider.

CHAPTER 14

Jilly

Cat-the-Stray was more than a little surprised, and embarrassed, when her would-be rescuer ventured into the Way the following week. To his credit, the gentleman did not approach her directly, nor did he leer at her or make any remarks whatsoever that made the young woman feel uncomfortable.

For her part, Cat kept her distance, offering a shy smile once or twice but mostly looking the other way. A part of her was very glad that the handsome man had returned, but another part of her, a very large part, was more than a little uncomfortable with the whole situation. She was closer to seventeen than sixteen now, by all appearances no more a girl, and surely the thought of the handsome man imparted intriguing, warm thoughts.

The man left early, tipping his floppy beret to Cat as he exited, his light brown eyes sparkling gaily, and the young woman was both relieved and upset that this second meeting had ended so abruptly. She shrugged it away, though, and went about her work, giving the stranger not another thought.

He came into the Way again the following week.

Again, he was more than polite, the perfect gentleman, not pressuring Cat to even so much as offer a greeting to him. He watched her more closely this time, though, and whenever she looked back, his eyes widened with intensity.

His intentions were becoming quite clear.

That night, alone in her room, Cat-the-Stray found it more difficult to dismiss her thoughts of the man. She wondered what life might be like for her in the years to come, away from Pettibwa and Graevis perhaps. She dared to fantasize about a life without work in Fellowship Way, about a life in a home of her own, with children of her own. That notion inevitably led her back to images of her own childhood, of her mother . . .

Cat-the-Stray shook her head violently, as if trying to launch the disturbing half memories right out of her ear. Suddenly the fantasy became a horrid thing that had no relevance to her present life. Her place was in the Way, with Graevis and Pettibwa. This was her home and, though she did not yet realize it, this place was also her shield against memories too terrible for her to face.

But the handsome gentleman came back again the night after the next, and then again the next week, and, predictably, the whispers started that his heart had been stolen by a certain barmaid. Cat-the-Stray tried to ignore the whispers and the sidelong glances, but even Pettibwa, cheery cheeked and grinning slyly, caught Cat’s gaze and nodded her head in the man’s direction more than once.

“Will ye wait the man at the table near to the window for me?” the conniving woman asked often, always with some excuse close at hand.

Cat-the-Stray could hardly refuse, but she went to the man with a cold demeanor indeed, asking what he fancied and pointedly clarifying that she was referring to food or drink only. Again to his credit, the gentleman did not press the young woman, but ordered some wine only.

He was in the tavern the next week, as well, and this time, Pettibwa, seeming a bit frustrated with the young woman, was more straightforward about insisting that the man was Cat’s to serve. Even more disheartening to the frightened young woman, Pettibwa left the Way a short while later, only to return with Grady.

“Gone on about long enough by me own thinking,” Cat heard the woman say to her son, to which Grady laughed and eyed Cat directly. He moved from his mother immediately and took Cat by the hand, pulling her along toward the man who had become such a regular in the tavern.

Cat resisted, tugging back, until she noted that half the patrons were watching and smiling, obviously understanding what was going on.

Cat pulled her hand from Grady’s grasp. “Lead on, then,” she muttered grimly, as if he were some powrie captain walking her to the plank of his barrelboat.

The gentleman smiled in recognition of Grady when he noticed the approach.

“My greetings to you, Master Bildeborough,” Grady said, sweeping a low bow.

“And mine to you, Master Chilichunk,” Bildeborough replied, though he didn’t bother to get up from his seat and likewise bow.

“I believe that you are acquainted with my . . .” Grady fished for the right word, and Cat, blushing fiercely, wanted to smack him on the back of the head.

“My sister,” Grady finished. “By adoption, of course.”

“Of course,” Bildeborough agreed. “She is much too beautiful to be a blood sister of yours!”

Grady’s lips seemed to disappear, but in truth, there was indeed little family resemblance between him and Cat-the-Stray. The young woman was undeniably beautiful, even in her plain barmaid’s dress. Her hair was long and golden, her eyes a startlingly clear and rich shade of blue, and her skin silken smooth and slightly tanned. Everything about her seemed to fit perfectly—her nose, eyes, and mouth in perfect proportion, her legs and arms long and slender but certainly not skinny. Her gait enhanced that perception as well, for she walked with ease and fluidity, always balanced.

“Cat-the-Stray is her name,” Grady said, eyeing the young woman somewhat contemptuously. “Or at least, that is the name Graevis, my father, gave to her when she was taken in.”

“Orphaned?” Bildeborough asked, seeming genuinely sympathetic.

Cat nodded, and her expression told the gentleman to let it go, which, of course, he did.

“And Cat,” continued Grady, “I give to you Master Connor Bildeborough of Chasewind Manor. Master Bildeborough’s father is the brother of Baron Bildeborough, who presides over the outlands of County Palmaris, third only to the duke, and of course, they both to the King himself.”

Cat realized that she should have appeared more impressed, but in truth, little about society had ever meant anything to her. She smiled at the man, at least—and from Cat-the-Stray, that was something!—and he returned the grin.

“I do thank you for the introduction,” Connor said to Grady, his tone begging the man to take his leave. Grady was more than willing to comply, practically shoving Cat right onto the man’s lap as he moved behind her. Grady then gave a curt bow and rushed away, back to a wide-smiling Pettibwa.

Cat backed away, glanced over her shoulder, and straightened her dress. She knew that her face was bright red, and felt the perfect fool, but Connor Bildeborough was no novice to the ways of courting.

“For all these weeks, I have come back to the Way hoping that you would once again find yourself in danger,” he said, taking Cat completely off her guard.

“Such a wonderful wish,” the young woman replied sarcastically.

“Well, I merely wanted to prove to you that I would be willing to rescue you,” said Connor.

Cat did well to keep the grimace from her face. Her pride didn’t appreciate that condescending notion—she was never one to think she needed anyone’s protection—but again she managed to check the defensive reflex, consciously reminding herself that this man truly meant no harm.

“Is not that the way it is supposed to happen?” Connor asked lightly, pouring half his wine into an empty glass on the table, then handing Cat the original glass, from which he had not yet sipped. “The young damsel, caught by fiends, rescued by the gallant hero?”

Cat couldn’t quite decipher his tone, but she was quite certain that he was not mocking her.

“Rubbish,” Connor went on. “Perhaps I came here hoping that I would get into a bit of a stew, so to speak, that you might rescue me.”

“And why would I want to be doing that?”

Cat could hardly believe she had spoken the words, but her horror vanished when Connor laughed heartily. “Why, indeed?” he said. “After all, I was a bit late in getting to the three who came after you, and as I said on that night, I believe that I did more to help their cause than your own!”

“Are you mocking me?”

“I am admiring you, young lady,” Connor replied without hesitation.

“Am I to swoon, then?” Cat asked, growing bolder and more sarcastic. “Should I run from the Way and hunt up some willing rogues, that your pride be assuaged?”

Again came the heartfelt laugh, and this time, despite herself, Cat found herself laughing with Connor.

“You are the spirited one,” Connor remarked. “A bit of the wild pony in you, not to doubt!”

Cat’s laugh was buried in confusion as soon as she registered the analogy. Something about the comparison, something she could not grasp, tugged hard at her, begging for release.

“My apologies,” Connor said a few moment’s later. “I meant no disrespect.”

That wasn’t it at all, Cat silently replied, but to Connor, she said nothing.

“By my heart, my remark referred not at all to your virtue, which I would not question,” Connor went on sincerely.

Cat nodded to him and managed a smile. “I have my work . . .” she started to say.

“Might we walk when you are done?” Connor asked boldly. “I have waited these weeks—more than a month it has been—just to be told your name. Might we walk?”

Cat didn’t know what to reply. “I must ask Pettibwa,” she explained, only to buy herself some time.

“I will assure her of my honor,” Connor asserted and started to rise.

Cat caught him by the shoulder—her strength seemed to surprise him—and held him back. “No need,” she assured him. “No need.”

She smiled at him again, pushed the wineglass, from which she had not sipped, back in front of him, and took her leave.

“Oh, by me eyes, he’s a handsome one!” Pettibwa beamed when she caught up to Cat in the small kitchen behind the bar area a short while later. The older woman clapped her pudgy hands before her, her toothy smile nearly taking in her ears. She clapped her hands again, then wrapped Cat in a bone-crushing hug.

“I had not noticed,” Cat replied coolly, not returning the hug and trying hard to keep her expression blank as Pettibwa jumped back to arm’s length.

“Hadn’t ye, now?”

“You embarrassed me.”

“Meself?” Pettibwa said innocently. “Ah, but, me girl, ye’d never find one sweet for ye if I left ye to yer own doings. Why, ye act like no man’s a good man!” The woman gave a bawdy wink. “So tell me now that ye’re not feeling a bit warm in yer belly, and a bit o’ the tingling, when ye look upon Master Bildeborough.”

Cat blushed fiercely, all the confirmation Pettibwa needed.

“No reason for embarrassment,” the woman said. “It’s all so natural.” She hooked one finger in the cleavage of Cat’s dress, pulled the dress lower, and shook her hand about, so that the young woman’s breasts jiggled. “And what are ye thinkin’ these are for?” Pettibwa asked.

Cat’s look was one of pure horror.

“For catchin’ men and feeding babies,” the woman said with a wink. “And ye can’t get the latter without the former!”

“Pettibwa!”

“Oh, go on then!” Pettibwa shot back. “I know ye think he’s handsome, and who wouldn’t? And well mannered and up to his waist in the gold, too. Nephew of the Baron himself! Why, even me Grady’s speaking highly o’ the man, and ye be knowing, by Grady’s words, that the man’s speaking highly o’ Cat-the-Stray. Sure there’s a sparkle in his eye when he’s looking on ye, and his pants are gettin’ a bit too ti—”

“Pettibwa!”

The older woman laughed riotously, and Cat took the welcomed break in the conversation to consider her words. Grady was all for this, so said Pettibwa, but Cat knew that had little to do with the demeanor of her would-be suitor. If she was set up with a nobleman, the gain for Grady would be twofold. First, he’d have the prestige of being related to the nobility, a sure invitation to any important social event, and most of all, with Cat’s needs attended to by outside money, she could have no claim on the lucrative Fellowship Way.

So Grady’s enthusiasm for this alliance held little weight with Cat, but Pettibwa’s exuberance was a bit harder to dismiss. Through all the bawdy talk, Cat could see that her adopted mother was indeed thrilled at the prospect of Cat being courted, especially by one as influential and handsome as Master Connor Bildeborough of Chasewind Manor.

So what did Cat think? That was the real question, the only one that truly mattered, but the young woman couldn’t look at things that way, not now, not with Pettibwa beaming more brightly than ever.

“He asked me to walk with him when I am done with my work,” Cat admitted.

“Oh, do!” Pettibwa said. “And if he means to kiss ye, then let him,” she said, tapping Cat on the cheek.

“But these,” Pettibwa went on, hooking her finger again and giving Cat’s breasts another jiggle, “these’ll wait a bit.”

Cat blushed again and looked away, pointedly did not look down. Her breasts had developed late, just past her sixteenth birthday, and, though by any standards they only added to her beautiful feminine form, she had never been comfortable with them. They represented another side of the girl, a womanly side, sensual, sexual—a part that Cat’s free and girlish spirit was not yet ready to admit. Graevis used to wrestle with her, had helped her to mature her fighting skills, but once those breasts had swelled, the man stayed away. It was as if they were a boundary between Cat and her beloved adopted father, a signal that she was not his little girl any longer.

In truth, Cat had never been his “little girl.” That had been reserved for another man, in some place far away, a place that Cat could not remember.

She wasn’t ready to grow up yet, not all the way.

And yet she couldn’t ignore the advances of handsome Connor Bildeborough, not at the price of breaking Pettibwa’s heart.

She went for the walk, and truly had a lovely time, for she found that Connor was as easy to talk to as he was to look at. He let her lead the conversation, down any avenue of her choosing, and was careful not to question her too personally on any points. She told him only that she was not really the daughter of the Chilichunks, but had been adopted in a faraway village called, according to Graevis, Weedy Meadow. “Have you ever heard a name so foolish?” she said, embarrassed. She went on to explain that she didn’t know where she had been before that, didn’t know of her family or her real name.

Connor left her at the door of the private quarters behind Fellowship Way. He didn’t even try to kiss her, not on the face anyway, only took her hand in his own and put it gently to his lips.

“I will come back,” he promised, “but only if you so desire.”

Before, she could even consider the question or the implications, Cat found herself mesmerized by the way his lashes closed upon those beautiful brown eyes. He was tall—he had to be close to six feet—and slender, but his body was hard with well-honed muscles. Strange emotions swirled in Cat as he lightly touched her arm, vaguely familiar feelings but ones she had not felt in several years.

“May I, Cat?” he asked.

“No,” she replied, and his expression became crestfallen. “Not Cat,” she explained quickly, and then, with a most curious expression, she said, “Jilly.”

“Jilly?”

“Or Jill,” the young woman replied, seeming sincerely confused. “Jill. Jill, not Cat. They used to call me Jilly.”

Her excitement mounted with each word, and so did Connor’s. “Your name!” he exclaimed. “You’ve remembered it!”

“Not Cat, never Cat,” Jill said firmly. “It is Jilly, Jill. I am sure of it!”

He kissed her, right on the lips, but he backed off at once as if in apology, as if to let her know that it was unintentional, a consequence of his sudden joy.

Jill let it go without a word.

“You must go and tell Pettibwa,” Connor bade her, “though surely I hate to part with you now.” He tipped his chin toward the door behind the young woman.

Jill nodded and moved to leave, but Connor caught her by the shoulder and turned her about to face him.

“May I return to Fellowship Way?” he asked in all seriousness.

Jill thought of some smart remark about the tavern being a public place, but she held her tongue and merely nodded, offering a warm smile. There followed a tense moment—Jill, and probably Connor, not sure if he would try to kiss her again.

He didn’t; he just grabbed her hand in both of his, squeezed it warmly, then turned and walked away.

Jill wasn’t sure if she was glad of that or not.

Pettibwa accepted the news with the purest joy—Jill was afraid that the woman would be hurt when she cast off the name Graevis had given to her. Far from it, though, the woman bubbled with joyful tears. “Not fittin’ to be calling ye Cat when ye’re no more a girl,” she said, wrapping Jill in a hug, falling over her so heavily that the strong young woman could hardly hold them both upright.

Jill went to bed that night full of warm feelings, some pleasant, others too intense, too uncomfortable for her to understand. Her thoughts careened back and forth between the realization of her true name and her experience with Connor. So much had happened, in a single night! So many emotions and memories had come rushing to the surface. Now she knew her name: Jill—though she knew that she was more often called Jilly.

And that feeling when Connor was close to her! How could she sweat so much on such a cool night?

That feeling, too, seemed something out of her past, something wonderful and terrifying all at once.

She couldn’t place it, and didn’t try. She knew her name now, and suspected that alone would begin to bring other memories back to her. And so it was with a true jumble of emotions, a purely teenage churning of confusion, fear and warmth, happiness and the verge of terror, that the young woman, no longer Cat-the-Stray, drifted off to a sleep of the sweetest dreams and the starkest nightmares.

CHAPTER 15

Miss Pippin

They were out beyond sight of land all too quickly, rolling on great swells and an aroma so thick that Avelyn felt as if he could float atop it. They were busy every minute, checking and rechecking lines, adjusting the rigging, for the Windrunner hadn’t been out to deep sea in several years and Captain Adjonas was clearly nervous. Old Bunkus Smealy seemed to take extra pleasure in ordering the monks on any particularly dangerous task.

But the old sea dog couldn’t fathom the level of physical training these four men had endured. He ordered Thagraine and Quintall up the yard of the mainmast, and so up they went, faster than any crewman on the Windrunner. Smealy sent them far out on the yard, and they went easily, hanging under, hand over hand, adjusting the rigging and then sliding down the ropes to stand on the deck right beside the first hand.

“Well, next for ye—” Smealy began, but Quintall cut him short.

“Take care, Master Smealy,” the monk said calmly. “We are as part of the crew, and as such, will work—” He paused, his stare boring into the man. They were about the same height, but Quintall carried an extra fifty pounds, every one of them hardened muscle. “—as the crew works,” Quintall finished ominously. “If you entertain thoughts of working the brothers of St.-Mere-Abelle beyond what you demand of the regular crew, then accompany those thoughts with visions of swimming.”

Smealy squinted perhaps a dozen times in the next few seconds and lifted a hand to scratch hard at his gray hair—to kill a few lice, Avelyn figured. The twitchy little man looked across the open deck, past the staring eyes of the crewmen, to the tall, regal figure of Captain Adjonas.

Quintall suspected that he and his fellow brothers might be fighting very soon, but so be it. He had to set the ground rules right away or this would be a long and perilous journey indeed. This was Adjonas’ ship, that Quintall did not dispute, but the abbey had paid well for this transport and the brothers had not been put aboard as slaves.

To the relief of the monks—though Quintall felt a bit of disappointment—Adjonas tipped his great feathered hat to the monk and nodded slightly, a clear sign of respect.

Quintall glowered at Smealy, the old sea dog trembling with frustration. Smealy glanced at each of the four monks, spat something unintelligible, then stormed away, taking out his rage on the nearest crewmen.

“You took a chance,” Pellimar remarked.

Quintall nodded. “Would you have us treated as cattle?” he asked. “We would all be dead before we ever reached Pimaninicuit.” He grunted and started away.

“Not all, perhaps,” Thagraine remarked, stopping Quintall short.

Avelyn and Pellimar held their breath at the bold words. The monks still carried some jealousy, Avelyn—and obviously Thagraine—realized, concerning which pair would go onto Pimaninicuit.

Quintall turned slowly. Two long strides brought him right up to Thagraine. “You might have fallen from the mast,” he said bluntly, his tone making the statement sound like a threat. “And then I would journey to the island.”

“But I did not fall.”

“And I did not push you,” Quintall stated. “You have been given your duty, and I mine. I will get you to Pimaninicuit.” He glanced Avelyn’s way. “Both of you, and if Captain Adjonas or Bunker Smealy—or any others aboard the Windrunner—conspire differently, they will answer to Quintall.”

“And to Pellimar,” the fourth monk added.

“And to Thagraine,” the man said, smiling.

“And to Avelyn,” Avelyn was compelled to add. The bond was immediate and secure, the four monks putting aside their personal squabbles in light of potentially more dangerous enemies. Avelyn, who had worked so closely with Quintall for more than four years, found that he believed the man wholly. He looked at Thagraine, who by fate had become his most trusted ally, and he smiled when he noted that the man and Pellimar, who had been together a year longer than had Avelyn and Quintall, had clasped wrists firmly, staring eye to eye.

It was indeed a good start.

No land came in sight for three days, the Windrunner making a direct run to the southeastern point of the Gulf of Corona, the northern tip of the region known as the Mantis Arm. They saw a light after dusk on that third day, far to the south but obviously high above the waterline.

“Pireth Tulme,” Captain Adjonas explained to his guests. “The Coastpoint Guards.”

“Whatever it may be,” Pellimar put in, “it is good to see a sign of land again.”

“You will be seeing it often over the next two weeks,” Adjonas replied. “We will run the length of the Mantis Arm near to the shore, then to deeper water in a straight run to Freeport and Entel.”

“And then?” Pellimar’s voice was full of anticipation.

“And then we have just begun,” Quintall put in firmly. The stocky man knew their course better than his three companions, as part of his private training with Master Siherton. The dangers of such a voyage were many, but perhaps most prominent among them was the danger to the mind. Pellimar seemed too eager, as if he expected Pimaninicuit to be quite close to Entel, but in truth, the Windrunner would likely spend the better part of four months getting to the island, and that was assuming favorable winds. Even if they arrived at Pimaninicuit early, they would only spend their days encircling the island, awaiting the day of the stone showers.

“Then we turn more directly south,” Captain Adjonas added.

“In sight of land?” Pellimar asked.

Adjonas scoffed at the absurd notion. “The only land to be seen would be the coast of Behren.”

“We are not at war with Behren,” Pellimar promptly put in.

“But the southern kingdom has little control over its raiders,” Adjonas explained. “To be in sight of land would mean to be in sight of pirates.” He snorted and walked away, but paused, looked back, and motioned to them.

The four began to follow.

“Only you,” Adjonas said, pointing to Quintall.

The stocky man followed the captain into his private quarters, leaving his three curious companions out on the deck with the cold, wet wind and the distant light of Pireth Tulme.

Quintall returned to them much later that evening, belowdecks in the closet-sized compartment they now called their home. There was something weird about his smile, Avelyn noted, something misplaced.

Quintall took Thagraine’s arm and led him out of the cubby, then the stocky man returned alone.

“Where?” Pellimar asked.

“You will learn soon enough,” Quintall replied. “I think two is enough for one night.” He moved to his bunk as Pellimar and Avelyn exchanged unknowing shrugs. Their curiosity only heightened as Quintall chuckled repeatedly, until he fell away into a sound slumber.

Thagraine was likewise chuckling the next day on the deck. Avelyn wasn’t sure the man had ever rejoined them the previous night, and indeed he looked haggard but certainly not displeased. The stoic Avelyn dismissed it, all of it. Apparently Quintall and Thagraine’s secret posed no threat, so whatever it might be really didn’t matter. For now Avelyn had his duties, and his goal was growing closer with each gliding league.

Pellimar, though, was not so patient. He prodded Quintall repeatedly, and when he got nowhere with the stocky man, he went to his older friend. Finally, after the bright sun had nearly reached its zenith, Quintall and Thagraine exchanged nods.

“The ceremony of necessity,” Quintall explained with a grin—a rather lewd grin, Avelyn thought.

“A fine one,” Thagraine put in. “Not so long in the trade, I’d guess.”

Avelyn narrowed his eyes, trying vainly to decipher the cryptic talk.

“Not here,” Pellimar breathed hopefully, having apparently figured it all out. Avelyn looked at him for some clue.

“Only for Captain Adjonas,” Quintall explained, “and for the four of us, who have earned the captain’s respect.”

“Not so long a trip then!” Pellimar cried. “Direct me!”

“Ah, but you have rigging to tie,” Thagraine teased.

“And I’ll work all the better after the—”

“Ceremony of necessity,” Thagraine and Quintall said together, laughing. Quintall nodded his approval and Thagraine led the eager Pellimar away.

“What are you talking about?” Avelyn demanded.

“Poor dear Avelyn,” chided Quintall. “Sheltered in your mother’s arms, you have never learned of such treasures.”

Quintall would say no more about it, leaving Avelyn chewing his lip in frustration for the rest of the afternoon. Avelyn stubbornly decided that he would ask no more, that he would overcome his curiosity, treating it as a weakness.

That discipline lasted only until the four took their supper, a bowl of lumpy, lukewarm porridge in the tight quarters of their small room, when Quintall talked of taking “first watch.”

“We set no watch,” Avelyn protested. “That is the job for the common crew.” The monk certainly wanted no part of a night watch on the decks, for a soaking rain had started, and even the smelly, damp cabin was better than walking the slick decks, or even worse, climbing the masts.

“I am second,” Thagraine said quickly, to Pellimar’s dismay.

“Fear not,” Quintall said to Pellimar, “for I am sure that Thagraine’s watch will not last long.” That brought a laugh from both men, obviously at Thagraine’s expense.

Avelyn shoved his plate forward forcefully, angered now at being left out of their little secret. It wasn’t until Quintall had left, though, that he finally got the clue he needed.

“She’s a fine one,” Pellimar remarked, quite offhandedly. Thagraine’s face as he glanced Avelyn’s way showed that he was disappointed; that alone clued Avelyn in to the fact that Pellimar had slipped.

“She?” Avelyn asked.

“The ship’s whore,” Thagraine admitted, scowling at Pellimar. “I am thinking that your watch, Brother Pellimar, just became the fourth.”

“Third,” Pellimar insisted. “If Avelyn desires a ride this night, he can wait until I’ve finished!”

Brother Avelyn sat back, thoroughly overwhelmed. The ship’s whore? The ceremony of necessity? His hands grew clammy—more out of sheer fear than anticipation. He had never expected such a thing, could not comprehend that his companions, on the most important journey of their lives should they live a century, would surrender to such base urges.

“Surely you are not offended,” Thagraine scoffed at him. “Ah, but it is simple embarrassment, then. Why, my dear Pellimar, I do believe that our companion here has never ridden a woman.”

Ridden a woman? The coarse image burned in Avelyn’s mind. To hear his fellow monks speaking of something as sacred as love in such crude terms did surprise and offend him.

He said nothing, though, fearful of making a fool of himself. Avelyn understood that he could lose more than a little respect from the other three, and that any mistakes could cost him dearly as the weeks aboard the Windrunner dragged on.

“You go after Thagraine,” he said to Pellimar, trying to keep his voice as steady as possible. “I will wait for another time.” He turned to lie on his cot then, noting the judging look Thagraine was sending his way. There would be a measure in this of his manhood, Avelyn realized, a test he could not fail. To completely lose the respect of Thagraine, or any of the others, could jeopardize it all. There were replacements for Pimaninicuit, after all, and Quintall, so strong and virile, Quintall, no doubt practiced in the arts of lovemaking, Quintall, who would likely visit this woman daily at the very least, was next in line for the island.

But the thought of actually going to see the woman terrified Avelyn. Thagraine’s perception of his sexual past was indeed accurate. All his adult life had been devoted to his studies; there had been no time for such diversions. He tried to push it all from his mind and find solace in sleep, but he got another shock when Thagraine and Pellimar began speaking in quite familiar terms of a certain maidservant and two of the cook’s helpers back at the abbey.

“More practiced than any of them,” Thagraine assured Pellimar, speaking of the ship’s woman.

“Yes, but the young one,” Pellimar argued, his voice almost wistful. “Bien deLouisa was her name, was it not?”

Avelyn’s stomach churned; he knew the woman, hardly more than a girl. She worked in the kitchen at St.-Mere-Abelle, a beautiful young lady with long black hair and dark, mysterious eyes.

And now these two fellow brothers were comparing her love making techniques!

Avelyn found he could hardly breathe. Had he been so blind as that? He had never even suspected that anything so sordid could go on at St.-Mere-Abelle.

He didn’t sleep well at all that night.

The weather was rough over the next few days—mercifully so, in Avelyn’s estimation, because he and his companions were kept very busy, attending rigging, a dangerous yet thrilling exercise in the gusting winds, and crawling in the dark belowdecks, checking for leaks in the hull. At one point, they even took up buckets as part of a bailing line.

The grueling schedule, though, allowed Avelyn the opportunity to put off his more personal problems. He knew what would be expected of him—the other three viewed sexuality as a test of manhood—and, on one level, at least, he was indeed intrigued. More than that, however, Avelyn was simply terrified. He had never known a woman in that way, and didn’t know how he would react. Every time he passed that cabin door, a small stateroom just behind the quarters of Captain Adjonas, he trembled.

His sleep every night was fitful, tossing and turning even more than did the Windrunner on the rough swells. All his dreams melded into that singular, mounting fear. He began to envision monsters behind that door, a horrid caricature of a woman, of his mother even, leering at him as he entered, eager to destroy his finer feelings, to steal his very soul. But even those nightmares were not quite that simple, for Avelyn’s other instincts, more base than any he had ever allowed himself to feel, often made him attack that female demon as fiercely as she attacked him, wrestling and kicking, biting in furious, uncontrollable passion. He awoke always in a cold sweat, and one time found himself in an even more uncomfortable position.

It had to happen: the weather cleared. The Windrunner glided easily over calmer seas, the southern reaches of the Mantis Arm’s coast a gray blur to the west. The four monks were on deck when Bunkus Smealy informed them that they would have no formal duties that day, that they might go about their business. “I know ye’ve a bit of prayin’ to catch up on,” the old sea dog said, mostly to Quintall, with a lewd wink. “Say a prayer for me, if ye’d be so kind.”

“One for every man on the ship,” Thagraine piped in, bringing on a cackling fit of laughter in Smealy. The old man ambled away on bowed legs.

“I could indeed use a round of morning exercise,” Thagraine added jubilantly when they were alone once more. He rubbed his hands together and started aft.

Quintall caught him by the shoulder. “Avelyn,” the stocky man said. Thagraine turned to regard him. “We have all tasted the sweetness of Miss Pippin,” Quintall explained, “except for our brother Avelyn.”

Three sets of eyes bore down on the young monk, who felt small indeed. “Go,” the nervous young monk bade Thagraine, before he hardly considered his options. “I am weary from the days of storm.”

“Hold!” Quintall said forcefully, stopping Thagraine before he had taken a single step. To Avelyn, he asked, “Are you to join with the barrelbumpers, then?”

Avelyn’s eyebrows rose with curiosity. He had heard the term before, and he knew Quintall and the others used it for the common seamen, but he had no idea what it meant. Now, putting it so obviously in sexual terms only confused poor Avelyn even more.

“Yes,” Quintall remarked quietly, “that might be more to your liking.” Thagraine and Pellimar chuckled; Avelyn noted that they tried to stifle the laughs and were thus somewhat sympathetic to him, at least.

“I know not of what you speak, Brother Quintall,” he replied bluntly, firming his jaw. “Perhaps you would tell me what a ‘barrelbumper’ might be.”

That brought a loud snort from Pellimar. Thagraine nudged him hard.

Avelyn scrunched his face with distaste and disbelief. To see other members of his order acting so . . . juvenile was the only word he could think of to describe it, pained him greatly.

“Do you see that barrel,” Quintall happily explained, pointing across the open deck to a single keg set far forward.

Avelyn nodded gravely, not liking where this was going.

“It has a small hole in one side,” Quintall went on, “for those who cannot use the woman.”

Avelyn took a deep breath, trying to calm his mounting anger.

“Of course, you’ll have to pay on your appointed night,” Quintall finished.

“The night you are in the barrel!” Thagraine howled, and all three broke into laughter.

Avelyn saw nothing at all humorous in the ridiculous joke, nor did the few crewmen close enough at hand to hear the insults. For Avelyn, this was a most sacred mission, the most important duty of the Abellican Church, and to profane it so by indulging in a shipboard orgy, was surely blasphemous.

“The woman was sanctioned by Father Abbot Markwart,” Quintall said suddenly, sternly, as if he had read Avelyn’s thoughts—not so difficult a feat, given the man’s sour expression. “In his wisdom, he knows the trying times of a shipboard voyage and would have us reach Pimaninicuit healthy of mind and body.”

“And what of soul?” Avelyn asked, but Quintall snorted at the notion.

“The choice is yours,” Quintall finished.

Avelyn didn’t think so, not at all. He had been called onto the table, so to speak. His actions now carried serious consequences concerning his future dealings with his three companions. If he didn’t have their respect, he couldn’t expect their loyalty, and given the level of jealousy that had been creeping about the four since they had become the chosen Preparers . . .

Avelyn took a bold step, cutting between Quintall and Thagraine. The stocky man willingly fell back, a smirk on his dark face—darker now for the week of beard—but Thagraine put his arm out to hold Avelyn back.

“After me,” the monk said firmly.

Too angry for debate, Avelyn hooked his arm under, then up and over Thagraine’s and gave a sharp tug to put the monk off balance. Avelyn then let go and dropped into a leg sweep that left Thagraine lying flat on the deck. Not wanting to continue the struggle, Avelyn was up and walking fast before the felled monk could respond.

Quintall’s laughter followed him.

Captain Adjonas came out of his room as Avelyn neared. He looked at the flustered young monk, then across the deck at the other three. His grin was telling when he looked back at Avelyn, and he merely tipped his great feathered hat and continued on his way.

Avelyn didn’t look back. He stalked up to the stateroom and lifted his hand to knock, then thought that perfectly ridiculous and simply walked in.

He caught her by surprise, wearing only a dirty nightshirt. She jumped when he briskly entered, pulling the covers from her bed up before her.

She wasn’t what he expected—and was certainly not the monster of his dreams. She was younger than he, probably just a year or so past twenty, with long black hair and blue eyes that had long ago lost their sparkle. Her face seemed tiny, framed by the voluminous hair, but cute, if not beautiful, and her frame, too, was small and thin. Avelyn suspected that to be from lack of food not from any desire to be fashionable.

She looked at Avelyn curiously, her fear fast fading. “One o’ the monks, then?” she asked in a throaty voice. “He said there’d be four, but I thought I’d seen all . . .” She paused and shook her head, apparently confused.

Avelyn swallowed hard; she was so oblivious of her partners that she didn’t even know how many of them had visited her.

“Are ye?”

“What?”

“A monk?”

Avelyn nodded.

“Well, good enough then,” she said, and she tossed the blanket onto the bed, then reached for the hem of her short shirt, pulling it up.

“No!” Avelyn said, near panic. He noted bruises on her legs, his eyes drawn down despite his good intentions. And the dirtiness of the woman assaulted him. Not that he was any cleaner; it amazed Avelyn how difficult it was to stay washed in the middle of so much water.

“Not yet,” Avelyn quickly clarified, seeing the woman’s stunned expression. “I mean . . . what is your name?”

“Me name?” she replied, and then she thought about it and chuckled and shrugged. “Yer friend calls me Miss Pippin.”

“Your real name,” Avelyn insisted.

The woman looked at him long and hard, obviously confused and surprised but also seeming a bit intrigued. “All right then,” she said at length. “Call me Dansally. Dansally Comerwick.”

“I am Avelyn Desbris,” the monk responded.

“Well, are ye ready then, Avelyn Desbris?” Dansally asked, pulling up the hem a bit more and striking a teasing pose.

Avelyn considered the sight from two widely disparate viewpoints. Part of him wanted to take her up on the offer, to rush right over and crush her under him; but another part, the part that had spent more than half of Avelyn’s life in fervent effort to elevate him and all of mankind somehow above this level—above following base, animalistic urges without thought, without reason—could not accept it.

“No,” he said again, walking near her and gently moving her hand away so that the nightshirt slipped back down over her legs.

“What would ye have me do?” the confused woman asked.

“Talk,” Avelyn answered calmly, under control.

“Talk? And what would ye have me say?” she asked, a mischievous, lewd sparkle coming to her blue eyes.

“Tell me where you are from,” Avelyn bade her. “Tell me of your life before this.”

If he had slapped her, she would not have looked more wounded. “How dare ye?” she asked.

Avelyn couldn’t hide a smile. She seemed insulted, as if he had gotten too personal with her, and yet she was offering willingly what should have been the most personal thing of all! He held up his hands and backed off a step.

“Please sit, Dansally Comerwick,” he bade, motioning at the bed. “I mean you no harm.”

“I am here for a reason,” she said dryly, but she did sit on the edge of the bed.

“To give us comfort,” Avelyn said, nodding. “And my comfort will come in the form of conversation. I would like to know you.”

“To save me, then?” Dansally asked sarcastically. “To tell me where I wandered from the righteous path and guide me back to it?”

“I would never presume to judge you,” Avelyn said sincerely. “But indeed I would like to understand this, which I apparently cannot comprehend.”

“Have ye never felt a bit funny then?” she asked, again with that teasing sparkle. “A bit itchy?”

“I am a man,” Avelyn assured her in all confidence. “But I am not certain that my definition of the term and that of my companions is nearly the same.”

Dansally, not a stupid woman, settled back and digested the words. She had spent the four days of the storm alone—except for the regular visits of Quintall, who never seemed to get enough of her. In truth, though, Dansally had felt alone for so very long—for all the voyage to and from St.-Mere-Abelle and for years before that.

It took more than a bit of coaxing, but at last Avelyn got the woman to answer his questions, to speak with him as she might a friend. He spent the better part of two hours with her, sitting and talking.

“I should go back to my duties now,” Avelyn said at last. He patted her hand and rose, heading for the door.

“Are ye sure ye’ll not stay just a bit longer?” Dansally asked. Avelyn looked back to see her stretched languidly on the bed, blue eyes sparkling.

“No,” he answered quietly, with respect. He paused a moment, considering the wider picture. “But I would ask a favor.”

“Don’t ye worry,” Dansally replied with a wink before he could begin to ask. “Yer friends’ll look on ye with respect, don’t ye doubt!”

Avelyn returned her smile warmly. He found that he believed her, and he walked back out into the sunlight truly relieved, but not in the way that the others, particularly Quintall, could ever have guessed.

Avelyn visited Dansally at least as often as all the others, sitting and talking, laughing, and one night even with Dansally crying on his shoulder. She had lost a baby, so she told him, stillborn, and her outraged husband had thrown her out into the street.

As soon as the story came pouring out, Dansally pulled away from Avelyn and sat staring hard at the man. She couldn’t believe she had so opened up to him. It made her more than a bit uncomfortable, for Avelyn, with his clothes on, had reached her in ways that the others never could, had touched a very private part of her indeed.

“He was a dog,” Avelyn said, “and no better. And a fool, Dansally Comerwick, for no man could ask for a better companion.”

“There goes Brother Avelyn Desbris,” Dansally said with a huge sigh, “Savin’ me again.”

“I would guess that you need less saving than most,” Avelyn replied. His words, the sincerity of his tone, struck her dumb. She dropped her gaze to the floor and the tears came again.

Avelyn went to her and hugged her.

The Windrunner made great time, cutting southwest from the southern reaches of the Mantis Ann in a direct run to Freeport. Adjonas swung her out wide at first, explaining that it would not do to be too close to treacherous Falidean Bay, where the water could rise forty feet in twenty minutes and the undertow of the tremendous flood tide could pull a sailing ship against gale winds and smash it to bits on the rocks.

They put into Freeport only briefly, with but a handful of sailors going ashore in the boat. The Windrunner caught the next tide away from the unlawful and dangerous place, and they were soon into Entel harbor.

Entel was the third largest city in Corona, behind Ursal, the throne seat, and Palmaris. The wharves were long enough in water deep enough for the Windrunner to dock, and Adjonas gave leave for all hands to go ashore, in two shifts.

On Quintall’s orders, the four monks ventured out together to see the city. Pellimar suggested that they pay a visit to the local abbey. Thagraine and Avelyn nodded, but pragmatic Quintall overruled that choice, fearing that any discussion of what might have brought four brothers of St.-Mere-Abelle so far south could lead to some uncomfortable questions. The secrets of Pimaninicuit were the domain of St.-Mere-Abelle only; according to Master Siherton, even the other abbeys of the Abellican Church knew little concerning the source of the magic stones.

Avelyn remembered the speech Master Jojonah had given him when first they had talked about the island, the stern warning that to utter even its name to any without sanction of Father Abbot Markwart was punishable by death, and he agreed with Quintall’s logic.

So they spent the day walking and marveling at the sights of the great city, at the thick rows of exotic flowers in the tree-lined green that centered the place, at the shining white buildings, at the frantic bazaar, the largest open market that any of them had seen, reputably the largest open market in all Honce-the-Bear. Even the vivid, bright colors of the clothing of Entel’s inhabitants struck the four as unusual. The city, it was said, was more akin to those of exotic Behren than to any in Honce-the-Bear, and Avelyn, after half a day of one astounding sight after another, decided that he would indeed enjoy a visit to Behren.

“Another time, perhaps,” he whispered, looking over his shoulder as he made his way back aboard the Windrunner, the sun dipping over the city.

Resupplied, the Windrunner put out the next day, sails full of wind with a favorable tide, sailing fast to the south.

Avelyn got his wish sooner than expected, for, without explanation, Captain Adjonas put his ship into the next harbor in line, Jacintha, just a score of miles to the south, but across the mountain range that divided the kingdoms.

The three nervous monks looked to Quintall for answers, but he had none, caught as completely off his guard as the others. He went at once to the captain, demanding an explanation.

“None know the southern waters better than the sailors of Behren,” Adjonas explained. “What winds we should catch, what troubles we might face. I have friends here, valuable friends.”

“Take care that your questions do not lead your contacts to the way to Pimaninicuit,” Quintall whispered ominously.

Adjonas straightened, the blood rushing to his face, making that garish scar seem all the more imposing. But Quintall did not back down an inch. “I will accompany you to your . . . friends.”

“Then change out of your telling robes, Brother Quintall,” Adjonas replied. “I’ll not guarantee your safety.”

“Nor I yours.”

The pair, along with Bunkus Smealy, went out late that afternoon, leaving the nervous gazes of three monks and thirty crewmen at the rail. Pellimar relieved his tensions with a visit to the woman—to Avelyn’s satisfaction, his companions still didn’t know her real name—but Avelyn and Thagraine remained at the rail, watching the sunset and then the lights of the structures that lined the harbor.

Finally came the welcome sound of oars and the boat, all three safely aboard. “We are out in the morning, at first light,” Adjonas said sharply to Smealy and to the nearby crew when the three gained the deck.

Thagraine and Avelyn exchanged grave looks, given the man’s uncharacteristic tone and the severe look on Quintall’s face.

“The waters are not clear, by any reports,” Quintall explained to his brothers.

“Pirates?” asked Thagraine.

“Yes, that and powries.”

Avelyn sighed and moved back to gaze at the unfamiliar landscape, layers of lights lifting up to the darkness of the great range known as the Belt-and-Buckle. He felt so far from home, and now, with the vast open Mirianic looming before him and the talk of fierce powries, he began to understand that he had much further yet to go.

He, too, visited Dansally that night. Brother Avelyn needed a friend.

CHAPTER 16

Endwar

Elbryan’s fifth summer in Andur’Blough Inninness was among the very best times in all his young life. He was no more a boy but a young and strong man, with all traces of his youth gone except for a mischievous-streak Tuntun feared he would never be rid of. He continued his ritual with the milk-stones, running out eagerly each morning, attacking the task with pride, for he could see the difference the continual exercise had made on his tall, graceful form. His legs were long and covered with muscle, and his arms had grown huge, each muscle clearly defined. When Elbryan bent his fist forward and flexed, he couldn’t put his other hand—and his hands were not small by human standards!—halfway around the bulging forearm.

But even with all that mass, there was nothing awkward about the young man. He danced with the elves, he fought with the elves, he skipped along the winding trails of Andur’Blough Inninness. His light brown hair had grown long, to his shoulders, but he kept it clean and neatly trimmed, pushed back from his face, which he still kept clean shaven.

He was welcomed in every elven ritual now—in every dance, in every celebration, in every hunt—but still, perhaps more than ever, Elbryan felt alone. It wasn’t that he craved human companionship; he continued to fear that thought greatly. It was simply Elbryan’s realization of how different he was from these creatures, and not just in stature. They had taught him to view the world as an elf might, with utter freedom and often more veiled in imagination than reality. Elbryan found that he could not possibly maintain such a stance. His sense of order was simply too strong, his sense of right and wrong too keenly developed. He expressed that sentiment to Juraviel one quiet afternoon, he and the elf out on a long walk, talking of the plants and animals.

Juraviel stopped in his tracks and stared at the young man. “Could you expect differently?” he asked simply.

It wasn’t the wording but the way Juraviel spoke that offered Elbryan comfort. For the first time, he realized that perhaps the elves were not expecting him to be as one of them.

“We are showing you a different way to view the world about you,” Juraviel explained, “one that will aid you in your journeys and trials. We are giving you tools that will put you above your kin.”

“Why?” Elbryan asked simply. “Why was I chosen for these gifts?”

“Blood of Mather,” Juraviel replied, a phrase the young man had heard all too often, usually derisively, from Tuntun. “Mather was your uncle, your father’s oldest brother.”

As he spoke, Elbryan found his mind drifting back to a specific place and moment, a time nearly five years previous, when he had stood on the ridge outside of Dundalis, Pony beside him, looking up at the glowing Halo. Though his mind conjured that image, that feeling, and placed him squarely within that space and time, he remained alert to Juraviel’s every word.

“He died very young, so it was believed by your father and the others of the Wyndon family.”

“I remember—” Elbryan stopped short. He didn’t know what he remembered. He had a feeling that his father had mentioned a lost older brother, Mather perhaps, and it must have been so, because Elbryan now knew he had heard that name before he had ever met with the Touel’alfar.

“The boy Mather was nearly killed,” Juraviel went on. “We found him in the woods, mauled by a bear, and brought him to Caer’alfar. It took him some time to heal, but he was strong, as is the way of your heritage. Afterward, we could have let him return to his family, but many months had passed and the Wyndons, by all the reports of our scouts, had moved along.”

The elf paused, as if wondering how he should proceed. “In centuries past,” he began solemnly, “our peoples were not so secluded. Elves and humans lived near each other, often trading stories and goods and sometimes living together in a single community. There were even marriages, two that I know written of, between elf and human, though few offspring ever came from such unions.”

“What drove our peoples apart?” Elbryan asked, for he thought that the world, particularly concerning his race, was a more tragic place for the change.

Juraviel chuckled. “You have been in Andur’Blough Inninness for five years,” he replied. “Have you noticed the absence of anything?”

Elbryan crinkled his brow. What could possibly be missing from so enchanted a place as this?

“Children,” Juraviel prompted at length. “Children,” he repeated, his voice low. “We are not like humans. I might live a millennium—I am nearly halfway to that point already—and sire no more than one, or perhaps two, children.”

Juraviel paused again, and it seemed to Elbryan as if a cloud passed over the elf’s angular features. “Three centuries ago, the dactyl awakened,” he said.

“Dactyl?” Elbryan asked.

“Demon,” Juraviel clarified. He turned away from Elbryan, walked to the edge of a small clearing, and lifted his head to the heavens and his voice in song.

“When the eyes of sentries turn inward,

When the hearts of men covet,

When love is lost to lust.

When the ways of merchants turn cheating,

When the legs of women bow,

When gain is ill not just.

Then look ye men to darkness.

Then see the smoke-filled sky.

Then feel the rumble ‘neath your feet

And know ‘tis time to die.

So turn your swords away from kin

Your hatred far from kind,

And see the charge of goblin and dwarf

To which lust has left you blind.

Thus find your hearts and enemies true

And all ill ways forsake

And know the time for righteousness!

The dactyl has come awake!”

Many images flitted through Elbryan’s imagination as Juraviel sang: scenes of war and terror, scenes so very much like Dundalis on that awful day when the goblins came. By the time Juraviel finished, the young man’s cheeks were wet with tears, and Juraviel’s were as well, Elbryan noted when the elf turned back to him.

“Dactyl is the name we give to it,” Juraviel said softly, “though truthfully the awakening of the demon is more an event of the whole world than of a specific being. It is our own folly—that of human and in times long past, of elf—that allows the dark creature to walk the earth.”

“And when the demon awakens, then there is war,” Elbryan reasoned from the song. “Like the battle that claimed my family.”

Juraviel shrugged and shook his head. “Often there are such battles when humans and goblins live near each other,” he explained. “On the wide seas, sailing ships often meet the low boats of powries, with predictable results.”

Elbryan nodded; he had heard of the fierce powries and their reputation for destroying human ships.

“It was three centuries ago when the dactyl last awakened,” Juraviel said. “At that time, I and my people traded openly with humans. We were many more. Many more, though not as many as the humans. Co’ awille, ‘Endwar,’ we call that horrible time, for four of every five elves were killed.” He sighed resignedly. “And since we do not procreate prolifically . . .”

“You had to run away,” Elbryan reasoned. “For the very survival of your race, you had to seclude yourself from the other races.”

Juraviel nodded and seemed pleased by the perceptive reasoning. “And so we came to Andur’Blough Inninness,” he said, “and to other such places of mystery. Aided by the holy humans and their precious gifts, the magical stones, we made these places our own, secluded and veiled from the eyes of the wider world. Know that the dactyl was defeated in that time long past after great cost, but gone, too, was our time in this world. And so we live on, here and there, under blankets of cloud, under cover of darkness. Our numbers are small; we cannot afford to be known, even to the humans whom we consider our friends.”

“Some of you do,” Elbryan remarked, thinking of Tuntun.

“Even Tuntun,” Juraviel replied with a laugh. But his smile did not last. “She is jealous of what you have.”

“I?”

“Freedom,” Juraviel went on. “The world is open to you, but not to Tuntun. She does not hate you.”

“I will believe that right up until the next time we spar,” Elbryan replied, thawing a laugh from his elven friend.

“She fights hard,” Juraviel admitted. “And on you, she is particularly strict. Is that not proof that she is your friend?”

Elbryan stuck a blade of grass between his teeth and considered the viewpoint.

“Tuntun knows that your life may be difficult,” Juraviel finished. “She desires you to be properly prepared.”

“For what?”

“Ah, that is the question,” Juraviel answered, his finger pointing into the air, his eyebrows arched. “Though we have forsaken the ways and places of the humans, we have not forsaken your race. It is we, the elves of Caer’alfar, who train those known as rangers, the protectors, usually of people who have no idea they need protecting.”

Elbryan shook his head; he had never heard of rangers, except for occasional references by the elves.

“Mather was a ranger,” said Juraviel, “one of the finest. For near to forty years he kept a line a hundred miles long secure from goblins and fomorian giants alike. His list of victories is far too long to be recited here, if we had a week to spare.”

Elbryan felt a strange sense of family pride. He remembered again that morning on the ridge, viewing the Halo, hearing the name of Mather distinctly within his mind.

“And so you shall be,” Juraviel finished. “Elbryan the Ranger.”

The elf nodded, then walked away. Elbryan understood that his lesson was at its end and understood, too, that this lesson might have been the most important of all during his time in Andur’Blough Inninness.

“There, do you feel it?”

Belli’mar Juraviel held his hand up, begging silence, then shifted his sensitive bare feet about on the stone face. A moment later, feeling the subtle vibrations running clearly into him through his toes, he gave a grim nod.

“Many miles north and west,” Tallareyish remarked, looking that way as if he expected some vast horde of darkness to be charging down toward Andur’Blough Inninness.

“Lady Dasslerond has been told?” Juraviel asked.

“Of course;” an elf by the name of Viellain, one of the oldest in Caer’alfar, answered. “And scouts have gone out. There are reports of a trench, a great upheaval, not twenty miles beyond our valley.”

Juraviel looked to the north, to the wild lands beyond his elven home and far beyond the settlements of any humans. “Do you know this place?” he asked of Viellain.

“It should not be so hard to find,” Tallareyish answered quickly, as eager as Juraviel to glimpse the evidence. The pair looked at Viellain, their expressions revealing much.

“The scouts will pass by the trench, if there is indeed such a marker, then continue far to the north,” the old elf explained. “Thus they shall not return to Caer’alfar for many days.”

“But Lady Dasslerond should be informed,” Tallareyish reasoned, guessing that Viellain, usually a stickler for rules, was coming around to their way of thinking.

“We can reach this place and return before the sun has set tomorrow,” Juraviel said, “if we can find it.”

“The birds will know,” Viellain assured him. “Always, the birds know.”

The glade was strangely quiet this night, with no elves in the area—or at least none showing themselves, for Elbryan had been around the Touel’alfar long enough to realize that a host of sprites could be within a dozen paces and even he, now so attuned to the forest, would not suspect it unless they chose to make their presence known.

Still, he was fairly certain that he was alone this night, except for his opponent, standing in the shadows across the way.

The young man held his breath when the elf came out into the moonlight.

Tuntun.

Elbryan clutched his staff and set his heels. He had not battled Tuntun in many weeks; he was determined now to give the upstart elf a bit of a surprise.

“I shall not stop beating you until you cry out my name,” Tuntun taunted, moving to the center and twirling her longer pole, the size of an elven sword, in a circle, while her second weapon, a stick fashioned as a dirk, worked in tighter circles over her fingers. Around and around the weapons went, reminding Elbryan of her uncanny dexterity. Tuntun could roll four coins at a time on each of her hands; she could juggle a dozen daggers, or even flaming brands, effortlessly.

But that quickness and precision would not be enough, Elbryan told himself. Not this time.

He stalked in, his staff horizontal before him, right hand palm up, left palm down. Normally, the combatants would speak the rules before a match, but with these two there was little need for such ceremony. After all these years, Tuntun and Elbryan understood each other perfectly; between these two, there were no rules.

Elbryan went into a crouch, and Tuntun wasted no time in going on the attack, sending her sword straight ahead. Elbryan let go of his staff with his left hand, turned his right hand over, then back. The overhand parry deflected the stabbing blade, but the second attempt, the undersweeping slap designed to send the elf’s sword flying up high, was far too slow to catch up to Tuntun’s retracting movement.

Elbryan caught the staff again with his left hand, holding steady, his defenses set.

But then he surprised Tuntun. Fighting logic said that he, with the heavier weapon and more lumbering moves, should have allowed Tuntun the initial attacks, playing black on the chessboard. Any offensive mistake would leave Elbryan dangerously vulnerable to the elf’s darting blades.

But on the young man came anyway, pressing furiously. He started with an overhand, underhand parry sweep again, but instead of catching the staff with his left hand as it came swishing back to horizontal, he turned his right hand over once more. Halfway through the next sweep, Elbryan’s powerful forearm flexed tight, catching the pole in mid-swing, and he brought its low end snapping in against his side, catching it under his right arm, then lowering and thrusting its tip like a spear.

Tuntun, almost expecting the attack from this man who so hated her, was not caught by surprise. She backed through the first swishes, then ducked under the thrust, crossing sword and dagger in an X above her head to keep the pole harmlessly high. She expected then to find an opening for a counter but had to stay defensive as she realized the young man wasn’t yet through with his surprisingly adept routine.

Elbryan brought the pole right back in, before Tuntun’s crossed blades could shift it to either side. Then he sent it straight out a second time, cutting short the thrust as the elf predictably ducked. He brought the leading end of the pole up and back over his head, launching the pole into an immediate spin, catching it again in his left hand after it went once around, then stepping forward forcefully. Now firmly held in both bands, his staff made a second twirl, then came arching diagonally toward the ground, toward Tuntun.

The elf squealed and threw her sword out to the side, blade vertical, its tip nearly touching the ground. The staff smacked it with all the young man’s considerable weight and strength behind it, and Tuntun went flying backward, skipping and hopping, even flapping her gossamer wings, to absorb the tremendous shock.

Elbryan smiled grimly and came on, twirling and swinging, poking, stabbing, thrusting—anything to keep the elf moving backward and off her balance.

His success was partly gained by surprise. Soon the cunning elf had a new and more respectful measure of him, and her parries—and the distance she kept between herself and her opponent—became more appropriate.

And so they fought, evenly matched, for a long while, poles sometimes slapping together so rapidly that it occurred to Elbryan that, if they had some kindling, they might light a fire from friction alone! Each scored minor hits, each felt minor stings, but neither seemed to gain the advantage as the minutes continued to slip by.

Elbryan slashed across in front of him and felt his staff smacked once, twice, perhaps a half dozen times before he even completed the pass. One solid blow, indeed, he thought, but landing that hit would prove no easy task!

That point came clearer a split second later, as the last of Tuntun’s sword parries hit hard enough to force his staff out just wide enough for the elf to dart straight ahead and sting the fingers of Elbryan’s trailing hand with her dirk.

He needed something new, something Tuntun had not seen from him and could not expect. Something daring, even desperate, like the shadow dive Tallareyish had used to defeat him. Tuntun was growing more confident, he realized. She felt she had his measure.

She was ripe for the plucking.

A series of swipes, stabs, and forward strides put Elbryan in the desired position. He shifted back on his heels, reading the elf’s next attack perfectly and easily sliding too far away for the small sword to reach.

Then he came ahead in a rush, hands apart and holding firm, swiping the staff across left to right in front of him, up high so that Tuntun could not stop it and had to duck it.

She did, perfectly, but Elbryan kept his staff moving, letting go with his left hand and using his right merely to keep the staff’s turn intact and balanced. He caught the weapon mid-pole, again in his left hand, an overhand grasp as it came around his back and swiped it across in the same direction, this time with only the one hand and using his hip, the back half of the staff still behind it, for leverage.

Again Tuntun—though surprised the second swing had come the same way and not on the predictable backhand—managed to dodge, this time rolling around the tip of the pole, turning a complete spin back to her right.

But Elbryan wasn’t more than half done. As his staff came sweeping around to horizontal in front of him, he caught it in his right hand, quickly flipped his left hand under the weapon, then stepped ahead and to the left in swift pursuit and launched the third swipe, again left to right, by pulling his right hand in while thrusting his left out.

Tuntun’s only avenue of escape was straight down to the ground, and so she took it unceremoniously.

Elbryan did not check the flying momentum, continuing his own spin and letting the staff fly out to its full extension, catching it down low in both hands, as he might have held a club in his younger days when at play smacking rocks far into the air.

Around he went, all the way around, though he knew that it was dangerous to turn his back for even a split second on one as swift as Tuntun. He yelled out as he came back to face her, dropping to one knee, swiping low with all his strength.

The staff swished harmlessly through the air. Tuntun was gone!

The man’s mind whirled through the possibilities, all jumbled with the horror that he had erred, that he was about to get clobbered. He realized immediately that Tuntun could not have stepped left or right without his noticing and certainly couldn’t have gone low under the cut with him dropping to one knee.

That left only one possibility, an escape borne on translucent wings.

As his swing crossed before him, Elbryan turned his left shoulder down and fell into a roll that left him on his back in the grass. He pulled with all his great strength, tearing out the staff’s momentum, halting its flow and turning it perpendicular to the ground.

Down came Tuntun, her wing-fluttering hop exhausted, her sword pointed below her, leading. She had meant to pounce right upon stupid Elbryan’s back, driving her wooden practice sword into the back of his neck. How her blue eyes widened when she saw the pole’s tip come up to meet her descent!

She batted futilely with her sword, then, that failing, tried to stab down at Elbryan. Her breath came out in a rush as she plopped down hard, the staff’s butt end secure against the ground, its tip stabbing hard into her chest between her lowest ribs.

She held there for a long moment, up high on the eight-foot pole, her sword nowhere near supine Elbryan. She dropped the sword—unintentionally, Elbryan knew, for it fell harmlessly to the side—so the young man graciously pulled the pole out straight so Tuntun wouldn’t fall off balance to either side. She landed on her feet, skittered back away from the weapon, but soon fell, gasping desperately for breath.

Elbryan, his weapon dropped, was at her side in a moment. He thought himself foolish as he neared the unpredictable Tuntun, expecting that she would find the strength to drive her dirk into his face, thus claiming a draw.

But Tuntun had no such strength. She couldn’t even talk, and her dirk, like her sword before it, slipped uselessly from her weakened hand. Elbryan knelt beside her, his arm about her shoulders, comforting her.

“Tuntun,” he repeated over and over, for he feared she was hurt, that she might die out here in the practice glade with no one near her except this man she so despised.

But finally she was breathing somewhat steadily again. She looked up at Elbryan, sincere admiration in her eyes. “Fairly won,” she congratulated. “I thought . . . you had over . . . stepped . . . your ability, but your recovery . . . was truly remarkable.”

Tuntun nodded and rose unsteadily, then walked from the glade, leaving Elbryan kneeling in the grass.

He hardly knew how to react. After so many long months, he had scored his first win.

The row of trees, short and wide apples, ran almost perfectly straight, then jumped back a dozen feet, up a ridge twice an elf’s height, and continued on straight again from there. The upheaval was recent, that much was perfectly clear, for the soil on the torn side of the ridge was loose and deep brown, pocked here and there by a root, but with no fresh, aboveground growth. Something had reached into the middle of this line of apple trees and simply pulled back a third of the row.

“This is one of Brother Allarbarnet’s groves,” remarked Tallareyish. The other two nodded their agreement, for Allarbarnet, a wandering monk of St. Precious Abbey of Palmaris, was not unknown to them or to any reasoning creature of Corona. He had wandered the lands—the Wilderlands and not the civilized regions of his birth—more than a century before, planting lines of apple seeds in hope that his fruit would encourage the people of the kingdom of Honce-the-Bear to explore the wider world. Brother Allarbarnet—the canonization process for the man had already begun, and the abbots expected that he would be sainted within the decade—had not lived to see his dream realized; indeed, it had not yet been realized, but many of his groves had grown and flourished. Unknown to the humans, Brother Allarbarnet had been named an elf-friend, and had often been aided by the elves or by the rangers the elves had trained. So these three knew of the man and his work, knew of his groves, and knew that they were always planted in straight lines.

What, then, had so altered this one?

There could be only one answer, for no living creature, not even one of the great dragons of the north, could so tear this amount of ground in such an even, tidy manner.

“Earthquake,” Juraviel muttered, but even given his grim demeanor, his melodic voice could sound only a bit ominous.

“From that direction,” Tallareyish agreed, pointing to the north in the direction, they all knew, of the wastelands of old, a torn and battered mountainous region known as the Barbacan.

“Not so unusual an event,” Viellain reminded the pair. “Quakes happen in all times.”

Juraviel understood his fellow’s reasoning and knew the elf was speaking those words for his sake mostly. For Juraviel’s anxiety was clearly etched on his fine features—how could it have been otherwise when he had been speaking to his protégé Elbryan about this very subject not a week’s time past?

Viellain was right, Juraviel knew logically. Earthquakes and thunderstorms, swirling tornadoes, even exploding volcanoes, were more often than not natural events. Perhaps it was coincidence.

Perhaps, but Juraviel knew, too, that such events might accompany a larger and darker phenomenon, that earthquakes that could tear the earth as here, that goblin raids upon villages, like the one that had orphaned Elbryan not five years before, might signal something evil indeed.

He looked to the north again, peering hard just above the horizon. If the day had been clearer, his keen eyes might have spotted something, some flicker, some confirmation. For now, the elf could only worry.

Had the dactyl awakened?

CHAPTER 17

Black Wings

They took it slowly, very slowly, with eager Connor coming to understand Jilly’s needs and hesitation. He sensed the way she tensed every time he moved near her, every time his face was within a few inches of hers, his lips and hers seeming to pull together as if magnetic.

But Jill inevitably turned away, her face flushed with frustration as deep as that which Connor felt. On those first few occasions, Connor took the rejection personally, as a slight, despite Jill’s proclamations otherwise. He couldn’t help but feel that she did not find him attractive, that he somehow revolted her. No novice in the ways of love, the nephew of Palmaris’ baron was surprised and pained but also intrigued. Jilly was a challenge he had not before faced and one he was determined to overcome.

Gradually, as he came to see the light in Jill’s eyes every time he entered the Way—a more and more common occurrence—the proud young man began to understand and accept that her problem was within the mysteries of her past and not with him. That realization didn’t lessen the challenge, though, and Connor found he wanted Jill more desperately than he had ever wanted any woman. To Connor Bildeborough, Jill became perhaps the ultimate challenge of his young life. So he would be patient, would spend his nights walking with Jill and talking. His other needs could be taken care of in the many brothels that openly offered their wares in the city, but of course he didn’t need to tell Jill, his Jilly, about that.

For Jill’s part, her night always got better when Connor entered the Way. She found herself thinking about him constantly, even dreaming about him. She took him to her private place, the roof down the alley, and together they sat for hours watching the stars, talking comfortably. It was up there that she finally allowed Connor to kiss her—actually kissing him back—though she kept it brief and pulled away as soon as those dark wings of some past event she did not understand began to flap up around her. In kissing him—in kissing anyone, she supposed—Jill was sent back to a moment of pain, an event in her past too painful for her to remember.

But she suffered that pain, and let Connor kiss her, every once in a while.

It was up on that rooftop, under a sky that was streaked by clouds and stars, that Connor first mentioned the prospect of marriage.

Jill found it hard to breathe. She couldn’t look at the man but kept her eyes locked on the stars, as if seeking refuge high above. Did she love Connor? Did she know what love was?

She knew it made her happy to be with Connor but also that it terrified her. She couldn’t deny the longings, how parts of her body seemed to grow very warm, how she felt as if she were on the verge of trembling whenever she looked upon him. But neither could Jill deny the fear of getting too close—to Connor or to any man. The sweetness was there, but somehow just out of Jill’s reach.

Her first instinct told her to refuse the proposal. How good a wife might she be, after all, when she wasn’t even sure who she really was? And how long would Connor remain with her when even a kiss was a strained thing, something she had to force past this great black block that she did not understand?

But what of Pettibwa and Graevis? Jill had to consider. What of her duty to the couple who had taken her in and given her a home? How much better their lives would be to know that she was well wed! Perhaps her ascension into local nobility would even raise their own station in life, and Jill would treasure that above all else.

Jill finally found the nerve to look back at Connor, to stare into those marvelous brown eyes, sparkling more now in this starry light than she had ever seen.

“You know that I love you,” he said to her, “only you. All these weeks, nay months, I’ve sat beside you, wanting to make love to you, wanting to wake beside you. Ah, my Jilly, do say you love me. If you do not, then I shall walk into the Masur Delaval and let the cold waters take me, for never again will this body know warmth.”

The words sounded so beautiful to the young woman, except for his reference to her as “Jilly,” which she really didn’t like much, which made her feel like a little girl. She believed him with all her heart, and she had come to love him, so she thought. What else could it be called, after all, considering that her smile came so easily whenever he was in sight?

“Will you wed with me?” he asked softly, so softly that Jill really didn’t hear the words but felt them as if they were transferred to her by his gentle touch as he ran the tip of his finger from the side of her nose and down her cheek.

She nodded and he kissed her, and she let him hold her close, their lips together for a long while, and all that time, while Connor was making soft, satisfied noises, Jill was beating back black wings, was furiously fighting to divorce her mind from the current situation, was remembering beer orders from her work in the Way, was thinking of the man she had seen get run down by a rushing cart the week before—anything so that the moment would not send her careening back across the lost years to something, some horrible event, that she could not face.

The reaction of Pettibwa and Graevis to the news of the marriage was not hard to predict. The bartender nodded, smiling, and gave his precious Cat—he still called her that—a generous and warm hug. Pettibwa was distinctly more animated, hopping up and down, breasts and belly bouncing wildly, and clapping her hands together, her cheeks fast streaking with an outburst of tears. All that Graevis and Pettibwa had ever wanted for the girl was for her to be happy: as unselfish a love as anyone could ever know. And now that seemed so certain. To wed nobility! Jill would never want for anything, so they believed. She would dress in the finest gowns and attend the highest social events in Palmaris, even in Ursal!

Their reaction confirmed to Jill that she had made the right choice. Whatever her personal problems, the sight of Graevis and Pettibwa so animated and so sincerely happy warmed her heart. With all that they had done for her, how could she have ever chosen otherwise?

The wedding was planned—by Connor’s family, of course, since they had the wealth to do it right—for late summer, and with all of the preparations ahead of them, Connor and Jill actually saw less of each other over the next few months than before the proposal.

“Finished already?” Grady called as he descended the wide, sweeping staircase of House Battlebrow, the most renowned brothel in all of Palmaris.

Connor, sitting back on one of the plush chairs in the lobby, turned an absent gaze his companion’s way.

“What, only one this night?” Grady chided. “To be sure then, there are at least two disappointed ladies in the house!”

“Enough, Grady,” Connor replied, his commanding tone leaving little doubt as to which was the dominant one in this relationship. Grady’s standing was nowhere near Connor’s, and the only reason the baron’s nephew suffered the almost constant companionship of the upstart commoner was for the sake of his adopted sister.

Grady knew too much about Connor’s nighttime pursuits for the nobleman to discard him, and though Grady had never even hinted at blackmail, Connor understood him well enough to fear him.

“What is wrong, my friend?” Grady asked, tying his belt and sliding into the chair beside Connor. “Your cheer has been left behind, I fear. Might the bonds of approaching matrimony be tightening?”

“Hardly,” Connor replied. “Would that the day were the morrow! How long I have waited!”

Grady spent a long moment digesting those words, trying to find any hidden meanings.

“And do not doubt my love for your sister,” Connor went on. “She is surely the most beautiful, the most tantalizing and teasing . . .” He let it go with a profound sigh.

Grady put his hands in front of his mouth to hide his grin. “So it seems that she is driving you mad,” he offered. “Her charms have put you into the arms of three women a night for, lo, these five months!”

Connor glared at him, hardly appreciating the sarcasm. “And if you tell her a single word of it, I shall stick my sword into your belly and wriggle it about,” he warned, and there was little doubt he meant every grim word.

But Grady understood he had the upper hand and he would not back away. “You do so like sticking and wriggling,” he teased.

“As any true man must!” Connor insisted. “Am I to let Jilly drive me to madness? But that does not mean I love her any less. Understand that. So fine a wife.”

“Have you bedded her?”

Connor’s expression forced Grady to lean the other way, fearing the man would slap him. “An honest question,” Grady protested, “and not one aimed in protection of my sister’s honor. Know that I would bed her myself, except for the consequences I would face from my parents.”

“And from me.” Connor’s words sounded as a low growl.

“No longer do I desire such a thing, of course,” Grady wisely conceded. Even hinting that he still had amorous desires for Jill to Connor would be akin to reaching under a crowning eagle to pull away its meal. “She is for you, and only you. A swooning girl, if ever I saw one. No man but Connor Bildeborough could bed her now, but by force.

“And what of Connor Bildeborough?” Grady bravely pressed. “Has Jill surrendered?”

“No,” the frustrated nobleman admitted. “But the time is near.”

“End of midsummer, I should say,” Grady agreed, “or will you wait that long?”

“I give her until the wedding night,” Connor replied. “She is fearful—virgins always are—but of course, my rights on that night are absolute. She will offer it, or I shall take it!”

Grady wisely bit back a remark questioning the virginity of his adopted sister. It really didn’t matter; all that mattered was what Connor believed.

And indeed Connor believed! Grady could see that in his every fidget, in his almost animal like intensity. Why, even the practiced whores of House Battlebrow were losing their charms for him!

“Dear Jilly,” Grady mumbled under his breath as Connor rose furiously from the chair and stormed across to the exit. “You teasing little wench. Putting your maidenhead on a barbed hook and jiggling it before the baron’s nephew.” Grady silently applauded his conniving little sister, though his perception of her actions almost scared him; he had never thought her capable of such a beautifully treacherous play. “Ah, good enough for both of them, I say,” Grady remarked more loudly, addressing a pair of ladies sitting on the bottom step of the wide stairway as he walked past in pursuit of Connor. The women cocked their heads curiously. “I’ll be rid of you, dear sister,” he went on, speaking to himself once more, “and let Connor Bildeborough learn in his own time that you were not worth the waiting!”

Another prostitute entered from the street just before Grady went out. He cupped her chin in his hand, drawing a smile from her. “The little teasing wench,” he said, moving near the woman, who was one of his favorites. “Poor Connor will learn soon enough that she hasn’t your charms nor your talents.”

He kissed her, then rushed out behind Connor. The night was young but getting on, and Connor would soon enough have to get to the Way to meet Jill. But perhaps he’d have time for a few drinks and a dice game before.

It was a ceremony that had all of Palmaris talking; the women swooning, the men standing tall, feigning importance, wishing they were in the carriage in Connor Bildeborough’s place as it made its winding way through the streets. Any reservations that the nobleman’s family had held toward the peasant orphan girl had been washed away when they met Jill, truly beautiful both inside and out. Now, seeing her adorned in a white gown of satin and lace, her long, thick blond mane pinned up on one side and hanging loose on the other, she seemed made for royalty. There were even whispers that the young woman was indeed of royal blood, and a host of rumors as to her past made their way through the crowds.

It was all nonsense, all pretension, but in Honce-the-Bear in God’s Year 821, that was the way things were done.

For Jill, her face was a mask of paint and false smiles. She looked a princess but felt like a little lost girl. On the one hand, she couldn’t deny the pleasure of dressing so beautifully, of knowing she was the center of attention. On the other hand, being the center of attention truly terrified her. It was bad enough that the carriage would roll through every part of the large city, bad enough that more than five hundred people would be in attendance at the church when she and Connor were wed, but the thought of what would come later, after the grand ball . . .

“I have waited long enough,” Connor had said to her that morning, following the words with a kiss on the cheek. “Tonight.”

And then he had left Jill with the thought. She hadn’t even been able to kiss him yet without those black wings of that awful past flapping up around her, but she knew what he expected—one of his house servants had described it to her in great detail.

She had smiled at Connor before he left, trying to be comforting. She dreaded the night to come.

The ceremony went off perfectly—solemn yet joyous, ladies crying, men standing tall and handsome. After the carriage ride, the newlyweds came to a hall filled with music and drink, with ladies and gentlemen spinning about, twirling and laughing. It was loud and rushing, exhilarating. Jill rarely drank more than a single glass of wine, but this night, Connor kept foisting glasses upon her, and she kept taking them. He was trying to loosen up her inhibitions, and she was, too.

Or maybe she was just trying to blur the terror.

She found herself in the arms of dozens of men whom she did not know, gentlemen all, by blood if not by deed. More than one whispered something lewd in her ear, more than one tried to get a hand somewhere it should not be. Even a bit drunk, Jill was agile, and she got through the dancing with her purity intact.

The ball ended far too soon, at Connor’s insistence, which brought more than a few randy comments.

Jill suffered them as she had suffered everything else, quietly and privately, looking at Graevis and Pettibwa as they stood beside the Bildeboroughs. This was for them, Jill constantly reminded herself, and in truth, she had never seen them, particularly Pettibwa, looking so happy.

When the guests were excused, Connor took Jill across the town to the mansion of his uncle, the Baron Bildeborough. They entered quietly through a side door of the west wing, proceeding to the guest quarters, which were empty, save a pair of handmaidens Baron Bildeborough had put at Connor’s bidding. The two young women—younger than Jill even, though she had just passed eighteen—took Jill to the private chamber, a room that made her feel tiny indeed! The ceiling was high, the walls covered in grand tapestries, and both the bed and the hearth were of heroic proportions. For Jill, who had spent her life so simply, it seemed somehow obscene; a dozen people could sleep comfortably on that bed, and she needed a stepping stool to even get onto it!

She said nothing as the handmaidens helped her to get out of her great gown, making suggestions all the while as to how she should proceed, of this trick or that trick they had heard about. “A lady must be well practiced in the ways of lovemaking for royalty,” one of them remarked.

“Is there a girl in Palmaris that Connor Bildeborough could not bed?” the other added.

Jill thought she would throw up.

When the tittering pair finally left, Jill was sitting on the edge of the great cushiony bed, wearing only a simple silk nightgown that was too low cut, both front and back, and didn’t go nearly far enough down her legs. The night was chill for late August and the room drafty, but the handmaidens had lit a small fire in the hearth. Jill was just moving for it when the door swung open and Connor, dressed in the black pants and white shirt he had worn for the wedding and ball but without his boots, without his jacket, and without his belt, entered.

She started for the hearth; he cut her off and wrapped his arms about her.

“My Jilly,” he whispered, the word lost as his lips brushed against her neck.

Connor backed off almost immediately, his face crinkled in confusion. He could feel her tension, she knew, and that notion alone allowed her to relax a bit. Connor knew her so very well; he could sense her fear. He would be gentle with her, she believed, would give her all the time she needed. He loved her, after all!

Even as that thought cascaded down through Jill’s body, easing the muscles, Connor grabbed her and pulled her to him roughly, crushing his lips against hers. She hadn’t even time to consider the rush of passion, so surprised was she. She didn’t fight back, not at first, just stood there perfectly still.

She tasted his lips, felt his tongue brushing through.

In her mind, she heard a scream, agonized. The scream of a dying child, of her mother, of her village.

“No!” Jill growled, pushing him back.

She stood before him, panting.

“No?”

Jill could not find the breath to answer, to explain. She just stood there, shaking her head.

“No?” Connor yelled again, and he slapped her across the face.

Jill felt her knees buckle and she would have gone down, except Connor was on her again, squeezing her tight, kissing her all about the face and neck. “You cannot deny me,” he said.

Jill squirmed and twisted, not wanting to hurt him, even sympathetic to him, but simply unable to comply with his needs. Finally she worked her arm up under his and broke the hold enough so that she could move back a step.

“I am your husband,” Connor said evenly. “By law. I will do as I please with you.”

“I beg of you,” Jill said, her voice barely a whisper.

Connor threw up his arms and spun away from her. “You have kept me waiting all these months!” he roared. “I have dreamed about you, about this night. Nothing else in all the world matters but this night!” He spun back to face her, now several steps away.

Jill felt as if she must be the most horrible person in the world. She wanted to give in to Connor, to give him what he deserved for his patience. But those wings, those black wings, that distant scream!

Connor’s demeanor changed again, suddenly. “No more,” he declared, his voice low, even threatening. Jill watched helplessly as he tore open his shirt, leaving it back on his shoulders, then squirmed out of his pants.

She had never seen a nude man before, and certainly not like this! But whatever feelings the sight of Connor’s body—and he was indeed a beautiful man—might have inspired were washed away by the fear, by the black wings, by feelings that Jill could not understand.

Even worse, there was no love, no tenderness in his face as he stalked back to her, just heated desire, an almost angry passion. “Look at me!” he demanded, grabbing Jill by the shoulders and turning her roughly, forcing her to face him directly. “I am your husband. I will do as I please, when I please!” As if to accentuate his point, he reached over with one hand and tore down the side of Jill’s nightgown, pulling it low enough to reveal one of her breasts. The sight of it, round and firm and creamy white, seemed to calm him for a moment.

“You approve of my appearance,” he concluded.

Jill looked down. Her nipple stood hard, but it was not for love, not for excitement, just fear and a cold sensation that coursed through her entire body. Connor brought his hand to it and pinched it hard.

Jill winced and pulled away. “I beg of you,” she whispered again.

Her hesitance incited his rage once more. Connor grabbed her and pulled her down, and before she could move to protest, he was on top of her, his knee between her legs, forcing them apart.

“No!” she begged, and she could feel him prodding at her, tearing at her nightgown to get the material out of his way.

His passion seemed to mount, driving him on, forcing him closer, rougher.

Jill gasped for air that would not come. She heard the flapping wings, the screams, the dying. She pulled and turned, looking away as his hungry mouth descended, but he only pursued, pinning one of her arms, putting all of his weight atop her.

The screams, distant, agonized. Her mother dying!

Jill scraped her forearm on the sharp edge of the stone hearth. She looked up to see she was trapped by the raised hearth, no room to squirm, her head close to the stone. And Connor would not relent, prodding and pushing.

Her mind was lost to the swirl of the past—to the screams, to the sights, the smells of torn bodies swelling, growing thick with decay. She was there again, in that most horrible place, with no escape, with the death and the fire.

The fire.

She saw the ember fall from a log, orange glowing like the eye of some hideous night creature. She closed her hand on it and felt no pain, was beyond pain.

And then she turned and stuck it into the face of her attacker, into the face of this thing that was atop her, this thing that had killed her mother, had murdered all of her village. It howled and fell away, and Jill rolled out from under it and scrambled to the bed.

Her surroundings confused her. She saw the man—it was a man, it was Connor!—rise to his feet, clutch at his face, and run screaming out of the room.

Waves of pain, assaulted her suddenly; she threw the ember back into the fireplace.

What had she done?

She fell upon the bed, crying, clutching her burned hand in the other and pressing both of them under her, against her breasts. Her sobs did not relent for many minutes, for half an hour perhaps, for all of an hour. She did not stop, did not look up when she heard the door open, when she heard the sound of footsteps—more than one set—approaching.

She did not stop crying when she was grabbed roughly and turned about, her arms pinned out wide to the sides, her legs hooked under the knees and similarly pulled out wide.

The handmaidens had her securely, and Connor, the burns on his face mercifully not so bad, approached, wearing only his shirt, and with that garment open wide.

“You are my wife,” he said grimly

Jill had no more fight left in her. She looked up pleadingly at the two women that held her, but both seemed impassive, even somehow pleased by it all, by the sight of her, and of Connor—seemed pleased by her helplessness and their part in it.

She looked back as Connor climbed up onto the bed, moving right atop her.

She shook her head. “I beg,” she whispered.

Connor thrust against her, but she felt no stabbing point.

Connor lifted his head up from her, and he seemed to her truly hurt and saddened. He spun away in frustration, shifting off the bed right back to his feet.

“I cannot,” he admitted, looking back sharply, his eyes reflecting a simmering rage. “Take her out of here and lock her in a room,” he demanded of the handmaidens, who immediately and none too gently moved to comply. “We shall let the magistrate, Abbot Dobrinion, determine her fate in the morning. Take her!

“And then return to me,” Connor added, speaking to the handmaidens, but aiming the words at Jill’s heart. “Both of you.”

CHAPTER 18

The Test of Faith

Hour after endless hour, day after endless day, the Windrunner glided lazily across the sparkling glassy surface of the South Mirianic. The sun became the enemy; the air grew uncomfortably hot. All the time.

Avelyn thought his very skin would slip off his body, a great rag, and fall rumpled to the deck. He burned and blistered, then browned, darker and darker, taking on the leathery appearance of those seasoned sailors around him. He tried to keep clean shaven, as did his monk companions, but there was no blade fine enough, and soon all three had scraggly beards.

The worst of it was the boredom. All they could see in any direction was the flat bluish-gray line of the horizon. Moments of excitement—a whale spout, the flight of a dolphin beside the prow, a run of bluefish churning white the water—came all too rarely and lasted barely seconds, to be inevitably replaced by the emptiness of the open sea. All romantic notions Avelyn had held concerning sea voyages were long gone, washed away by the slow, creaking, rolling reality.

He visited Dansally often, and for hours at a time. She was forbidden to come out of her cabin and preferred it that way, both she and the captain fearing what might happen if the common sailors, men who had been away from women for great lengths of time, caught her sweet scent. Thus she kept her cabin door securely locked.

Avelyn also noted that his three monk companions, apparently tiring of Dansally, visited her far less often. He was glad of that, though he wasn’t certain why. Dansally didn’t seem to mind at all the duties of her profession, and Avelyn had come to accept her work as a part of who she was. As he had said to her on his initial visit, it was not his place to judge her.

He believed that with all his heart, and yet he couldn’t deny he was glad to see that the others, including Captain Adjonas, were spending less time with her. He came to know aspects of Dansally that his companions would never think to look for—her witty sense of humor, tenderness, and her regrettable resignation for her station in life. Avelyn came to hear her dreams and ambitions, uttered rarely and never to anyone else, and he, alone among all the men the woman had known, tried to encourage those dreams, to give the woman some respect for herself. The issue of physical intimacy did not come up between them during those weeks, for both of them had found a more special intimacy, far more satisfying.

And so the days went, the sun, the stars, the endless swells and sparkles. The one relief for the monks and crewmen alike came on cloudless nights, for the colors of the Halo were much clearer here than in the northern zones. Soft blues and purples, vivid oranges and sometimes a deep crimson lined the night sky, lifting hearts and spirits.

Even prosaic and gruff Quintall appreciated the beauty, saw the Halo as a sign of God, and took faith whenever those colors appeared.

“Starboard ho!” came the cry one bright morning the second week out of Jacintha.

Quintall peered at the horizon, hopeful, though he knew from his discussions with Adjonas that they were not near to halfway to Pimaninicuit, and any other land they might sight would only tell them that they were far off course.

“Whale to starboard!” the lookout cried a moment later. “Must be a dead one, ‘cause he’s not moving.”

Farther back along the deck, Avelyn was close enough to hear Captain Adjonas mutter, “Damnation.”

“Is it bad fortune to spot a dead whale?” the innocent monk asked.

“No whale,” Adjonas answered grimly. “No whale.” He headed forward, Avelyn in his wake, and Bunkus Smealy, Pellimar, and Thagraine falling in line. Quintall was already at the rail, pointing far out and down.

Adjonas took up his spyglass and peered in the direction. He shook his head almost immediately and handed the instrument to Quintall—a move that Bunkus Smealy apparently did not like.

“No whale,” Adjonas said again. “Powrie.”

“Powrie?” Avelyn said, confused. Powries were skinny dwarfs, barely four feet in height.

“Powrie vessel,” Adjonas explained. “Barrelboats, they’re called.”

“That is a boat out there?” Pellimar asked in amazement.

Quintall nodded, bringing down the glass. “And keeping fair time with us,” he added.

“They’ve no sail,” argued Pellimar, as if logic alone should dismiss the possibility that this was a powrie craft.

“Powries need no sail,” Adjonas answered. “They pedal, turning a shaft to a great fan aft of the ship.”

“Pedal?” Pellimar scoffed, thinking the notion ridiculous in so vast a sea, where distance was measured in hundreds of miles.

Adjonas’ voice was grim and unrelenting. “Powries do not tire.”

Avelyn had heard as much. Powries were not often seen, except in times of war when they were dealt with all too often. Their battle prowess was the stuff of legend, of terrifying fireside tales. Though diminutive in stature, they were said to be stronger than an average man and with incredible stamina. They could suffer brutal hits with club or sword and keep on fighting, and they could wage battle for hours at a stretch, even after a forced march of many miles.

“So far out,” Quintall remarked. “Surely there’s no land within ten days’ sail.”

“Who can know the minds of powries,” Adjonas replied. “They have been quite active of late, so my friends in Jacintha informed me. They slip into the shipping routes and take their fill, then move back to deep water, following the blues or the cod or other favored fish. A hardy and stoic type, do not doubt; powries have been said to be out on the open water for a year and a half at a stretch.”

“But what would they do with their booty?” Avelyn reasoned innocently, drawing looks from the other five. “If they waylay ships, what goods do they extract and where, then, do they drop off their newfound cargo?”

Adjonas and Bunkus Smealy exchanged grim glances, telling the four monks that they simply did not understand this enemy.

“They take lives,” Adjonas answered calmly. “They waylay ships simply to kill. They attack only to pillage enough stores to get them to the next ship and for the simple thrill of the hunt and torture.”

Avelyn blanched, so did Thagraine and Pellimar, but Quintall only let out a low growl and turned his gaze back in the direction of the distant powrie ship.

“But for us to pass so close to one of them,” Pellimar offered nervously. “What dumb luck is that? We’d not even have seen the craft if we were but a hundred more yards to port.”

“But they would have seen us,” Adjonas replied. “Our sails break the horizon for miles, and powries have magic of their own, do not doubt. It is said that they have friends that swim under the sea, returning to them with whispers of passing ships. This is not dumb luck, my good brother Pellimar.”

“What could they know of us?” Quintall demanded, not turning back to face the others.

“Only that we are a lone ship far from home,” Adjonas was quick to answer.

“Of our mission?” Quintall pressed.

“Nothing,” Adjonas assured him. “It is doubtful that any aboard the powrie craft would even recognize your abbey robes.”

Quintall nodded. “Then run away from them,” he instructed.

Avelyn and the others held their breath as they watched Captain Adjonas’ face tighten. Avelyn feared that Quintall, in issuing such a clear order, might have overstepped his bounds this time.

“Hard to port!” Adjonas screamed out, then he calmed and turned to his first hand. “Fill our sails, Mister Smealy,” he instructed. “I’ve no desire to do battle with powries.”

Smealy ran off. Adjonas let his dagger-throwing gaze linger on Quintall’s back for a long while, then calmly turned and, with a quick nod to the other three monks, walked away.

Avelyn moved to the rail and shaded his eyes with his hand, peering hard into the vast gray-blue expanse. He thought he caught sight of the barrelboat but couldn’t be sure—it might have been no more than the shadow of a wave.

The Windrunner veered hard to port, sails filling and pushing the square-rigged caravel on with tremendous speed. But the powries tailed her; the lookout called down repeatedly, his tone growing thick with frustration and fear, that the barrelboat was keeping pace, was even beginning to close a bit.

Now at the taffrail the four monks and Captain Adjonas watched the powries’ progress. Avelyn could see the craft clearly now; no longer did he confuse the strange barrelboat with any wave shadows.

Adjonas looked up at his sails, then at his crew, tacking frantically to keep them as full of wind as possible.

“An amazing design,” Quintall remarked of the closing craft. “Why is it that we humans have not copied it?”

“There is a human barrelboat in Freeport,” Adjonas replied, “and several were constructed in Ursal for use on the river. But men are not powries. The quarters within such a boat are tight—far tighter than even your small cabin on the Windrunner. And men have not the powrie endurance. The dwarves can pedal all day, while most men tire within the hour—or after a couple of hours, at most.”

Quintall nodded, his respect for the stoic, tireless enemy redoubled. “If the powries will not tire, then we cannot simply keep up the run,” he remarked.

“I will set bowmen firing flaming arrows upon the vessel when it closes a bit more,” Adjonas answered, his tone far from hopeful. “But most of the craft is underwater, with little above to aim at, and none of that critical. Hopefully we will be able to keep our pace swift enough so that the powries’ initial ram causes little damage. Then we will fight them—what choice do we have?—as they try to board us.”

Quintall was shaking his head before Adjonas even finished. “We cannot allow them to ram,” he argued. “Any damage would slow us, at the least, and that we cannot afford. We have less than a week of extra time—and that if our calculations to our destination are correct and the winds hold.”

“I see few options,” Adjonas remarked.

The other three monks were looking grimly at the distant barrelboat or at each other, shaking their heads, but Quintall had turned his thoughts in a different direction, digesting all the information that Adjonas had given him of the enemy.

“Tell me,” he said at length, “how swift will a barrelboat run if its great fan becomes entangled?”

Adjonas looked at him curiously.

“We have extra netting,” Quintall added.

“The fan is not so exposed,” Adjonas said. “Even if we placed the netting perfectly in the barrelboat’s path, it would not likely snag on anything except the catch hooks protecting the fan.”

“Suppose that we did not simply place the net but rather took it to its destination?” Quintall asked slyly, drawing a confused look from all but Thagraine, who had caught on and was more than eager.

“That would be foolhardy,” Adjonas began, but he stopped as the hatch of the barrelboat flipped open and a red-capped head popped into sight. Up came a skinny arm, holding a funnel-shaped tube.

“Humans!” the powrie shouted through the funnel. “Yach, trader, give her up! You cannot outrun us, yach you cannot, nor can you hope to give a fight. Give her up, I say, and some of you might be spared.”

Adjonas looked all around at his now-stationary crew. He saw the expressions there, the sudden faint hope in the powrie’s promise.

Bunkus Smealy spoke for many of them by Adjonas’ estimation. “Might that we should harken to his words, Captain,” the first hand said. “If we offer them no fight—”

Adjonas pushed him aside and walked in from the rail so that all on deck could see him. “They shall kill us, every one!” he shouted. “These are powries, bloody caps, looking to wet their berets in human blood. They’ll not let a ship sail from them, nor do they have room for prisoners! If we stop, or even slow, they’ll only ram us all the harder.”

Even as Adjonas spoke, a flaming quarrel arched over the taffrail of the Windrunner, slashing into the rear sail. Three crewmen ran to the small fire immediately, minimizing the damage.

“Yach, how long can you keep up the run, trader?” the powrie howled, and then he disappeared, closing the hatch behind him.

“Who are your best swimmers?” Quintall asked, moving up to the captain. Adjonas looked at him curiously.

“The Windrunner is a ship of cold northern waters,” he replied. “As a habit, we do not swim.”

Quintall nodded grimly and turned to his three brothers. He hated risking them all but realized the success of the mission hinged on their actions right now. Before he ever finished his motion, Avelyn, Pellimar, and Thagraine dropped their robes to the deck and began stretching their muscles and swinging their arms.

“We are swimmers,” Quintall explained. “Even in the cold northern waters. Fetch me a net.”

Adjonas motioned to Bunkus Smealy; this was Quintall’s operation now, and the Windrunner captain, with no other apparent options, was more than willing to give the sturdy monk his chance.

The four were at the port rail out of sight of the barrelboat soon after. Quintall tossed the net into the water, and Thagraine went in right behind it, taking hold.

Adjonas grabbed Quintall by the shoulder. He pulled a stone from his baldric, a small red ruby, and handed it over. “Only if you see a need,” he explained. “That stone is more valuable than all my ship.”

Quintall looked it over curiously. He could feel the magic within it, a faint pulsing of energy. He nodded to Adjonas, then unexpectedly handed the stone to Avelyn. “Not a man alive knows the power of the stones better,” he said to his companion. “Use it well if we find the need.”

Avelyn took it and fingered it for a few moments, feeling the energy clearly, understanding the purpose of the stone as surely as if it had spoken to him. He moved to put it in his loincloth but didn’t feel secure with that, so he popped it into his mouth instead, rolling it behind his teeth.

Then they went in, swimming fast to join Thagraine, who was still bobbing with the net, many yards behind the swift-running Windrunner.

They split into two groups, with Thagraine and Quintall holding the net between them while swimming out to the side, trying to find an angle to the closing barrelboat, and Pellimar and Avelyn putting themselves right in line with the craft, keeping low in the water in case that hatch should open again or in case the powries had some other method of looking out.

Adjonas watched nervously from the taffrail. He knew things about powries and about the sea that the four monks apparently did not. If the barrelboat got by the net holders, for example, they would never catch up and Adjonas couldn’t turn about for them. They would be stranded in open water, and thus, surely doomed. Even more dangerous, powries were said to have waterborne friends, often ones with a distinctive dorsal fin.

The captain nodded, confident that even if brave Quintall knew all of this, he still would have gone into the South Mirianic with the net.

“Swim hard!” Quintall gurgled to his companion, moving fast to close the remaining distance. The barrelboat was moving much more swiftly than it appeared, for it cut no prow wake, as did the Windrunner. Thagraine worked as furiously as he could, flailing arms and legs, but he would not have gotten to the mark had not Quintall, the other end of the netting hooked about his broad shoulders, tugged him along.

Exhausted, the two men dove under for the last expanse, swimming so the craft would pass right over them. Fortunately, the water was crystal clear.

Up ahead, Avelyn and Pellimar waited anxiously. They would have to get aboard the barrelboat, whatever the outcome of Quintall’s attempt. If the net failed, then these two would have to find some way to stop the powries. Avelyn rolled his tongue over the ruby. The stone wouldn’t be nearly strong enough, he realized, to take out the wet barrelboat’s sturdy hull.

The barrelboat closed—fifty yards, forty, twenty—cutting the water smoothly.

Then it jerked suddenly and its straight run shifted to the diagonal. Avelyn and Pellimar swam with all speed. Pellimar reached the drifting boat first, pulling himself cautiously up its slick, rounded side. He shuffled for the hatch and got there just after it opened.

The first powrie out was truly stunned. The fan had snagged on some seaweed or on something the caravel had dropped, so the dwarves thought, and it was not so uncommon an occurrence. But to see a human standing on the deck!

The sight was no less amazing to Pellimar, who had never seen a powrie up close. The dwarf stood just over four feet, with gangly arms and legs that seemed too skinny to support its barrel-like torso.

The dwarf’s expression did not change, its pale, wrinkled face staring openmouthed as Pellimar hit it with a solid right cross.

The monk stared at his wounded hand, and at his opponent, so much more solid than it appeared! The hard-headed powrie shook its head vigorously, lips flapping.

Pellimar hit it again, a series of three quick left jabs, then brought his right leg up hard, snapping out his foot to connect right under the powrie’s jaw. The dwarf’s head snapped back, and it fell to the deck and rolled over the side of the barrelboat.

But another was in its place, this one not surprised. Pellimar, quick as a cat, hit it, too, with three solid punches—a left, right, left combination—but the monk’s impetus was lost when his right hand, still pained from the first hit, connected that second time.

Avelyn, rushing in behind his brother, saw Pellimar jerk suddenly and then fall to the side, a bright red line across his chest. There before Avelyn stood the powrie, its short sword dripping Pellimar’s blood. The dwarf squealed in rage, seeing its victim falling off the side, seeing a chance to heighten the color of its already bright crimson beret tumbling into the Mirianic. That moment of distraction gave Avelyn his chance.

He could have bent low and barreled into the dwarf, but he sensed its solidity and saw another powrie coming through the hatch behind it. Putting his personal safety aside, Avelyn had to consider the greater good.

He ran forward and slid down to the deck, scrambling fast and taking the ruby from his mouth. He rubbed it in his hand, calling forth its magic, finding its center of energy and bringing that to a volatile level.

The powrie came across with a backhand slash, but Avelyn managed to duck beneath it. He reached between the powrie’s legs and tossed the stone upward, toward the hatch. Then, guided purely by his survival instinct, Avelyn curled his legs under him and came up fast.

The ruby, shining with power, arced lazily over the open hatch. The next powrie coming out saw its sparkle and, mesmerized, reached for it. The dwarf caught the gem securely, but surrendered his hold on the ladder. Thus, when Avelyn and the other powrie came up suddenly, rising over the stone holder, the surprised dwarf fell back down into the barrelboat, glowing ruby in hand.

Avelyn clung to the powrie’s sword arm for all his life. He had one hand below him and managed to push the hatch back as they descended, Avelyn rolling right over the hatchway, the deceivingly agile powrie hopping to its feet atop the now-closed portal. The dwarf lifted its sword, grinning evilly, and let out a wail that shook Avelyn to the marrow of his bones as he lay prone not far away.

But then the dwarf was flying, the hatch spinning through the, air behind it, and a stream of thick black smoke poured from the open hole.

The jolt sent Avelyn tumbling, and he didn’t fight the motion. The blast had not likely killed half the powries—the barrelboat was nearly as large as the Windrunner!—and they would be up on deck soon enough.

And Avelyn had no desire to face another.

Quintall and Thagraine came up breathless after setting the net in place. By the time Quintall got near the barrelboat a powrie was in the water, and Brother Pellimar was tumbling close behind.

With their heavy bodies and spindly limbs, powries were not strong swimmers, and Quintall easily overtook the dazed creature, pushing it under the water and gaining a seat atop its shoulders. The powrie struggled desperately, but the powerful man locked his legs tight and fought to keep his balance.

The dwarf would not find the surface ever again.

Once in the water, Avelyn found Quintall treading high not so far away, half his body clear of the sea. The sight surprised Avelyn at first—until he noted the “seat” his companion had found. Thagraine, some distance to the side, had Pellimar under one arm, swimming as hard as he could for the turning caravel.

As soon as his grim business was finished, Quintall, easily the strongest swimmer, relieved Thagraine of his burden and nearly kept up with his two companions, despite the added weight of an unconscious Pellimar.

Adjonas watched it all anxiously, moving along the rail as his ship executed a turn. The barrelboat was disabled temporarily, but the fight was hardly over. The captain ordered archers into place and told them to take whatever shots presented themselves if the powries came out through that smoke, which was already diminishing.

Then he watched, because there was nothing else he could do. The Windrunner came right about, bearing down on the four monks, and on the barrelboat. There were indeed powries on her deck now, some with heavy crossbows, taking potshots at the swimming monks.

Even worse for the monks, Adjonas knew, was the trail of blood the wounded Pellimar was leaving in the water.

Thagraine was first to the Windrunner, grabbing frantically at a line thrown from the deck. He had barely taken hold, Avelyn twenty yards away, and Quintall and Pellimar that distance again, when the lookout gave a not-unexpected cry.

“Dorsal fin!” he shouted. “Shark, white shark!”

“Get them up quickly!” Adjonas howled, moving to the rope to lend a hand. “More ropes into the water!”

One thrown rope splashed right near Avelyn, but understanding the frantic lookout and the newest danger, he refused it, turning about for Quintall and Pellimar.

“Brother Avelyn!” Thagraine shouted from his perch on the Windrunner’s rail. “You and I are the Preparers! They are expendable!”

The words assaulted Avelyn with the force of a cold slap. Expendable? These were monks of St.-Mere-Abelle! These were human beings!

With a growl, Avelyn pushed on, finally reaching the tiring Quintall. To Avelyn’s surprise, Pellimar bobbed in the water behind the stocky man.

Avelyn asked no questions, nor did Quintall, who was swimming hard for the rope. Avelyn finally reached Pellimar and hooked his arm around the bobbing man’s shoulder.

A crossbow quarrel skipped across the water right beside Avelyn’s face as he turned. He saw it, then—a dorsal fin sticking fully two feet out of the water—and though he had never seen or heard of sharks before, he could well imagine the horrors that lay beneath the telltale fin.

The shark closed, as did the Windrunner. A dozen men—Quintall, Thagraine, and Adjonas among them—had the rope in hand and were pulling it taut even as Avelyn desperately grabbed its other end.

He couldn’t lift himself even a bit, had all that he could handle and more in simply keeping his grasp on the rope and on limp Pellimar.

But they got him up to the rail, Quintall grabbing Pellimar and hauling the man onto the deck, Avelyn dangling dangerously low. He heard the screams of the crewmen and looked down, one foot still in the water, as the great dark shape, fully twenty-five feet in length, glided under the Windrunner, under Avelyn.

A split second later, the terrified monk was standing on the deck.

“Big one,” Adjonas remarked, noting the shark.

Bunkus Smealy turned his greasy grin on Avelyn, holding one hand up, his thumb and index finger about five inches apart. “With teeth this long,” he said cruelly.

There were a dozen powries on the deck of the barrelboat, Adjonas noted, but none would go into the water with the great shark so close and so obviously agitated. Powries and sharks worked in concert, so it was said, but apparently there were limits to such friendship.

A wicked grin widened on the captain’s face; he decided to test that unlikely truce.

“Give them a bump,” he told Bunkus Smealy, and the first hand shrieked with glee and ran to the wheel.

It wasn’t a full ram—no sensible captain would pit his ship against the strong hull of a powrie barrelboat—but enough of a nudge certainly to send all but one of the powries on deck rolling into the water. The Windrunner’s archers opened up hard as the ship crossed beside the powrie craft, leaving three more dwarves dead in the water.

A second, smaller dorsal fin joined the first in its tightening ring.

How the dwarves scrambled!

“Get us away,” Adjonas called to his crew. The sharks would feed on the dead, and the frantic actions of those still alive combined with the widening blood spill would likely bring more in, he knew. No powrie would dare go into the water to try and untangle the netted fan with frenzied sharks so close.

Even worse for the powries, though neither Adjonas nor any other aboard the Windrunner could have foreseen it, the drifting barrelboat appeared remarkably like a wounded whale to the crazed sharks.

The barrelboat, rolling from the contact with the Windrunner, with water rushing in the open hatchway, soon disappeared under the waves.

The excitement on the Windrunner did not dissipate until the powries were left far behind. The monks had been the heroes of the fight, but Avelyn heard crewmen muttering “foolhardy” as often as “brave.” The sailors were a tough bunch, proud and cynical, and if he or Quintall or any of the others expected a congratulatory pat on the back, they were disappointed.

Avelyn and Thagraine took the severely wounded Pellimar into Dansally’s quarters, and found the woman was versed in more skills than the sensual. Soon after, the man was resting as comfortably as possible, and Avelyn left the room.

He found Quintall standing with Adjonas, the captain, looking weary, leaning against the mainmast.

“Powries,” he was muttering when Avelyn walked up. “More bloody caps than ever on the Mirianic, north and south. They have multiplied on their isles, the Julianthes, it would seem, bursting from their shores. Their attacks will only increase in number and in purpose.”

Quintall shrugged away the grim words. “How fares Pellimar?” he asked Avelyn.

Avelyn sighed helplessly. “He may live,” he replied, “or he may not.”

Quintall nodded, then suddenly exploded into action, his roundhouse punch catching Avelyn square on the jaw, dropping the man in a heap to the deck. “How dare you?” Quintall yelled.

Sailors looked up from every corner of the deck; Adjonas eyed the stocky man with disbelief.

Avelyn pulled himself up, wary of another blow, thoroughly confused by Quintall’s actions.

“You are the chosen Preparer,” Quintall scolded. “Yet you risked your life to save Pellimar.”

“We all risked our lives by going out,” Avelyn argued.

“We had no choice in the matter,” Quintall retorted, so angry that his spittle sprayed forth with every word. “But when the danger to the Windrunner was ended, when the powries were stopped and the way was clear, you went back into the dangerous waters.”

“Pellimar would have been eaten!”

“A pity, but not important!”

Avelyn swallowed his next retort, knowing that it would be a useless argument. He had never imagined such a level of fanaticism, even from stern Quintall. “I could not leave him, and you.”

Quintall spat on the deck at Avelyn’s feet. “I asked you not for help, and would have refused it if offered. The way to our destination was cleared, the threat to the Windrunner ended. You should have gone aboard and stayed aboard. What a waste Pellimar’s life, and my own, would have been had Avelyn, too, died in the water!”

Avelyn had no response. The argument was indisputable. He pulled himself up, nodding in agreement, though in his heart he knew if the situation arose again he would again go back to the pair.

“We do not know that the way to Pimaninicuit is now clear,” Adjonas whispered, protecting the sacred name.

“Pellimar is no good to us in any case,” Quintall was fast to respond. “Even if he lives, he’ll not likely crawl out of bed for many days.”

Avelyn studied the stocky man intently. The mission was all important—Avelyn agreed and he would sacrifice his own life for the good of the voyage. But to ask him to let another die?

Avelyn shook his head, though fortunately Quintall and Adjonas missed the movement. No, the young monk decided, that he could not, would not, do.

“Remember,” Quintall said to him gravely.

“I will go to Pellimar,” Avelyn replied, taking comfort in the subtle vow the words implied, one that Quintall could not comprehend. “Dansally tends his wounds?”

“Who?” Quintall asked as Avelyn walked away.

Avelyn smiled, not surprised.

Pellimar’s condition did not much improve as the days slipped past. The weather remained hot and clear, and no more barrelboats came into view.

Perhaps it was the boredom, the heat, or the tasteless provisions, but the crew grew increasingly uneasy, even hostile. More than once, Avelyn heard Bunkus Smealy and Adjonas in a shouting match, and every time the monk walked the open deck now; he felt burning gazes of hatred on his back. The crew were blaming the monks for their discomfort, for this whole journey. Quintall had warned Avelyn and Thagraine of this, as Adjonas had warned Quintall. The Windrunner was usually a coast hugger. Journeys into the wide, vast ocean were extremely rare, and rumors told of a madness that often grabbed at a crew. Ships had been found, so the stories went, intact and seaworthy, but with not a crewman aboard. Some said it was the work of ghosts, or evil monsters of the deeper waters, but most rational, experienced sailors attributed it to fear and suspicion, to the long days of emptiness and the undeniable feeling that the sea would never end, that the ship would sail and sail until there was no more to eat and no more to drink.

It got so bad by the sixth week out of Jacintha that Adjonas, to Avelyn’s utter dismay, opened privileges of Dansally to other members of the crew. It had to be done in a calm fashion, so the captain ordered, and every time Avelyn saw another of the filthy sailors going to Dansally’s door, his heart sank a bit lower, and he chewed a bit more of his skin from his lip.

Dansally took it in stride, accepting her lot in life, but her expanded duties left her little time for her talks with Avelyn, something the monk, and now the woman, dearly needed.

Even the extra privileges did little to improve the mood of the increasingly surly crew. The situation came to a frightening head one especially hot humid morning. Quintall spent the better part of an hour in a sometimes heated discussion with Captain Adjonas. Finally, Adjonas seemed to nod his assent, and then he called Bunkus Smealy to his side.

More yelling ensued, mostly by Quintall, and when Smealy at last tried to counter, the stocky monk snapped his hand under Smealy’s chin and lifted the man from the deck by the throat.

Avelyn and Thagraine rushed to Quintall’s side, Thagraine pointing out that all the crew was watching with more than passing interest.

“It proves my point, Captain Adjonas,” Quintall remarked, giving Smealy a little shake. “He is the leader of the unrest, a man to be thrown over as food for the sharks.”

Adjonas calmly put his hand over Quintall’s arm, easing it and his first hand down. Smealy pulled away, coughing and, predictably, turned to the crew for help.

“Utter one word of encouragement to them,” Quintall threatened, “and all my attacks, and those of my companions, will be directed at you. Both your arms and both your legs will be broken and useless when you hit the water, Bunkus Smealy. How long could you stay afloat, waiting for the Windrunner to turn about and find you?”

The greasy man blanched. “We’re too far out,” he said to his captain, his plea sounding as a whine. “Too far!”

“The island—” Adjonas started to say.

Smealy stopped him with a snarl. “There ain’t no island!” he yelled, and the murmurs of the crewmen, seeming closer now than a moment before, were in agreement.

Adjonas turned a worried glance at Quintall. They had another month of sailing, at the least, and the captain honestly wondered if his crew would show that much patience. They had been carefully picked, most had sailed with Adjonas for nearly a decade, but weeks on end out of sight of land were unnerving.

“Three months!” the captain yelled suddenly. “Before ever we started from Jacintha, I told you that we would find three months of travel before our destination was reached. Yet, we’ve not yet marked the end of our second month out of St.-Mere-Abelle. Are you cowards, then? Are you not men of your honor?”

That backed them off, though they continued grumbling.

“Know by my word,” Quintall said to Smealy as the first hand, too, retreated, “that I hold you personally responsible for the actions of the crew.”

Smealy never blinked and didn’t dare look away from the dangerous monk until he was halfway across the deck.

“It will only worsen if Pimaninicuit is not easily found,” Adjonas quietly warned the three.

Quintall fixed him with an icy stare.

“We are on course, and on time,” Adjonas assured him, feeling the need to calm the man, “according to the maps I was given.”

“They are accurate to the league,” Quintall growled in response.

Indeed they were, for four and a half uneasy weeks later, the lookout cried out, “Land to forward!”

All the crew rushed to the forward rails, and soon enough the gray haze became more substantial, became the undeniable outline of an island, conical in shape. Gray became green as they closed, lush vegetation thick on the slopes.

“By my estimation we have nearly a week to spare,” Adjonas remarked to the four monks—for Pellimar, though still very weak, was up on the deck again. “Should we go ashore and scout—”

“No!” Quintall snapped to everyone’s amazement. The captain’s recommendation seemed perfectly logical.

“None but the Preparers may go ashore,” Quintall explained. “Any others who touch the shores of Pimaninicuit will find their lives forfeit.”

It was a strange decree, one that caught Avelyn so much by surprise that he hardly noticed Quintall had openly proclaimed the name of the island.

The words caught Captain Adjonas off his guard as well, an unexpected proclamation and one that was hardly welcomed by Adjonas. His crew had been aboard ship for so long, with only the short break in Entel. To keep them out now, with land so close and inviting—land likely covered with fruit trees and other luxuries they had not known on the open sea—was foolhardy indeed.

But Quintall would not relent. “Circle the island close once that we might discern where best to put the Preparers ashore, then sail out to deeper water out of sight of the island,” he instructed the captain. “Then sail back in five days.”

Adjonas knew he was at a critical point here. He didn’t agree with Quintall, not at all, but now with Pimaninicuit in sight, he had, by agreement with the Father Abbot, to let the monk take command. This was the purpose of the voyage, after all, and Father Abbot Markwart had made no secret of Adjonas’ place in all this. On the open seas, he was the captain; at Pimaninicuit, he would do as told, or all payment, and the sum was considerable, would be forfeit.

And worse.

So they circled, spotting one promising lagoon, and then sailed out to deeper waters for the longest five days of the trip, particularly for Avelyn and Thagraine.

Avelyn spent all the last day in prayer and meditation, mentally preparing himself for the task ahead. He wanted to go to Dansally and tell her of his fears, of his inadequacy for such a task, but he resisted the urge. This was his battle alone.

Finally, he and Thagraine, carrying their supplies, slipped down the rope off the side of the Windrunner into the boat, Pimaninicuit looming large before them.

“We need be far out when the showers begin,” Quintall explained to them, “for the stones have been known to cause great damage. When it is ended, we will sail back here.”

A cry from the stern stole the conversation, and the monks and Adjonas turned as one to see one of the crew, a boy of no more than seventeen who had been especially sea-crazed, dive off the ship into the water, then begin swimming hard for the shore.

“Mister Smealy!” Adjonas roared, turning a stern eye on all the crew. “Archers to the rail!”

“Let him go,” Quintall said, surprising Adjonas. Quintall realized that shooting the desperate man in front of the crew would likely cause a mutiny. “Let him go!” Quintall yelled louder. “But since he has chosen the island, he will find his work doubled.” He bent low and whispered something to Thagraine then, and Avelyn doubted that it had anything to do with putting the fleeing man to work.

Avelyn and Thagraine rowed away from the Windrunner moments later and the ship raised sail immediately, fleeing for the safety of the deeper waters far from Pimaninicuit. On board Quintall launched right away into lies about the dangers to the foolish seaman, about how the monks, and the monks alone, were trained to withstand the fury of the showers. “He will not likely live to return to the Windrunner,” Quintall explained, trying to prepare the volatile crew for the blow that would surely come.

Thagraine was out and running as soon as the small boat brushed its bottom on the black sands of the island beach. They had passed the mutineer on the water, far to the side, and Thagraine had made a mental note of his direction and speed.

Avelyn called out to his companion, but Thagraine only ordered him to secure the boat, and did not look back.

Avelyn felt a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. He hauled the boat to a sheltered point in the lagoon and tipped it low, filling it with water and securing it on the shallow bottom.

Thagraine returned to him soon after.

Avelyn winced, seeing the man alone. He knew what instructions Quintall had offered.

“There is much to eat,” Thagraine said happily, trembling with excitement. “And we must seek out a cave.”

Avelyn said nothing, just followed quietly, praying for the young sailor’s soul.

The next two days, mostly spent huddled in a small cave on the side of the single mountain, overlooking the beach and the wide water, were perfectly unbearable. Thagraine was most ill at ease, pacing, stalking, and muttering to himself.

Avelyn understood the man’s distress and knew that Thagraine’s agitation could cost them both much when the showers came. “You killed him,” the younger monk remarked quietly, taking care so that his statement did not sound as an accusation.

Thagraine stopped his pacing. “Any who step on Pimaninicuit forfeit their lives,” he replied, straining hard to keep his tone even.

Avelyn didn’t believe a word of it; in his mind, Thagraine had acted as a tool for the murderous Quintall.

“How will they know when we are finished?” Thagraine asked suddenly, wildly. “How will they even know when the showers occur if they sail so far from the island?”

Avelyn eyed him carefully. He had hoped to draw the man into a discussion of his action against the sailor, to ease the man’s mind, at least for now, that they might concentrate on their most-important mission. But his words hardly seemed to calm Thagraine; quite the opposite, the man, obviously racked with guilt, paced all the more furiously, slapping his hands together repeatedly.

The showers, by their calculations, were now overdue. Still the pair huddled near the edge of the cave, looking for some sign.

“Is it even true?” Thagraine protested every few minutes. “Is there a man alive who can bear witness to such a thing?”

“The old tomes do not lie,” Avelyn said faithfully.

“How do you know?” Thagraine exploded. “Where are the stones, then? Where is the precious day?” He stopped, gasping for breath. “Seven generations,” he shouted, “and we are to get here within the week of the showers? What folly is this? Why, if the abbey’s calculations are off by only a month, or a year perhaps . . . are we to stay huddled in a hole all that time?”

“Calm, Thagraine,” Avelyn murmured. “Hold fast your faith in Father Abbot Markwart and in God.”

“To the pit of Hell with Father Abbot Markwart!” the other monk howled. “God?” He spat contemptuously. “What does God know when he calls for the death of a frightened boy?”

So that was it, Avelyn realized: guilt, pure and simple. Avelyn moved to take Thagraine’s hand, to try and offer comfort, but the older monk shoved him away and scrambled out the narrow mouth of the cave, running off into the brush.

“Do not!” Avelyn cried, and he paused only a moment before following. He lost sight of Thagraine immediately, the monk disappearing into the thick underbrush but headed, predictably, for the open beach. Avelyn moved to follow, but as soon as he got out of sight of the cave, something, some inner voice, called to him to stop. He looked back in the direction of the cave, then out over the hillside to the water. He noted that the sky had turned a funny color, a purplish, rosy hue the likes of which Avelyn had only seen at sunrise or sunset, and then only on the appropriate horizon. Yet the sun, in this region of long days, was still hours from the western rim and should have been shining bright and yellow in the cloudless sky.

“Damnation,” Avelyn sputtered, and he scrambled with all speed back to the shelter of the cave. Inside, from that higher perch, he spotted Thagraine, running wildly along the beach, and he saw, too, a gentle rustling on the water far out from the shore.

Avelyn closed his eyes and prayed.

“Where are you, damned God?” Thagraine cried, stumbling along the black sands of Pimaninicuit. “What cost do you exact from your faithful? What lies do you tell?”

He stopped then, suddenly, hearing the splashing.

He grabbed at his arm a moment later, felt a line of blood there, and noticed a small stone, a smoky crystal, lying on the black sand before him.

Thagraine’s eyes widened as surely as if God himself had answered his questions. He looked back and turned and ran with all speed for the cave, crying for Avelyn every step.

Avelyn couldn’t bear to watch, nor could he bear to look away. Fiery rocks streaked down before the cave entrance, slicing holes in the wide leaves of trees and Bushes. The rocky hall was light for some time, gradually increasing to the point where it punished the very ground of Pimaninicuit.

And through the deluge, Avelyn heard his name. He peered out, stunned, as a torn and battered Thagraine came into view beyond the thinned foliage, the man bleeding in so many places that he seemed one great wound. He stumbled forward pitifully, holding out his arms toward the cave.

Avelyn set his feet under him. He knew that it was foolhardy for him to go out, but how could he not? He could make it, he told himself grimly. He could get to Thagraine and shelter the man back to the cave. He tried not to think of the choice that would then befall him, of tending to either Thagraine or to the sacred stones, for his period of opportunity for sealing the enchantment of the stones was narrow indeed.

But Avelyn would have to worry about that when the time came. Thagraine was barely twenty strides away, stumbling forward, when Avelyn started out.

He saw it at once, a dark blot high above, and he knew, somehow he knew, its deadly path.

Thagraine spotted him then, a hopeful, pitiful, smile widening on his bloody face.

The stone streaked down like an aimed arrow, smashing into the back of Thagraine’s head, laying him out flat on the ground.

Avelyn fell back into the cave, into his prayers.

The storm intensified over the next hour, wind and rocky rain pounding the island, battering the ground above Avelyn’s hole so forcefully that the monk feared it would collapse upon him.

But then, as abruptly as it began, it ended, and the skies cleared quickly to deep blue.

Avelyn came out, frightened but determined. He went right to Thagraine, a torn and bloody pulp. Avelyn meant to turn him over, but he could not find his breath when he looked at the fatal wound, a gaping hole smashed right through Thagraine’s skull, brain matter splattered all about.

The object of Thagraine’s death, a huge purple amethyst, held Avelyn’s attention. Gently, reverently, Avelyn reached into the back of his dead companion’s head and pulled forth the stone. He could feel the power thrumming within it, the likes of which he had never before imagined. Surely this was greater than any stone at St.-Mere-Abelle! And the size of it! Avelyn’s hands were large indeed, yet even with his fingers fully extended he could not touch all edges of the stone.

He went to work, put all thoughts of Thagraine and of the boy Thagraine had killed far out of his mind, and went with furor to the task he had trained to do for all these years. He prepared the amethyst first, coating it with special oils, giving it some of his own energy through intense prayer and handling.

Then he went on, letting his instincts guide him to which stones were the most full of heavenly energy. Many showed no magical power at all, and Avelyn soon realized that these were the remnants of previous showers, brought up to the surface by the battering of the storm. He selected an egg-sized hematite next, and then a ruby, small but flawless to his trained eye.

On and on he went. Only those stones he selected and treated would hold their power; the others would become the waste of Pimaninicuit, buried by the black sands and the resurgent foliage over the next seven generations.

Late that night, the monk fell, thoroughly exhausted, upon the beach bordering the lagoon. He did not wake up until long after the dawn, his precious cargo intact in his pack. Only then did Avelyn take the time to note that dramatic change that had come over Pimaninicuit. No longer did the island seem so plush and inviting. Where trees and thick brush had grown was now only battered pulp and blasted stone.

It took great effort for the monk to get the sunken boat raised and floating, but he somehow managed. He thought that he should fill it with fruits or some other delicacy, but in looking around at the near-total devastation, Avelyn realized that opportunity was lost. On another note, Avelyn could not help but laugh at the absurd, useless treasure that lay strewn all about him. In an hour’s time, he could collect enough precious—though non-magical—gemstones to finance the building of a palace finer than that in Ursal. In a day, he could have more wealth than any man in all Honce-the-Bear, in all the world, perhaps, including the fabulously rich tribal chieftains of Behren. But his orders concerning Pimaninicuit had been explicit and unyielding: only those stones treated to retain their magic could be brought from the island. Any other gems taken would be considered an insult to God himself. The gift of the showers was given to two monks only, and whatever they might prepare, they might take. Not a ruby, not a smoky quartz, more.

Thus, Avelyn simply sat staring outward, too overwhelmed even to eat, and waited for the Windrunner.

The sails came into sight late the next day. Like a robot, beyond feeling, Brother Avelyn got into the boat and pushed away. Only then did he think that perhaps he should retrieve the body of Thagraine, but he decided against that course.

What better fate and final resting place for an Abellican monk?

CHAPTER 19

Truth Be Told

He hardly noted the passing of the days, the weeks, so enthralled was he with the horde of God-given treasures. While Adjonas tended to the crew and their course, the three remaining monks—even Pellimar, whose condition had steadily improved—worked with the stones. The powrie slash had not been without consequence to Pellimar, though, tearing the muscles about the monk’s left shoulder. His arm hung practically useless, with no sign that it would ever improve.

They encountered no powries on the voyage back from Pimaninicuit, and Avelyn wasn’t concerned in any case. He above all others sensed the throbbing powers of some of the gemstones. If a barrelboat showed itself, Avelyn was confident he could use any one of a dozen different stones to destroy it utterly.

Most intriguing of all was the giant purple amethyst, with so many different crystal shafts. Its bottom was nearly flat, and placed on the floor it resembled some strange purple bush, with stems of various heights rising at many angles. Avelyn could not discern the purpose of the magic, except to note that there was a tremendous amount of energy stored within those crystals.

Some of the stones, such as the hematite, were placed in a small tumbler and rolled for hours on end, smoothing them to a perfect finish. Others had to be treated with oils for many days, that their magic be locked permanently within them. All three monks knew the process, and knew each stone, except for that amethyst.

They couldn’t tumble it—it was too large for the container—and they hardly knew where to begin with their oils. Avelyn made it his personal work, and he treated the giant crystal with prayers, not physical salves. He felt as if he was giving a bit of himself to the stone each time, but that was acceptable, as if it were some communion with his God.

The talk among the monks did not turn often to poor Thagraine—they prayed for him and, in their minds and hearts, put him to rest—but among the grumbling crew, little was whispered that did not concern Taddy Sway, the youth who had tried for the island and who had not returned. Avelyn felt burning, accusing eyes on his back every time he walked the deck.

Whispers bred open talk in the heat and boredom of the passing days, and open talk bred accusing shouts. Avelyn, Pellimar, and most of all, Quintall, were not surprised then, one early morning, when Captain Adjonas came to them, warning of a mounting call for mutiny.

“They want the stones,” Adjonas explained. “Or at least, some of the stones, in exchange for the life of Taddy Sway.”

“They cannot even begin to understand the power of these gems,” Quintall protested.

“But they understand the value of a ruby or an emerald,” Adjonas pointed out, “even without the magic.”

Avelyn bit his lip, remembering the hours on the beach, surrounded by so vast a wealth of useless gems.

“Your crew is being well paid for the voyage,” Quintall reminded the captain.

“Extra compensation for the lost man,” Adjonas remarked.

“They knew the risks.”

“Did they?” the captain asked sincerely. “Did they suspect that the four men they carried might turn against them?”

Quintall stood up and walked to stand right before the captain, the monk seeming even more imposing because Adjonas had to stoop belowdecks, whereas Quintall could stand at his full height.

“I am only echoing their sentiments,” Adjonas explained, not backing off an inch. “Words that Quintall should hear. We are three months yet from St.-Mere-Abelle.”

Quintall glanced around the tiny cabin, eyes narrowed as he planned his next move. “We must end it this day,” he decided, and he moved to Avelyn’s cot and took one of the gemstones, an orange-brown stone marked by three black lines—a tiger’s paw, it was called—from the tumbling box.

The stocky monk led the way to the deck, the other three close behind. Quintall’s physical attitude as he came out alerted the crew that something important was about to happen, and they quickly gathered around the group, Bunkus Smealy at their lead.

“There will be no compensation for Taddy Sway,” Quintall said bluntly. “The foolish youth forfeited his life when he swam to the island.”

“Ye killed him!” one man cried.

“I was on the Windrunner,” Quintall reminded.

“Yer monks, I mean!” the man insisted.

Quintall neither denied nor confirmed the execution. “The island was for two men alone, and even one of them, trained for years to survive Pim—the island, did not return.”

Bunkus Smealy turned about and waved his hand forcefully, quieting the rising murmurs. “We’re thinking that ye owe us,” he said, turning back to Quintall. He tucked his hands into his rope belt, taking on an important attitude.

Quintall measured him carefully. He understood then that Smealy was the linchpin, the organizer, the would-be captain.

“Captain Adjonas does not agree,” Quintall said evenly, coaxing the mutiny to the surface.

Smealy turned a wicked grin on the captain. “Might not be Captain Adjonas’ decision,” he said.

“The penalties for mutiny—” Adjonas began, but Smealy stopped him short.

“We’re knowing the rules,” Smealy assured him loudly. “And we’re knowing, too, that a man has got to be caught to be hung. Behren’s closer than Honce-the-Bear, and they’re not for asking many questions in Behren.”

There—he had played his hand, and now it was time for Quintall to take that hand and crush it; Smealy’s eyes widened when he looked back at the stocky monk, when he heard the low growl coming from Quintall’s throat, when he looked at the man’s arm and saw not a human appendage but the paw and claws of a great tiger!

“What?” the old sea dog started to ask as Quintall, faster then Smealy could possibly react, raked the man chin to belly.

The horrified crew fell back.

“He killed me,” Smealy whispered, and then, true to his words, with three great lines of bright blood erupting across his neck and chest, he fell limp to the deck.

Quintall’s roar, truly the roar of a tiger, sent the crew scrambling. “Know this!” the transformed monk bellowed from a face that looked human but with a voice that sounded much greater. “Look upon dead Bunkus Smealy and see the fate of any other who speaks against Captain Adjonas or the brothers of St.-Mere-Abelle!”

Given the expressions on the crewmen, Avelyn thought it unlikely that any of them would utter another mutinous whisper all the way back to the coast and to St.-Mere-Abelle.

The three monks exchanged not a word as they went back to their cabin, nor for the rest of that day. Avelyn took care to keep his accusing gaze away from Quintall. His mind swirled in a hundred different directions. He had come to know Bunkus Smealy well over the last few months and, though he was not overfond of the weasely man, he could not help but feel some sense of loss.

And agitation. The cool and callous way Quintall had dispatched the man, had murdered a human being, shook gentle Avelyn to his very bones. This was not the way of the Abellican Church, at least not in Avelyn’s mind, and yet the efficiency of the executions of Taddy Sway and now of Bunkus Smealy made Avelyn suspect that Quintall was acting as he had been instructed by the masters before they had left port. The mission was vital, true enough, the greatest moment in seven generations. Avelyn and the other monks would give their lives willingly to see the mission successful. But to kill without remorse?

He chanced a look at Quintall early the next day as the man went about his business. He remembered the emotional torture the execution had exacted on Thagraine, the restlessness. None of that was evident in the dark, stocky man. Quintall had killed Bunkus Smealy as he had drowned the powrie, without distinction of the fact that the victim this time was not an evil dwarf but a human being.

A shudder coursed down Avelyn’s spine. Without remorse. And Avelyn knew when they returned to the abbey, when their tale was told in full, the masters, even Father Abbot Markwart, would only nod their agreement with Quintall’s brutal actions.

Avelyn could appreciate their notion of the “greater good,” for that would surely be the excuse given, but somehow all of this was out of line with justice, and justice was supposedly among the major tenets of the Abellican Church.

For Brother Avelyn, who had just been through the most sacred event, who had just realized the most religious experience by far of all his young life, something here seemed terribly out of place.

The month had turned to Parvespers, the last month of the autumn, when the Windrunner swept around the northeastern reach of the Mantis Arm, past Pireth Tulme and into the Gulf of Corona. Cold winds and stinging spray buffeted the crew. At night, they huddled together around oil lamps and candles, trying to ward off the chill. But their spirits were high, every man. All thoughts of Taddy Sway and Bunkus Smealy were behind them now, for their destination and their reward were at hand.

“Will ye stay in the abbey, then?” Dansally asked Avelyn one crisp morning. Land was out of sight again as the Windrunner cut a direct course across the gulf to All Saints Bay.

Avelyn considered the question with a most curious expression. “Of course,” he finally answered.

Dansally’s shrug was telling to the perceptive monk. He realized suddenly that she was asking him for companionship! “Do you mean to leave the ship?” he asked.

“Might,” Dansally replied. “We’ll be puffin’ in three times between St.-Mere-Abelle and Palmaris, where Adjonas means to dock for winter.”

“I have to . . .” Avelyn began. “I mean, there is no choice before me. Father Abbot Markwart will need a full accounting, and I will be at work for months with the stones I collected—”

She silenced him by putting a finger gently across his lips, her eyes soft and moist.

“Would that I could come and visit ye then,” she said quietly. “Might that be allowed?”

Avelyn nodded, fairly stricken mute.

“Would ye be bothered?”

Avelyn shook his head rather vigorously. “Master Jojonah is a friend,” he explained. “Perhaps he could find you work.”

“On me back in an abbey?” the woman asked incredulously.

“Different work,” Avelyn answered with a chuckle, hiding his discomfort at the notion. Those wicked stories of Bien deLouisa flitted through his memory. “But would Captain Adjonas let you off the ship?” he asked, to change the uncomfortable course down which his mind was flying.

“Me contract was for the isle and back,” she replied. “We’ll soon be back. Adjonas got nothing on me after Palmaris. I’ll get me pay—and more for the favors I did for the rest of the crew—and be gone.”

“Then will you come to the abbey?” Avelyn asked, showing more emotion, more hopefulness, than he had intended.

Dansally’s smile was wide. “Might that I will,” she answered. “But first, ye got to do something for me.” As she finished talking, she leaned closer, putting her lips to his. Avelyn recoiled instinctively, out of shyness. When he thought about his hesitation, it only strengthened his resolve. His relationship with Dansally was special, was something different from the physical connection she had with other men. Surely his body wanted what she offered, but if he gave in now, then would he be lessening that special bond, reducing his relationship with Dansally to the level of all the others?

“Don’t ye pull away,” she pleaded, “not this time.”

“I could bring Quintall to you,” Avelyn said, a bitter edge to his voice.

Dansally fell back and slapped him across the face. He meant to respond with an insult, but by the time he recovered, he noted that she was kneeling on the bed, head down, shoulders moving with sobs.

“I—I did not mean . . .” Avelyn stuttered, feeling horrible about wounding his precious Dansally.

“So ye think I’m a whore,” she said. “And so I am.”

“No,” Avelyn replied, putting a hand on her shoulder.

“But I’m more a virgin than ye know!” the woman snapped, head coming up so that her gaze, her proud gaze, could lock with Avelyn’s. “Me body does its work, ‘tis true, but me heart’s never been there. Not once! Not even with me worthless husband—might that be why he threw me out!”

The thought that Dansally had never loved caught Avelyn off his guard and settled him back for a bit. Though he was completely inexperienced in physical lovemaking, he understood what she was saying.

And he believed her!

He didn’t answer, except to lean forward and offer a kiss.

Brother Avelyn learned much about love that day, learned the completeness of body and spirit in a way more profound than his morning exercise could ever approach.

So did Dansally.

The Windrunner was welcomed at St.-Mere-Abelle with understated efficiency, just a handful of monks, Masters Jojonah and Siherton among them, coming down to the docks to greet the returning brothers and their precious cargo, and to direct the lesser monks in carrying aboard ship a pair of heavy chests. A new wharf had been constructed, reaching far enough out into the bay so that the Windrunner could dock.

To mollify his crew, Adjonas had the chests opened as soon as they were brought on deck, and how the men gasped!

Avelyn did, too, noting the piles of coins and gems and jewelry, such a treasure as he had never before seen. Something beyond the rich materials caught his eyes, though, as the lids were being secured in place once more. He didn’t quite understand it, nor could he make out the aura of magic surrounding Master Siherton. The man had one of his hands behind his back, and Avelyn noted that he was fingering a pair of stones, a diamond and a smoky quartz.

Suspicious, but wise enough to keep his mouth shut, Avelyn bid farewell to Adjonas and the others—though not a man aboard the Windrunner regretted the departure of the three monks—and went ashore. His thoughts were on Dansally, hoping she would indeed leave the Windrunner at next port and make her way to St.-Mere-Abelle. Logically, Avelyn knew that she would indeed, knew that they had shared something precious. But still his doubts lingered. Had their encounter really been special to Dansally? How had he measured up against all the men she had known? Perhaps he hadn’t really done it right, or perhaps Adjonas had ordered her to bed Avelyn, or even had made a wager with her that she could not bed the man.

Avelyn fought hard to dismiss all those ridiculous notions and doubts. Whatever logic assured him, Avelyn knew that he would not relax until he saw the dark-haired woman’s blue eyes again, eyes to which Avelyn had brought back a good measure of sparkle, at the gates of St.-Mere-Abelle.

The reception awaiting the three returned monks inside the abbey was more in tune with what they had been expecting. The chapel hall was lined with the finest baked goods from all the region—muffins and sweet rolls, cinnamon and raisin breads—all to be washed down with mead and even some of the rare and precious wine known as boggle. The choir was there, singing joyously. The Father Abbot watched from his high perch on the balcony, and all the monks of the order and all the servants of the abbey danced and sang, and laughed the whole night through.

How Avelyn wished that Dansally were there! That thought led him to wonder why she and the others of the Windrunner had not been invited. With the tides, the ship could not put out until after midnight, so why hadn’t the thirty, or at least the captain, been included in the much-deserved festivities?

The last bite of a cinnamon roll turned over in Avelyn’s stomach, a sinking feeling. A group of monks were walking toward him—he recognized Brother Pellimar among them—no doubt to pester him about the events on the island. Avelyn knew that he could say nothing about that time until he had reviewed his words with the Father Abbot.

And at that moment, the young monk had other things on his mind. He considered the stones Master Siherton had carried to the ship: a diamond and a smoky quartz. He knew the properties of diamonds, the creation of light, but had never used quartz. Avelyn closed his eyes, ignoring the call of his name by Pellimar, and reviewed his training.

Then it came to him in a sudden, horrifying rush. Diamonds not for light but sparkles! Quartz to create an image that was not real! The crew and captain of the Windrunner had been cheated! Now Avelyn knew why Adjonas was not at the gathering, and as he considered the implications, his gut churned violently.

Avelyn rushed past the approaching group, muttering something about speaking with them soon, then ran about the room, taking a mental count of those in attendance. He noted with mounting trepidation that not all of the monks were in attendance, that one group in particular, the older students, tenth-year immaculates, those men on the verge of becoming masters, were absent.

Neither could he find Master Siherton.

Avelyn ran from the chapel, skittering down the empty halls, his footsteps echoing noisily. He didn’t know the hour but suspected that midnight was near or that it had come and gone.

He ran for the south side of the abbey, the seaward side, and turned into one long corridor, its left-hand wall dotted with small windows that overlooked the bay. Avelyn rushed to one and peered out desperately into the night.

Under the light of a half moon, he saw the outline of the Windrunner gliding out into the bay. “No,” he breathed, noting the bustle on the deck, tiny silhouettes rushing past a small fire near the stern. He saw a second fire on the water.

“No!” Avelyn screamed.

Another ball of flaming pitch soared out from the monastery, skipping in along the starboard rail of the vessel, igniting the mainsail into one tremendous flame.

The barrage intensified, more pitch, great heavy stones, and giant ballista bolts battering the ill-fated craft. Soon the Windrunner was adrift, the strong currents of All Saints Bay taking her toward a dangerous reef. Avelyn winced, seeing men leaping from the deck, their doom at hand.

The screams of the crew drifted across the dark water; Avelyn knew that the other monks, at their celebration, would not hear. He watched helplessly, hopelessly, as the ship that had been his home for nearly eight months jolted and listed, then broke apart on the reef as still more missiles soared in. Tears ran freely down his cheeks; he mumbled the name “Dansally,” over and over.

The bombardment went on for many minutes. Avelyn heard the people in the cold water, and hoped against hope that some of them, that his dear Dansally, might make it to shore.

But then came the worst thing of all—a hissing, sizzling noise. A bluish film covered the dark water, snapping and crackling off the stones and the sailors, off the remnants of the proud ship. A sheet of conjured lightning silenced the screams forever.

Except in Avelyn’s mind.

More missiles went out, though their task was certainly finished. The strong ebb tide of All Saints Bay would collect the flotsam and jetsam and carry it out to the open sea. All the world, save Avelyn and the perpetrators, would think this a tragic accident.

“Dansally,” Avelyn breathed. His shoulders slumped, the young man needing the stone wall for support. He rolled away from the window, putting his back to the wall, facing the corridor.

“You should not have come,” Master Siherton said to him, the tall, hawkish man standing quietly.

Avelyn noted the considerable bag of stones at his belt and the grayish graphite he held in his hand. Graphite was the stone of lightning.

Avelyn slumped back against the wall even more, thinking Siherton would use the stone to destroy him then and there and, in many ways, hoping Siherton would do just that. The master only reached out and grabbed Avelyn by the arm and led him to a small, dark room in one far corner of the massive abbey.

The next morning, a crestfallen Brother Avelyn was in Father Abbot Markwart’s private quarters, Masters Siherton and Jojonah flanking him. It stung Avelyn even more to realize that the actions taken against the Windrunner had not been a rogue decision by brutal Siherton but had been sanctioned by the Father Abbot, apparently with Master Jojonah’s knowledge.

“There can be no witnesses to the location of Pimaninicuit,” Father Abbot Markwart said evenly.

As there will be no witnesses to my death, Avelyn thought, for the corridors of St.-Mere-Abelle had been deserted that morning, the monks and servants sleeping off their evening of revelry.

“Do you realize the implications to the world?” Markwart said suddenly, excitedly. “If Pimaninicuit became common knowledge, the security of the Ring Stones would be lost and petty merchants and kings would hold the secret to wealth and power beyond their comprehension!”

It made sense to Avelyn that, for the security of the world, the location of Pimaninicuit should remain secret, but that thought did little to erase his revulsion at the destruction of the hired ship and the murder of her crew.

And the murder of Dansally.

“There could be no other outcome,” Markwart said flatly.

Avelyn glanced around nervously. “May I speak, Father Abbot?”

“Of course,” Markwart replied, resting back in his chair. “Speak freely, Brother Avelyn. You are among friends.”

Avelyn tried hard to keep his expression calm at that absurd notion. “All aboard the ship would have been long dead before the next occurrence of the stone showers,” he argued.

“Sailors make maps,” Master Siherton said dryly.

“But why would they?” Avelyn protested. “The map would be of no use to them, since seven generations—”

“You are forgetting the wealth strewn about Pimaninicuit,” Father Abbot Markwart interrupted, “a treasure trove of jewels beyond imagination.”

Avelyn hadn’t thought of that. Still he shook his head. The journey was too treacherous, and if the crew had been well paid, as promised, they would have had no reason to dare the perils of the South Mirianic again.

“It was God’s will,” Markwart said with finality. “All of it. You are to speak nothing of what you have witnessed. Return now to the room that Master Siherton assigned to you. Your punishment will be determined and revealed later this same day.”

Avelyn’s thoughts whirled, too confusing a jumble for him to utter even a sound of protest. He staggered away as if he had been struck. Markwart verbally hit him again when he got to the door.

“Brother Pellimar succumbed this morning to his grievous wounds,” the Father Abbot informed Avelyn.

Avelyn turned, stunned. Pellimar would carry scars forever, but surely he had mended. Then Avelyn understood. The previous night, at the party, Pellimar had been loose with his tongue. Too loose. Even to utter the name of the island without Father Abbot’s permission was forbidden.

“A pity,” Markwart went on. “That leaves only you and Quintall of the four who went to Pimaninicuit. You will have much work before you.”

Avelyn stepped out of the room, into the stone corridor, and vomited all over the floor. He staggered away, half blind, half insane.

“He is being watched?” Markwart asked Siherton.

“Every step,” the tall master replied. “All along, I feared this response from him.”

Master Jojonah snorted. “Avelyn worked alone on Pimaninicuit, yet the hoard he retrieved is inarguably the finest ever brought back from the island. How can you doubt his value?”

“I do not,” Siherton replied. “I only wonder when those qualities that give Avelyn such value will become dangerous.”

Jojonah looked at Markwart, who was nodding grimly. “He has much work to do,” the Father Abbot told them both. “Committing his adventures to the page, cataloguing the stones, even seeking out their true strength and deepest secrets. The crystal amethyst most of all. Never have I seen such a magnificent stone, and Avelyn, as its Preparer, has the finest chance to discern its true measure.”

“Perhaps I can persuade him to our way of thinking before he is finished his work,” Jojonah offered.

“That would be most fine,” replied Markwart.

Siherton gave his fellow master a dubious glance. He did not believe that Avelyn, so full of idealism and ridiculous faith, could be corralled.

Jojonah noted the look and could not disagree. He would try, though, for he was fond of young Brother Avelyn and he knew the alternative.

“The summer solstice,” Father Abbot Markwart remarked. “At that time, we will discuss the future of Brother Avelyn Desbris.”

“Or lack thereof,” Master Siherton added, and from his tone, it wasn’t hard for Jojonah to figure out which event would most please the hawkish, brutal man.

Avelyn found himself secluded from the rest of the monks over the next few weeks. His only contacts were with Siherton, Jojonah, and a couple of other masters, as well as the pair of guards—more tenth-year immaculates, who remained with him wherever he went—and Quintall, who was often at work beside him in the room of the Ring Stones.

Disturbing questions haunted the young monk every day. Why did they have to kill the men of the Windrunner? Couldn’t Father Abbot Markwart have simply imprisoned them? Or, if this procedure was always the case, then why didn’t the monastery simply man its own ship and send only trusted monks to Pimaninicuit?

Every logical argument ran smack into a wall, though, for Avelyn knew that he would not impress any change over his superiors and the way of the Abellican Order. And so he worked, as he was instructed, penning the tale of his adventures in great detail, studying and cataloguing the newest stones, their type, their magic, their strength. Whenever he was allowed to handle a magical stone, Master Siherton was at his side, a potent and lethal gem in hand.

Avelyn realized his place now, and truly he felt like one of the Windrunner’s crew. His only solace came in his many discussions with Master Jojonah, to whom he still felt a bond. But while Jojonah continually tried to explain the necessity for the actions taken upon the monks’ return, Avelyn simply would not accept it.

There had to be a better way, he believed, and despite the potential for disaster, there could be no justification for murder.

The spring of 822 was late when his work neared completion, and Avelyn noted with some concern that Master Jojonah spoke with him less and less, noted with some concern the tender master’s sympathetic expression whenever he looked upon Avelyn.

Avelyn grew uneasy, and then desperate. So much so that he chanced to pocket a gemstone, a hematite, one day. Fortune was with him, for a mistake by Quintall caused a minor explosion that afternoon, and though no one was hurt and nothing too badly damaged, it proved enough of a distraction for the theft to go unnoticed, at least for the moment.

Back in his cell, Avelyn fell into the powers of the stone. He didn’t really know what he would do, other than spy on the masters and confirm his fears of his approaching fate.

His spirit walked free of his body, passed through the porous wood of the door and past the pair of oblivious guards. Avelyn felt that tug of the stone, wanting possession, but his will was strong and he resisted, floating invisibly down the corridor and finally to Father Abbot Markwart’s door.

Inside, Avelyn glimpsed Siherton and Jojonah with the Father Abbot, the old man livid about the mishap in the stone room.

“Brother Quintall is a bumbler,” Jojonah pointed out.

“But a loyal one,” Siherton snapped back, an obvious comparison to Avelyn.

“Enough of this,” demanded Markwart. “How goes the work?”

“The cataloguing is nearly complete,” answered Siherton. “We are ready for the merchants.”

“What of the giant crystal?”

“We have found no practical use for it,” Siherton replied. “Avelyn—Brother Avelyn,” he corrected with a derisive snort, “is convinced that it is thick with magic, but how to extract that magic and what purpose it might serve, we do not know.”

“It would be folly to auction it,” Jojonah put in.

“It would not bring a good price unless we could determine its powers,” Father Abbot Markwart agreed.

“There are merchants who would purchase it simply for the mystery,” Siherton argued.

Avelyn could hardly believe what he was hearing. They were talking about a private auction of the sacred stones! How much that notion diminished the sacrifice of Thagraine and Pellimar, of the Windrunner’s crew and of Dansally! The thought of unbelieving merchants plying the gift of the stones, to amuse guests, perhaps, or even for sinister purposes, wounded Avelyn deeply. His spirit drifted out of the room, unable to bear any more of the sacrilegious talk.

He was heading back for his physical coil when he realized that time was against him. His spirit hovered there in the hall. The missing hematite would surely be discovered, and even disregarding that stone, Avelyn’s future was far from secure.

What was he to do? And how could he tolerate any of this madness, this insult to God?

Master Siherton came out of Markwart’s room alone, his boots clicking on the floor as he made his way in the direction of the stone room. To check on the damage from Quintall’s misstep, no doubt, the spying Avelyn realized; to check on the lists of reorganized stones.

Tugged by a sense of urgency, Avelyn gave in to the hematite, his spirit floating fast for Siherton’s back.

The pain as he entered the man’s body was excruciating, beyond anything Avelyn had ever felt. His thoughts mingled with Siherton’s; their spirits clashed and battled, shoving and pushing for possession. Avelyn had struck the man off guard, but even so, the struggle was nothing short of titanic. Avelyn realized then that an attempt at possession was akin to fighting an enemy on his home ground.

If any had been about to bear witness, they would have seen Siherton’s body lurching back and forth across the corridor, slamming into walls, clawing at its own face.

Then Avelyn felt the weight of a corporeal form again. He knew instinctively that Siherton’s spirit was nearby, locked in some dimensional pocket that Avelyn did not understand. And he had control of the body; it moved to the commands of his spirit!

Avelyn went off with all speed to the stone room, entering forcefully and snapping his glare over the two guards and Quintall before they could utter a word of protest.

“You remain,” Avelyn commanded one of the guards. “You,” he said to Quintall, “your punishment has not yet been determined.”

“Punishment?” Quintall echoed breathlessly. He had been told that there would be no consequences from his mishap, and indeed, such minor problems had not been uncommon in the month in which he and Avelyn had been at work with the new stones. Just a week before, Avelyn had melted a leg of one table while examining a ruby sprinkled with carnallite!

“Brother Avelyn was not—” Quintall began to protest.

“To your room and prayers!” the voice of Siherton commanded.

“Yes, my master,” said a cowed Quintall, and he moved off out of the room.

“Be gone!” Avelyn commanded the other guard, and the man ran out of the room, swiftly passing Quintall in the hall.

Then Avelyn and the remaining guard began selecting and collecting stones: the giant crystal amethyst, a rod of graphite, a small but potent ruby, and several others, including turquoise and amber, celestine and a tiger’s paw, a chrysoberyl, or cat’s eye, some gypsum and malachite, a sheet of chrysotile, and a piece of heavy magnetite. Avelyn placed them in a bag, and in it he placed, as well, a small pouch of tiny carnallites, the one stone whose magic could be brought forth only a single time. Avelyn then went to the other end of the room and pocketed a valuable emerald, not an enchanted one, but one used as an example of a particular cut, and then he bade the guard to follow him—and quickly, since the use of the hematite was draining the monk and Siherton’s spirit was nearby, trying, Avelyn knew, to find some route back to its body.

They made their way to the secluded cell that held Avelyn’s body, the master’s voice quickly and forcefully dismissing the two men who stood guard in the hall.

The one remaining guard, the man from the stone room, opened the door on Siherton’s order. There stood Avelyn’s corporeal form, as he had left it, clutching the hematite. Avelyn in Siherton’s body stepped past the guard and deftly took the hematite, then instructed the guard to shoulder the inanimate body and follow him.

“Brother Avelyn is to be punished for treason against the Order” was all the explanation he offered, and the guard, who had heard rumors to that effect for weeks now, did not question the news.

It was vespers, so few were about to observe the master and the guard, bearing his extraordinary burden, as they made their way to the abbey roof overlooking All Saints Bay. The guard, as instructed, placed the body at the base of the low wall and stepped back

Avelyn waited for many moments, gathering his strength. He bent over the body, slipping the hematite and one other stone, into its hand, tying the gemstone sack to the body’s rope belt.

“The stones will allow us to find the body,” he explained to the guard, noting that the man was growing increasingly suspicious. “They will take from Brother Avelyn the last of his physical strength as he dies.”

The guard’s face screwed up with curiosity, but he did not dare to question the dangerous master.

Avelyn knew that he had to be quick—that he had to be perfect.

With great effort, Avelyn tore his spirit free of Siherton’s corporeal form and reentered his own, coming to his physical senses even as Siherton’s body shivered with the return of his own spirit.

Avelyn was up, quick as a cat, clutching the stones in one hand and grabbing Siherton by the front of his robe with the other. Before the guard could come to the master’s aid, Avelyn hauled the stunned Siherton and himself over the rail.

They plummeted past the abbey walls, down the cliff face, into the gloom, Siherton screaming his protests.

Avelyn kicked and pushed the man away, then called upon the second stone he held, the malachite.

Then he was floating, Siherton continuing to plummet.

Avelyn continued to push out as he descended gently past the angled cliff. Near the bottom, he pulled the amber from his pouch. He touched down lightly on the water, as he had done in an exercise that seemed to him a million years ago. He was glad that Siherton’s body was not in sight; he could not have borne that spectacle.

Using the amber, he walked across the cold water to a point where he could get ashore, then he moved off down the road.

He knew that he would never look upon St.-Mere-Abelle again.

He used the stones. With the malachite, he floated gently over cliffs that any pursuing monks would spend hours climbing down. With the amber, he crossed wide lakes that his pursuers would have to circumvent. Using a chrysoberyl, a cat’s-eye, he could see clearly in the dark and move along at daylight pace without the telltale glow of a light. At the first town he entered, he happened upon a caravan of several merchant wagons, and there he sold the common emerald, giving him all the funds he would need for a long, long time.

He put miles and miles behind him, between him and that terrible place called St.-Mere-Abelle. But the young monk could not pull his mind far from the horrors he had witnessed, the encroaching evil that nibbled at the very heart of all that young Avelyn Desbris had held dear.

He learned the truth of it one cold night as he lay curled beneath a tree, under the stars, under the heavens. As if his thoughts were magically transported, or his prayers for guidance divinely answered, his eyes looked across the scores of miles to a land of great jagged mountains, to a smoking cone in its midst, and the black devastation behind a slowly creeping line of red lava.

Avelyn understood then—all of it—for it was not without precedent. This gloom that had come to Honce-the-Bear had come before in a definite shape and manner that was oft-told in the historical volumes at St.-Mere-Abelle. All of it: the cancer that had grown in his world, the unpreparedness, the ungodliness of St.-Mere-Abelle. The monks were the sentinels of God and yet even they had given in to complacency, to the cancer. And because of that lapse, the darkness had returned.

Half-crazed, his entire world shattered, Avelyn understood. The dactyl was awake. The brooding demon that forever haunted the race of man had come back to the world. He knew it to be true. In all his heart, young Avelyn Desbris recognized the darkness that had murdered Taddy Sway and Bunkus Smealy, the evil that had destroyed the Windrunner and left his dear Dansally cold in cold water, the wickedness that had forced Brother Pellimar to “succumb” to his wounds.

He awoke from his fitful sleep before the dawn.

The dactyl was awake!

The world did not understand the coming darkness.

The dactyl was awake!

The Order had failed; their weakness had facilitated this tragedy!

The dactyl was awake!

Avelyn ran off—one direction seemed as good as any other. He had to tell the world of the evil. He had to prepare the men and women of Honce-the-Bear, and all of Corona. He had to warn them of the demon, warn them of the Order! He had to somehow show them their own unpreparedness, their own weakness.

The dactyl was awake!

CHAPTER 20

The Oracle

“How many lights do you see?” The words were spoken in the elvish tongue, one that Juraviel was using more and more with Elbryan. The young man knew all the words, all the common phrases, now, after five years in Andur’Blough Inninness, and only his inflections still needed perfecting.

Juraviel held a candle, as did Elbryan; and a couple of stars had appeared in the sky, the sun just gone behind the mountainous western horizon.

The young man spent a long moment studying Juraviel. Elbryan’s lessons had turned more toward philosophy during the fall and winter of God’s Year 821 to 822, and he had learned that even the simplest questions carried many layers of subtle meanings. Finally, convinced that this was but a prelude to his lesson, and nothing dramatic, the young man looked up and did a quick count of the stars, noting four.

“Six,” he announced cautiously, adding the two candles.

“They are separate, then,” Juraviel stated, “Your light and mine, and those of the stars.”

Elbryan’s brow furrowed. Slowly, hesitantly, as if he expected to be rebuked, he nodded his head.

“So if you pinched the light from your candle, you would stand in darkness,” Juraviel reasoned.

“More than now,” Elbryan was quick to reply. “But still I would have some of your light.”

“Then my light is not contained within the flame,” Juraviel went on, “but rather, it spreads far and wide. And what of the light of the stars?”

“If the light in the stars was contained within the stars, then we would not see the stars!” Elbryan growled in mounting frustration. There were times, such as this, when he hated simple elven logic. “And if the light in your candle was contained within the candle, then I would not see it.”

“Exactly,” replied the elf. “You may go now.”

Elbryan stamped his foot as Juraviel turned away. The elf was always doing this to him, leaving him with questions that he could not answer. “What are you talking about?” the young man demanded.

Juraviel looked at him calmly, but made no move to respond.

Elbryan took the cue—it was his lesson, after all. “You are saying that the light, since it is not contained, is a shared thing?”

Juraviel didn’t blink.

Elbryan paused for a long while, backtracking the conversation, considering the options. “One light,” he said finally.

Juraviel smiled.

“That was the answer,” said Elbryan, gaining confidence. “One light.”

“I count a dozen stars, at least, now,” replied the elf. Elbryan looked up. It was true enough; the night was fast deepening, the stars coming out in force.

“A dozen sources of the same light,” Elbryan reasoned, “or of different lights that all join together. Because I see them, they blend. The lights become one.”

“One and the same,” agreed Juraviel.

“But must I see them for this to be true?” Elbryan asked eagerly, but his anticipation dissipated as he saw the frown immediately come over the elf.

Elbryan paused and closed his eyes, remembering his earliest lessons, the axioms the elves had put to him so that he might view the world in a completely different manner. In elven philosophy, the first truth, the basis of reality was that the entire material, physical world was no more than the collection of perceptions by the observer. Nothing existed except in the consciousness of the individual. It was a difficult concept for Elbryan, because he had been brought up with the idea of community, and within that concept, such elevation of self was considered the worst of sins: pride. The elves didn’t see things that way; Juraviel had once asserted to Elbryan that everything in the world was no more than a play put on for Juraviel’s benefit. “My consciousness creates the world around me,” the elf had proclaimed.

“Then I could never defeat you in battle unless you willed it so,” Elbryan had then reasoned.

“Except that your consciousness creates the world around you,” the elf had replied, and then, typically, he had walked away.

That seeming contradiction had left Elbryan in a quandary. What he came to understand from that viewpoint was a sense of self he had never before felt free to explore.

“The stars and my candle are one because I can see both,” the young man said conclusively. “I make the world around me.”

Juraviel nodded. “You interpret the world around you,” he corrected. “And as you heighten your senses to become aware of the slightest details, your interpretations will grow, your awareness will grow.”

Juraviel then left him, sitting in a field, holding his candle and watching the birth of so many stars, heavenly fires to join with his own. That simple shift in perception, that all the lights were truly one, gave Elbryan a sense of oneness with the universe that he had never truly experienced before. Suddenly the heavens seemed closer to him, seemed within reach. Suddenly he felt a part of that vast velvet canopy.

All through the rest of that year, and through the months of God’s Year 822, Elbryan learned to view the world as an elf, to find a paradox of individuality and community, an elevation of the self, yet a oneness with all about him. The tiny shifts in perception brought on so many new experiences, allowed him to see flowers where he never before would have looked, allowed him to feel the presence of an animal—even identify its approximate size—by subtle scents and vibrations in the living world about him. He felt like a great empty sponge being dunked into the waters of knowledge, and he absorbed so much, taking incredible pleasure in each lesson, in each word. His entire concepts of space and time altered. Sequence became segment, memory became time travel.

Even Elbryan’s sleeping habits changed, shifting to a more controlled, meditative process than a lumped time of uncontrollable unconsciousness. “Fanciful musing,” the elves called it, or “reverie.” In this semidream state, Elbryan could tune out his sense of sight, yet keep his ears and nose keen for external stimuli. And he replaced much of his dreaming with time travel, moved his mind back to another place in his life that he could replay the events about him and view them from a different perspective, and thus, learn from them.

Olwan was alive to him on those nights, as was Jilseponie, dear Pony, and all the others of Dundalis. Somehow the perfect recollections gave Elbryan a sense of immortality, as if all those people really were alive, just locked away in a different place to which his memory was the key.

He took comfort in that. He found that much of elven philosophy gave him solace, except that he could not really change what had happened, could not alter the past.

The pain remained, the horrible screams, the desperate fights, the mounds of bodies. On Juraviel’s instruction, Elbryan did not avoid the anguish, but went to that terrible place often, using the harsh reality of the death of Dundalis to strengthen his nerve, to harden him emotionally.

“Trials past prepare us for trials future,” the elf often said.

Elbryan didn’t argue, but he wondered, and almost feared, what future trials could possibly match the pain of that awful day.

He stood atop the treeless hillock and he waited, his eyes glued to the eastern horizon, to the tiny sliver of light heralding the approach of dawn.

He was naked, every hair, every nerve feeling the tickle of the chill breeze. He was naked and he was free, and as the horizon brightened a bit more, he lifted his sword, a large but well-balanced weapon, into the air before him, both hands clasping its long hilt, the muscles of his arms bulging.

Elbryan brought the sword across in a gentle sweep, his weight shifting gradually with the movement of the outstretched blade to keep his balance perfect. Up went the blade over his left shoulder. He stepped right foot forward, then brought the sword back, again slowly, perfectly balanced. His left foot came forward, then went out to the side, blade and right foot following, turning the young man as if he were now facing a second opponent. Strike, parry, strike, all in harmonic and slow motion, and then he dropped his right foot back, coming around in a fluid movement to stalk back to the left. Strike, parry, strike—the same routine.

Then he dropped his right foot back again and half pivoted, so that he was facing exactly opposite from where he had started. He came ahead in three strong strides—strike, strike, strike with the blade as he moved, then repeated the same motions he had used, left and right, from this new position.

“Bi’nelle dasada,” it was called, the sword-dance. The young man continued for nearly an hour, his arms and weapon weaving ever more intricate patterns in the empty air. This was the bulk of his physical training now, not sparring but gaining a memory of the movements within his muscles. Every attack and parry angle became ingrained in him; what had been conscious battle strategy melded into a reactive response or an anticipatory strike.

From the trees at the base of the hillock, Juraviel and some others watched the sword-dance in sincere admiration. Truly the muscled young human was a thing of beauty and grace, a combination of pure strength and uncanny agility. His sword swished with ease, as did his long and wavy, wheat-colored hair. Never losing the slightest edge of balance, Elbryan’s muscles worked in perfect harmony, perfect fluidity, none battling, flexing and complementing each move.

And his eyes! Even from this distance, the elves could see the olive-green orbs sparkling with intensity, truly seeing the imagined foes.

The young Elbryan’s movements improved with every day, and so Juraviel gave him more of the sword-dance, the most intricate battle movements known to the elves, who collectively were the finest swordsmen m all the world. Elbryan mastered the intricate movements, every one, soaked them into the sponge he had become and held them fast in his heart, mind, and muscles. No longer did any, even Tuntun, question his prowess or his bloodline. Never again in Andur’Blough Inninness were the words “blood of Mather” spoken derisively where young Elbryan was concerned. For he had passed through the “wall of nonperception,” as Juraviel called it, had shrugged off the human societal inhibitions of consciousness, had become one with the greater powers, the natural powers, about him.

On those occasions when he did spar, he not only understood how to defeat any attack, deflect, dodge, or block, but also knew which tactic would offer appropriate counterattacks or would keep his defensive posture strong against subsequent attacks from that foe, or even from others. Elbryan now won far more often than he lost, even held his own when battling two against one.

His routines became more varied, more deadly, resembling in many instances the motions of an animal predator. He could put a dagger in his hand and curl his arm in such a way that he might strike as the viper. Or he didn’t even need the dagger but could stiffen his fingers that he might drive them right through any obstacle.

And every morning, before the mist veil blanketed Andur’Blough Inninness, Elbryan came to this spot and watched the dawn, weaving his sword-dance, building the memory.

The blood of Mather.

The gifts—a heavy blanket, a small chair shaped of bent sticks, and a wood-framed mirror—surprised and confused Elbryan. The mirror alone was very expensive, he knew, and the craftsmanship and incredibly light wood of the chair allowed it to be folded and easily carried, but the only one of the three presents that made any sense to him was the blanket, a most practical item.

Tuntun and Juraviel let the young man look the gifts over for a long while, let him test the chair and even study his own image in the silvery mirror.

“My deepest gratitude,” Elbryan said sincerely, though his measure of confusion was clear in his voice.

“You do not even understand the significance,” Tuntun replied distastefully. “You believe that you have been given three gifts, yet it is the fourth that is most precious by far!”

Elbryan looked at the elf maiden, studied her blue eyes for some hint.

“The mirror, the chair, and the blanket,” Juraviel said solemnly. “The Oracle.”

Elbryan had never heard the word before; again his confusion showed clearly on his face.

“Do you think that the dead are gone?” Tuntun asked cryptically, apparently enjoying this spectacle. “Do you think that all there is is all you see?”

“There are other levels of consciousness,” Juraviel tried to clarify, casting a stern glance at his teasing partner.

“Dreaming,” Elbryan offered hopefully.

“And the memories of fanciful musing,” Juraviel added. “In Oracle, the musing combines with the consciousness to bring the memory to the present.”

Elbryan’s brow furrowed as he considered the words, as their implications began to unfold before him. “To speak with the dead?” he asked breathlessly.

“What is dead?” Tuntun laughed.

Even Juraviel couldn’t suppress a chuckle at his elven companion’s unending games. “Come,” he bade Elbryan. “It would be better to show than to tell.”

The three left Caer’alfar, moving purposefully into the deep woods. The day was not bright above them, even darker than usual with the misty blanket, and a light rain tickled the forest canopy. They walked for nearly an hour, no one talking except Tuntun, who offered an occasional verbal jab at Elbryan.

Finally Juraviel stopped at the base of a huge oak, its trunk so wide that Elbryan couldn’t put his arms halfway around it. The two elves exchanged solemn looks.

“He’ll not do it,” Tuntun promised, her melodic voice rising singsong.

“Nor could he ever defeat you in battle,” Juraviel was quick to respond, drawing an angry stamp of Tuntun’s delicate foot.

Elbryan took a deep breath and straightened his shoulders. So, this was but another test, he thought. One of his will and mental prowess, no doubt, considering the three gifts he carried. He was determined not to disappoint Juraviel and not to let Tuntun be right about anything.

Around the back of the tree, Elbryan saw there was a narrow opening between the roots, a tunnel that seemed to widen as it descended at a steep angle.

“There is a pedestal of stone inside on which you must place the mirror,” Juraviel explained, “and a place before it where you might set up your chair. Use the blanket to cover the entry, so that it becomes very dark within.”

Elbryan waited, expecting more instructions. After a long moment, Tuntun nudged him roughly. “Are you afraid even to try?” she chided.

“Try what?” Elbryan demanded, but when he looked to Juraviel for support, he found the elf was pointing to the narrow opening, indicating that the young man should enter.

Elbryan had no idea what they expected, what he should do, beyond the simple instructions Juraviel had offered. With a shrug, he took up his items and moved to the opening. Getting in would be test enough, for the cave was far more suited to one of elven stature. He slipped the chair in first, easing it down as far as he could reach, then closing his eyes and letting go. From the sound of its descent, the floor of the cave was not more than eight feet below the opening, he figured. Next he lay the blanket along the bottom of the shaft, using it to cover uneven jags of roots, that he wouldn’t hook his clothing, get stuck, and look completely stupid in Tuntun’s always-judging eyes. With a final glance at Juraviel, hoping futilely that some further information would come his way, Elbryan closed his eyes and started in, going headfirst and protecting the mirror with his body. As soon as he crossed under the tree, he opened his eyes, now more sensitive to the darkness, and scouted. A bear or a porcupine or even a smelly skunk might have slipped in here, and it was with great relief that Elbryan found the cave apparently empty, and not so large. It was fairly circular, perhaps eight feet in diameter. As promised, a stone pedestal rested near the wall just to Elbryan’s side, and hooking his arm around a root in the ceiling, he turned right side up and swung his feet to the pedestal, then stepped down easily to the cave floor. A bit of water had accumulated in one low spot, but nothing threatening or even inconvenient.

Elbryan quickly set the mirror on the pedestal, leaning it against the back wall of the cave, and opened his chair, placing it before the mirror, as instructed. Then he went about draping the blanket over the cave entrance, darkening the room so that he could barely make out his hand if he held it in front of his face. That done, the young man felt about, found his chair, and slipped into it.

Then he waited, wondering. His eyes gradually adjusted so that he could just barely make out the larger shapes in the room.

The minutes continued to pass him by; all was quiet and dark. Elbryan grew frustrated, wondering what test this might be, wondering what purpose could be found in sitting in the dark, facing a mirror he could hardly see. Was Tuntun right in asserting that this trip was a waste of time?

Finally Juraviel’s melodic voice broke the tension. “This is the Cave of Souls, Elbryan Wyndon,” the elf half spoke and half sang. “The Oracle, where an elf, or a human, might speak with the spirits of those who have passed before them. Seek your answers in the depths of the mirror.”

Elbryan steadied himself with the breathing routine of bi’nelle dasada and focused his eyes on the mirror—or at least on the area where he knew the mirror to be, for it was hardly discernible.

He brought out a mental picture of the pedestal and mirror, recalled the image from the few moments before he had draped the blanket. Gradually, the square shape was visible, at least in his mental image, and so he sent his gaze within the frame of that square.

And he sat, as the minutes became an hour, as the sun behind the elven mist and the clouds made its way toward the western horizon. Boredom crept into his concentration, along with the frustration of realizing that Tuntun might be right. Still, no further calls came from beyond the cave, so the two elves, at least, were apparently being patient.

Elbryan dismissed all thought of the elves, and each time one of those distracting notions—or any other thoughts from outside this one room—came back to him, he fought it off.

He lost all sense of the passing of time; soon nothing invaded his focus. The room darkened even more as the sun moved westward, but Elbryan, his eyes long past the gloom, didn’t notice.

There was something in the mirror, just beyond his vision!

He slipped deeper into his meditative state, let go of all the conscious images that cluttered his mind. Something was there, a reflection of a man, perhaps.

Was it his own reflection?

That notion stole away the image, but only for a moment.

Then Elbryan saw it more clearly: a man, older than he, with a face creased by the sun and wind, a light beard trimmed low to follow the line of his jaw. He looked like Elbryan, or at least as Elbryan might look in a score of years. He looked like Olwan, and yet it was not, the young man somehow knew. It was . . .

“Uncle Mather?”

The image nodded; Elbryan fought for a gulp of air.

“You are the ranger,” Elbryan said quietly, barely finding his voice. “You are the ranger who went before me, who was trained by these very same elves.”

The image made no move to reply.

“You are the standard to which I am held,” Elbryan said. “I fear that you stand too tall!”

Something seemed to soften in the visage of the spirit, and Elbryan got the distinct feeling that, in Mather’s eyes at least, his fear was misplaced.

“They speak of responsibility,” the young man went on, “of duty, and the road that lies before me. Yet I fear I am not all that Belli’mar Juraviel believes me to be. I wonder why I was chosen in this—why was Elbryan saved that day in Dundalis? Why not Olwan, my father, your brother, so solid and strong, so knowing in the ways of battle and the world?”

Elbryan tried to pause and collect his thoughts, but he found the words kept coming out as if compelled by the spirit, by this place, and by his own state of mind. Even if this was his uncle Mather, he realized he was speaking to the spirit of a man he had never known! But that fear couldn’t hold against the river of his own soul, pouring forth in great release.

“What height must I attain to satisfy the judgment of Tuntun and the many other elves of like mind? I fear that they ask of me the strength of a fomorian giant, the speed of a frightened deer, the wariness of a ground squirrel, and the calm and wisdom of a centuries-old elf. What man could measure such?

“Ah, but you did, Uncle Mather. By all that they say of you, even by the look in Tuntun’s eyes—one of sincere admiration—I know that you were no disappointment to the fairy folk of Caer’alfar. How will they judge me twenty years hence, a mere day by an elf’s measure? And what of this world I will soon know?”

Terrifying images, mostly of other humans, flitted across Elbryan’s vision, as if they were flying across the face of the mirror.

“I am afraid, Uncle Mather,” he admitted. “I do not know what it is that I fear, whether it is the judgment of the elves, the dangers of the wilderness, or the company of other people! More than a quarter of my life has passed since I have seen another who stands as a human, who sees the world as a human.

“But then,” he continued, his voice dropping low, “I fear most that I no longer see the world as a human, nor can I truly view it as an elf might, but as something in between. I love Caer’alfar, and all of this valley, but here I do not belong. This I know in my heart, and I fear that out there, among my own kind, I will not be among my own kind.

“Kin and kind,” Elbryan decided, “do not always go together. What is left of me, then? What creature am I that is neither elf nor human?”

Still the image did not answer, did not move at all. But Elbryan felt that soft feeling—that sympathy, that empathy—and he knew then that he was not alone. He knew then his answer.

“I am Elbryan the Ranger,” he asserted, and all the implications of that title seemed to fall over him, their weight not bowing but bolstering his broad shoulders.

Elbryan realized that he was bathed in a cold sweat. Only then did he notice the room had darkened almost to the point of absolute blackness. “Uncle Mather?” he called in the direction of the mirror, but the image of the specter and even of the mirror itself was no more.

Juraviel was waiting for the young man when he crawled out of the hole. The elf looked as if he meant to ask some question, but he stared instead at Elbryan’s face, and apparently found his answer. They said nothing all the way back to Caer’alfar.

CHAPTER 21

Ever Vigilant, Ever Watchful

Jill looked out past the towering rocks to the dark waters of the wide Mirianic, great swells rolling lazily, then breaking fast against the rocks two hundred feet below her. The rhythm continued, through the minutes, through the hours, through the days, the weeks, the years. Through all eternity, Jill supposed. If she were to return to this place in a thousand years, the waves would remain, rolling gently and then crashing against the base of this same rocky rise.

The young woman looked back over her shoulder at the small fortress that she called home, Pireth Tulme. In a thousand years, the scene would be the same, she decided, except that this structure, with its single low tower, would not remain, would be taken by time, by the wind and the storms that swept into Horseshoe Bay with disturbing regularity.

She had only been here for four months and she had witnessed a dozen such storms, including three in one week, that had left her and her forty companions, all members of the elite corps known as the Coastpoint Guards, soggy and sullen.

Yes, those were the words, Jill decided. “Soggy and sullen,” she said aloud, and nodded, thinking that a fitting description of all her life.

She had been given her chance, the one opportunity that most people, particularly women in the patriarchal kingdom of Honce-the-Bear, never had. Jill closed her eyes and let the ocean sounds take her back to another shore, a gentler shore on the banks of the Masur Delaval, to the city of Palmaris, the only home she remembered. How fared Graevis and Pettibwa? she wondered. And what of Grady? Had her disaster with Connor Bildeborough destroyed the man’s attempts at entry into the high society?

Jill laughed and hoped that it had. That would be the one good thing to come of the tragedy. Nearly two years had passed since her “wedding night,” but the pain remained vivid indeed.

She looked around again, then up at the sky and noticed that many of the stars had disappeared. A moment later, a light rain began to fall. “Soggy,” she said again, shaking her head. No matter how many times she witnessed it, Jill could hardly believe how quickly the rain came on in Pireth Tulme.

Like the rain that came into her life, first in that frontier village, when the goblins came, then in Palmaris. She could hardly remember that first incident, but she knew that her life had gradually grown wonderful. And then, in the snap of fingers, in the space of a single kiss, it was all gone, all taken away.

How much more could she have hoped for above the wedding in Palmaris? She had been married in St. Precious, considered by many to be the most beautiful chapel in all of Corona. And Dobrinion Calislas, Abbot of St. Precious and thus the third-ranking priest in the entire Abellican Church, had performed the ceremony himself! What young woman would not swoon at the mere thought of such a day? And then the night, spent in the mansion of Baron Bildeborough!

A shiver traced Jill’s spine as she remembered—the grand room, the change that had come over Connor, and then the look on his face, first feral and then, with the side of his nose and one cheek burned and blistering, even worse. His expression had softened only a bit the next morning when he and Jill had gone again before Abbot Dobrinion. Of course, since it had not been consummated, the marriage had been annulled immediately.

A snap of old Dobrinion’s fingers.

There was still the matter of Jill’s crime, though. Her assault on a nobleman, one that might well have left the handsome young man permanently scarred, was no minor matter in Palmaris. By right, Connor could have demanded her execution. Short of that, there was the very real possibility that Abbot Dobrinion would bind Jill into indenture to Connor, perhaps for the remainder of her life.

But Connor had been merciful, and ever was Abbot Dobrinion long on forgiveness. “I have heard of the incident with three rogues on the back roof of Fellowship Way,” the old priest had explained, a warm smile coming to his face. “One with your skills should not be wasted serving at tables. There is a place for a woman of your talent and ferocity, a place where such wild anger is assuaged, even applauded.” Thus the old abbot ad bound her over into the service of the King of Honce-the-Bear, as a foot soldier in the Kingsmen, the army. That moment remained very clear to Jill: Dobrinion’s words spoken sympathetically, while she looked back over her shoulder at Pettibwa and Graevis. There was no anger showing on the faces of her adopted parents, no hint that Jill and her irrational actions of the previous night had cost them, too, so much—just a most profound sadness. Pettibwa had nearly burst apart at Abbot Dobrinion’s decree, at the notion that her Jilly would be taken from her. There was little joy that night at the Way, where Jill said her good-byes.

Soon after, with Palmaris behind her, Jill had come to see the wisdom of the abbot’s decision. Indeed she had thrived, initially, at least, in the military. She started as a common foot soldier, “fodder walkers” they were called, but soon enough worked her way into the more elite cavalry group. There were no real enemies to battle: Honce-the-Bear had been at peace for longer than anyone could remember. But in the weekly sparring contests, Jill released enough enemies from her memories to carry her through with a ferocity that had astonished her superiors. One by one, her sparring partners had been dispatched, usually painfully, until not a man or woman in the unit desired to go against her. Her notoriety had made her more than a few real enemies, though, and so she had been moved about, from one fortress to another, serving a variety of functions, from castle guard to cavalry patrol.

All in all, it had been a boring year; castle guards were no more than showpieces, and the worst incident Jill had seen in four months with the cavalry patrol was a fight between two peasant brothers, when one had bitten the other’s ear off. And so it was with great expectations and hopes that Jill had received the news of her appointment into the second most elite unit, behind only the Allheart Brigade, in all of Honce-the-Bear: the famed Coastpoint Guards. These were the legendary fighters who had in ages past turned away a powrie invasion, the fearsome warriors who had tamed the region known as the Broken Coast, thus widening the domain of Honce-the-Bear’s King.

She didn’t get what she expected when she arrived at the small fortress of Pireth Tulme, overlooking Horseshoe Bay and the wide Mirianic. Pireth Tulme was but one in a series of keeps dotting Honce-the-Bear’s coastline. Like all of its sister fortresses, Pireth Tulme was secluded, far from any large settlements, but strategically located to watch the waters for invasion. Pireth Tulme guarded the southern passes of the Gulf of Corona, while Pireth Dancard held post on the five small islands centering the gulf, and Pireth Vanguard watched the northern way.

To Jill, their mission seemed paramount, a stoic existence protecting the welfare of all the kingdom. It didn’t take her long to realize that she was alone in her convictions.

Pireth Tulme, and apparently all the other Coastpoint fortresses, were far from the stoic bastions of their reputation. The partying had hardly slowed in all the four months Jill had been there. Even now, later into the night as she walked her watch along the low walls, she could hear the revelry—the clink of glasses lifted high in one toast after another, the bawdy laughter, the squeals of women pursued or pursuing.

The guards were forty in number, with only seven of them female. Jill, whose only experience with a man had been so very disastrous, did not like the odds. She shook her head distastefully as she walked her watch this night, as she did every night.

A short while later one haggard-looking soldier—a man of forty years by the name of Gofflaw, who had spent more than half his wretched life in the Kingsmen, including a dozen years in the Coastpoint Guards shuffling from one lonely outpost to another—came staggering out to the wall, making his way toward Jill.

She gave a sigh, resigned to the reality about her. She wasn’t particularly afraid; she didn’t think the drunken slob would even get to her before he fell off the narrow walkway, dropping the eight feet to the fortress’s small courtyard. Somehow, bouncing against the blocks of the outer wall with each step, he got near the woman.

“Ah, me Jilly,” Gofflaw slurred. “Walkin’ again in the rain.”

Jill shook her head and looked away.

“Why don’t ye go inside and warm yer bones then, girl?” the man asked. “Quite a row this night. Go on with ye. I’ll take yer watch.”

Jill knew better. If she accepted his outwardly gracious offer and went inside, Gofflaw would soon follow, leaving the walls empty. Even worse, for him to be out here fetching her, there was likely a conspiracy inside. The long, low main house of Pireth Tulme was not large, only three medium-sized common rooms, each surrounded by a dozen anterooms, each barely large enough for the pair of cots and two footlockers it held. Most of the structure was underground, the main house being three identical levels but appearing as only one story from the courtyard. If Jill ventured into that tight place, if this man was out here to lure her in, she would likely find herself in grabby quarters indeed.

“I will keep my own watch, thank you,” she replied politely and started away.

“And just what’re ye watching for?” the soldier demanded, his tone suddenly sharp.

Jill spun on him, her blue eyes narrow and glaring. She knew the routine and even agreed that it seemed very unlikely that any enemies, or anyone at all, would approach the fortress or sail past it on their way into the Gulf of Corona. But that wasn’t the point, not in Jill’s estimation. If one invasion came every five hundred years, the Coastpoint Guards, the elite of the elite, must be prepared for it!

“You go to your party,” she said evenly, her jaw clenched. “I choose to walk to honor the uniform I wear.”

Gofflaw snorted and wiped a greasy hand down the front of his own red jacket. “The better of it, ye’ll learn,” he said. “Just ye wait until the days become a year, and then two and three and four and—”

“I believe that she understands your reasoning, Gofflaw,” came a solid, unwavering voice. Jill looked past the drunk, who turned as well, to see Warder Constantine Presso, the commander of Pireth Tulme, approaching along the wall. By all appearances, the man was impressive—tall and straight, mustache and goatee neatly trimmed, his red-trimmed blue overcoat tailored straight and proper, black leather baldric crossing right shoulder to left hip and sporting an impressive sword, a family heirloom. He was in his late twenties and had earned his position by defeating three bandits who had slipped into the house of a nobleman one evening. When she had first arrived at Pireth Tulme and had met the warder, Jill’s hopes had soared with a sense of greater responsibility.

She had soon learned, though, that the ready appearance of the fortress, on that day when the Kingsmen’s regional commander had taken her out to the isolated outpost, had been no more than a temporary show, and that Warder Presso, for all of his regal appearance, had long ago fallen into the same trap as the rest of her companions.

Presso eyed Jill directly—he was often doing that. “And I believe that she declines,” the warder said.

“I do,” Jill agreed.

Gofflaw muttered something under his breath and started past Presso, but the man stuck out his arm, blocking the way.

“But it grows late,” Presso said to Jill, “or should I say early? Your watch surely is ended.”

“I take the night.”

“What part of the night?”

“The night,” Jill snapped. “No one else will come up here. They view the setting of the sun as the end of their duties, what little duties they do bother to perform during the day.”

“Calm, lass,” Presso said, patting his hand in the air. Perhaps he was trying to be the levelheaded commander, but to Jill, it came off as condescending.

“I am well read in our rules of conduct and operation,” Jill continued. “Our watch does not end with the setting sun. ‘Ever vigilant, ever watchful,’ ” she finished, the motto of the once proud Coastpoint Guards.

“And for what are you watching?” Presso asked calmly.

Jill’s face screwed up incredulously.

“Would you see a powrie ship, or even a raft full of goblins, if it glided past us into the gulf, barely a hundred yards from our shore?”

“I would hear them,” Jill insisted.

Presso’s snort fast became a full-blown chuckle. “Dawn is not so far away,” he said. “Pray you go inside now and get the rain out of your bones.”

Jill started to protest, but the warder cut her short. He set Gofflaw up as sentry, then took Jill by the arm and pulled her in front of him, pushing her gently toward the tower door.

They went in together, and in truth, Jill was glad to be out of the rain. At the bottom of the tower stairs, through the small hallway that led into the main house, the pair passed a partly opened door. From the sounds emanating from within, it was quite obvious what was going on in there.

Jill hurried down the hallway and entered the common room of the upper level. A dozen men were in there, along with two women, all nearly falling-down drunk. One man was up on the tables, dancing, or trying to, and removing his clothing to the jeers of his male friends and the hoots of the women.

Jill looked straight ahead as she made for the door to the stairwell that would get her down to her room. Warder Presso caught her just as she reached that door, grabbing her by the shoulder.

“Stay with us and enjoy the rest of the night,” he said.

“Are you commanding me to do so?”

“Of course not,” replied Presso, who was really a decent sort. “I am merely asking you to stay. Your watch is ended.”

“Ever watchful,” Jill replied through gritted teeth.

Presso gave a great sigh. “How many months of boredom can you tolerate?” he asked. “We are out here alone, all alone, with nothing but time ahead of us. This is our life, and each of us must choose whether it will be pleasant or wretched.”

“Perhaps we have different views of what is pleasant,” Jill said, subconsciously glancing back across the room to the hallway and the partly open door.

“I give you that,” Presso replied.

“May I go?”

“I could not order you to stay, though I truly wish that you would so choose.”

Jill’s shoulders sagged. Presso’s conciliation somehow seemed to take the strength from her more than any order he might have issued. “I was put in service to the Kingsmen by a magistrate, the abbot of Palmaris,” she explained.

Presso nodded; he had heard as much.

“I did not choose to enter, but once in the ranks, I came to believe,” she said. “I do not know what it was—a sense of purpose, a reason for continuing.”

“Continuing?”

“To live,” she answered sharply. “My duty is my litany—against what, I do not know. But this—” She held her hand out to the revelry, to the half-naked dancer who, as if on cue, tumbled from the table. “This is no part of my duty nor my desire.”

Presso touched her arm gently, but still she recoiled as if she had been slapped. The warder immediately raised both his hands unthreateningly.

Jill understood his concern to be both defensive and compassionate. On the very first night after her arrival, one of the men had tried to get too familiar with the fiery woman. He had limped for a week, one foot swollen, one ankle and both his knees bruised, one eye closed and a lip too fat for him to drink anything without it dribbling down the front of his shirt. Even without the very prominent evidence that she could defend herself, Jill believed that Presso would not try anything. Despite his acceptance of the behavior within Pireth Tulme, Jill recognized that he was a man of some honor. He had his way with the other women, probably all six of them, but he would not infringe where he was not invited.

“I fear that Gofflaw’s reasoning was sound,” the warder warned. “The months will wear on you, day after boring, lonely day.”

“Indeed,” remarked Jill, gesturing with her chin across the way. Presso turned to see Gofflaw entering the room. The warder sighed audibly, then turned back to Jill and merely shrugged. He really didn’t care that the walls were unmanned.

Jill swung about and left the room, but as soon as the door was closed behind her, she veered down a side corridor and back out into the rain. She moved to a ladder and climbed to the seacoast wall, then sat on its outer edge, dangling her legs over the long drop.

There she stayed for the rest of the night, watching the stars return as the storm cloud raced away into the gulf. As the day brightened, the pillarlike rocks in the wide bay came clearer, standing tall and straight like sentinels, ever vigilant, ever watchful.

CHAPTER 22

The Nightbird

“The snows will be soon in coming this year,” Lady Dasslerond remarked, staring out of her high tree house at the gray clouds that loomed on the horizon just north of the enchanted valley.

“A difficult winter would be consistent,” Tuntun replied, her expression even more grave than usual.

Lady Dasslerond turned back to the pair and considered the words. The raid on Dundalis, the sightings of goblins and even giants, the evidence of many earthquakes to the north of Andur’Blough Inninness—all pointed to the resurgence of the dactyl. There were even reports of a smoke cloud rising lazily over the Barbacan, streaming from a solitary mountain known as Aida.

It made sense; the dactyl could—and indeed, likely would—awaken a long-dormant volcano, using the magma to strengthen its underworld magic.

“How long is he?” Lady Dasslerond asked as her gaze returned to the west and north.

“He has just passed his sixth year with us,” Juraviel answered without hesitation. “He was rescued from the goblins in the harvest season of the year the humans call 816. Their reckoning shows the turn of 823 approaching.”

Lady Dasslerond turned to Juraviel, her expression showing that his answer was not acceptable. “But how long is he?” she asked again.

Juraviel sighed and rested back against the wide trunk of the maple. Measuring such things was never easy for the elf, especially since he feared he viewed Elbryan with favorable eyes.

“He is ready,” Tuntun unexpectedly put in. “The blood of Mather runs thick in his veins. In a half century, we will be telling our next would-be ranger that he is of the blood of Elbryan.”

Juraviel couldn’t suppress a small laugh, even given the gravity of this meeting. To hear Tuntun speaking so well of Elbryan seemed to him the ultimate irony. “Tuntun speaks the truth,” he confirmed as soon as the shock wore off. “Elbryan has trained hard and well. He fights with grace and power, runs silent and wary, and has visited the Oracle many times, almost always with success.”

“He found a kindred spirit?” asked Lady Dasslerond.

“Only that of Mather,” Juraviel replied, beaming as the smile widened across his lady’s fair face.

“But he is not yet ready,” Juraviel added quickly. “There is more for him to learn of himself and of the woodland arts. He has a year remaining, and then, he will indeed walk as a ranger.”

Lady Dasslerond was shaking her head before the elf even finished his proclamation. “The winter will be difficult,” she said firmly. “And the humans have settled several communities along the edge of the Wilderlands, have even resettled that place which was, and is again, known as Dundalis. If what we fear is true, then Elbryan will be needed before the next season of harvest.”

“Even if our fears of the dactyl prove false,” Tuntun added, “many of the humans are unprepared for the Wilderlands. The presence of a ranger would do them well.”

“The turn of spring?” Juraviel asked.

“You will have the boy prepared for his walk,” Lady Dasslerond agreed.

“And what of Joycenevial?” Juraviel asked.

“The bowyer is ready for him,” Lady Dasslerond replied. “And the darkfern is tall this season.”

Juraviel nodded. He knew that Joycenevial, the finest bowyer in all of Caer’alfar, in all of the world, had been cultivating a special darkfern all these six years since Elbryan had been brought to Andur’Blough Inninness. This would be Joycenevial’s first human task since Mather, and, since the bowyer was aged even by elven standards, most likely his last.

This one would be special.

Elbryan thought that he knew every trail and grove in the enchanted valley, and so he was indeed confused on that day when Juraviel led him down a particularly twisting path, often branching and crisscrossing a stream more than a dozen times. Their destination must be important indeed, Elbryan realized, for this trail was even more difficult to follow than the winding ways that hid Caer’alfar itself!

Finally, after hours of backtracking, the pair came to a short descent down a steep, sandy bank. At the bottom of the ravine, past a blocking wall of low evergreen bushes, they came to a bed of ferns, bluish green in color. Most were about waist high to Elbryan, shoulder high to Juraviel. Elbryan understood immediately that this was their destination, that there was something unusual about these plants; they were growing in neat rows, evenly spaced, and the ground around them was bare. He wouldn’t have expected much undergrowth, for the ferns cast shade, but this area was too clean, as if caring hands regularly weeded it.

“These are the darkfern,” Juraviel said, his tone full of reverence. He led Elbryan to the nearest plant and bent low, bidding the young man to inspect the fern’s stem.

The plant was thick and smooth, and the stem didn’t seem to narrow at all as it came up high and spread, three-pronged, to the leafy fronds. Elbryan peered closer, and his green eyes widened in surprise, then narrowed again quickly as he moved even closer to inspect the stem.

Silvery lines wove gracefully about the dark green stem; they seemed to Elbyran consistent with the fishing lines and the bowstrings the elves used.

“The darkfern is one with the metal,” Juraviel explained as soon as he realized that Elbryan had found the key. “This ravine was chosen for the planting because we learned that it is rich in minerals, particularly silverel, which the plant prefers above all.”

“The plant brings the metal lines up with it?” Elbryan asked. Many implications came to him then, as if the fog veiling one of the mysteries of elven life had suddenly lifted. The elves used many metal implements—shields and swords mostly—and Elbryan had sometimes wondered where they got the material, since, to his knowledge, there were no working mines in Andur’Blough Inninness. He had assumed that they traded for the metal, but then he had come to realize that elven metal was unlike anything he had seen outside the enchanted valley. He remembered his father’s sword, bulky and dark, but that hardly compared to the fine elvish blades, shining bright and holding so keen an edge.

“They are as one,” Juraviel confirmed. “The darkfern is the lone source of silverel.”

Elbryan stared hard at the lines of gleaming metal. He felt as if he had seen this same pattern before, though where that might have been, he could not remember.

“Treated and cured properly, the stems are incredibly strong and resilient,” Juraviel explained; “and pliable.”

“Even after you take the metal from them?”

“We do not always take the silverel from the harvested stem,” the elf replied.

Elbryan thought on that for a moment, particularly on Juraviel’s last claim that the plants were pliable. Then it came to him where he had seen this same design. “Elvish bows,” he breathed as the fog flew from yet another mystery. Now he knew how the elvish bows, so small and frail, could launch an arrow a hundred yards on a straight line.

He looked up from the plant to see Juraviel nodding.

“There is no composite, not bone and wood, even when blended with sinew, that is stronger,” the elf said. He motioned to the man. “Come with me,” he bade.

They walked carefully past the cultivated rows to the tallest fern of all, one whose broad fronds were above Elbryan’s head. Unexpectedly, Juraviel handed Elbryan his sword, then motioned the young man back a few paces.

Elbryan watched, mesmerized, as the elf closed his eyes and began to chant in the elvish tongue, using many words so arcane that Elbryan didn’t recognize them. The song came louder, faster, and Juraviel began to dance delicate, spinning circles wrapped in a larger circle that encompassed the plants. Elbryan concentrated, looking for the root sounds that made up the elf’s song, but still he could not decipher many of the ancient words. He did understand that Juraviel was praising the plant and thanking it for the gift it would soon give. This did not surprise Elbryan; the elves always showed respect for other living creatures, always prayed and danced over the bodies of animals they had hunted, and sang countless songs to the fruits and berries of Andur’Blough Inninness.

The twirling elf tossed several puffs of powder upon the plant, then bent low and with some reddish gel painted a stripe around the base of the stem just an inch or two from the ground. He finished with a leaping flourish and landed pointing to the stripe. “One clean strike!” he commanded.

Elbryan rolled to one knee quickly and brought the sword flashing across, severing the plant at exactly the stripe. The darkfern landed upright and held for a moment, then slowly tumbled to the side into Juraviel’s waiting hands.

“Follow quickly,” the elf bade, and ran off.

Elbryan had to work hard to keep up. Juraviel ran all the way back to Caer’alfar, to the side of the glen, to a tall tree that housed only a single elf.

“Joycenevial is as old as the oldest tree in Andur’Blough Inninness,” Juraviel explained as the aged elf came out of his home and slowly descended. Without saying a word, he dropped between the pair, took the cut fern from Juraviel, and held it up near Elbryan. He turned it over and nodded, apparently pleased by the fine and clean cut, then started back up his tree, fern in hand.

“No markings?” Juraviel asked.

Joycenevial only shook his head, not even bothering to look back at the pair.

Juraviel praised him once, then started away, Elbryan in tow. The young man had a million questions stirring around in his head. “The red gel?” he dared to ask, trying to start a conversation, trying to unravel this most extraordinary day.

“Without it, you would never have cut through the darkfern,” Juraviel replied.

Elbryan noted the curtness of the answer, the elf’s crisp, almost sharp tone, and he understood that further questioning would be unwelcome, that he would learn what he must when the elves decided to tell him.

Juraviel sent Elbryan off to his duties then, but interrupted the young man again that afternoon, two bows, including one that was fairly large by elvish standards, in hand.

“We haven’t much time,” Juraviel explained, handing the large bow to his student.

Elbryan took it and, ignoring the multitude of questions that again swirled in his thoughts, silently followed. He studied the bow as he walked, and concluded at once that this was not formed of the darkfern such as he had cut, but from a smaller plant.

The old elf took up a curious-looking knife, bent upward on both sides and with its cutting edge on one side of a slit running down its middle. He grasped it firmly in his left hand and cradled the fern stem—now stripped of its fronds—in his right. He tucked the long shaft of the plant under his right shoulder, then gently, very gently, scraped the blade along the stem.

A tiny strip peeled away, so thin as to be nearly translucent. Joycenevial nodded solemnly; he had treated the fern stem perfectly for the carving.

The old elf closed his eyes and began a chant. He pictured Elbryan at the moment when the young human held the stem, envisioned the size of his hand, the length of his arms. Other bowyers would have marked the stem appropriately, but Joycenevial was far beyond such crude necessities. His was an act of the purest creation and not a mere crafting; his art was bound by magic and by the sheer skill that seven hundred years had honed. And so it was with eyes closed that the old elf went to work on the stem, singing softly, using the music of his voice to pace his cuts in depth and intensity. He would spend the better part of half a year on this one, he knew, scraping and treating, notching and weaving spells of strength. Twice a week during the carving, he would coat the stem with special oils to add to its resilience. And when at last the bow had taken shape, he would hang it over an ever-smoking pit, a secret, enchanted place where the magic was strong indeed, so strong that it continually filtered up from the ground.

Half a year—not so long a time as measured by the elves of Caer’alfar, a mere moment in the long history of Belli’mar Joycenevial, father of Juraviel. He closed his eyes and considered the final ceremony, for the bow and the boy: the naming. He had no idea what title he would give the bow; that would come to him as the weapon took on its own personality, its own nuances.

The name would have to be correct, for this bow would be the epitome of his crafting, Joycenevial determined, the highest achievement in a career so often marked by perfection. Every elf in the valley carried a bow crafted by Joycenevial, as did every ranger that had gone out from Andur’Blough Inninness in the last half millennium. Not one of them would hold their weapon up against this bow, however, for Belli’mar Joycenevial, as old as the oldest tree in Andur’Blough Inninness, knew that it would be his last.

This one was special.

At least this time be had hit the tree that held the target! Elbryan looked at Juraviel hopefully, but the elf just stood, shaking his head. In one swift movement, Juraviel put up his bow and let fly an arrow, then another, then a third in rapid succession.

It had come so fluidly, so fast, that Elbryan was still staring at the elf when he heard the third arrow hit He was almost afraid to look up at the mark and wasn’t surprised to find all three embedded squarely in the target, one in the bull’s-eye, the other two right beside it.

“I will never shoot as well as you,” Elbryan lamented, in as close to a whine as Juraviel had heard from the young man in years. “Or as well as any elf in the valley.”

“True enough,” retorted the elf, and he smiled as Elbryan’s green eyes widened. That apparently was not the response the young man wanted to hear.

With a growl, proud Elbryan put up his bow and let fly, missing everything this time.

“You are aiming at the target,” Juraviel remarked.

Elbryan looked at him curiously; of course he was aiming at the target.

“At the whole target,” the elf explained. “Yet the tip of your arrow is not nearly large enough to cover the whole.”

Elbryan relaxed and tried to decipher the words. He considered them in relationship to the entire elven philosophy of life, the oneness. Suddenly it seemed possible to him that his arrow and the target were one and that his bow was merely a tool he used that he might join the arrow and target.

“Aim at a specific, very precise point on the target,” Juraviel explained. “You must tighten your focus.”

Elbryan understood. He had to find the exact spot where the arrow belonged, the specific point where the two, target and arrow, were to be joined. He lifted the bow—which was too small for him—again, drew back to the length of the bend, though his long arms would have allowed him to pull much farther, and let fly.

He missed, but the arrow notched into the tree barely two inches above the target—by far the closest the young man had come.

“Well done,” Juraviel congratulated. “Now you understand.” And the elf began to walk away.

“Where are you going?” Elbryan called to him. “We have only been out for minutes. My quiver holds ten arrows yet”

“Your lesson for this day is completed,” Juraviel replied. “Contemplate it and spend as long as you desire perfecting it.” The elf walked off, disappearing into the thick brush of the forest.

Elbryan nodded grimly, determined that by the time Juraviel brought him out here the next day, he would be able to hit that target with ease. He would stay out here all the rest of the day, and would return as soon as his duties with the milk-stones were completed the next morning, so he thought.

Every time his concentration wavered even a bit, his arrow flew wide of the mark, disappearing into the forest scrub. Elbryan had come out to this place with a full quiver, a score of arrows, but within half an hour, his quiver was empty and not a one could be found. Just as well, the young man thought, for the fingers of his right hand ached, as did the muscle in the middle of his chest, and the inside of his left forearm was badly chafed.

The next day, Juraviel gave Elbryan a black leather guard to put on that left arm and a new bow, this one not of darkfern but the largest the elf could find in all the valley—though it was also too small for the towering man. Juraviel also brought with him a light green triangular huntsmen’s cap, which Elbryan accepted with a confused shrug. This time they went out with two full quivers, and Elbryan, improving minute by minute, spent nearly three hours at the range. At the end of the day, Juraviel revealed a new tool for him, the very cap he wore upon his head. The elf showed him how to bring the front tip of the triangular hat low above his eyes and to use that point as a reference in lining up his shots.

The very next day, Elbryan hit the target two out of every three shots.

All through the fall and winter, Juraviel trained Elbryan with the bow. The young man learned the practical aspects of the weapon, learned how to fashion arrows, heavy for greater damage and light for longer flight, and how to replace bowstrings—though the elven silverel string rarely broke. Most important of all, Elbryan came to know that archery was more a test of the mind than the body, a concentration and focus. All of the physical aspects—the draw, the aiming, the loosing of the arrow—soon became automatic repetition, but each individual shot remained a mental measure of distance and wind, of the length of the draw and the weight of the arrow. The fingers of the young man’s right hand were soon laced with calluses, and the leather on the inside of his black arm guard had been worn down to half its original thickness. For Elbryan went at this training with all the hunger he had shown in his other endeavors, with a pride and determination that had many of the often scatterbrained elves shrugging their shoulders in disbelief. Every day, whatever the weather, Elbryan was at the target, working, training, drawing shot after shot, and inevitably sinking his arrows into the target, near if not in the bull’s-eye. He learned to shoot fast—and from different angles: to roll on the ground and come around with an arrow flying; to hang upside down from the branch of a tree, arcing his shot skyward so it held the appropriate range; to let fly two arrows at once and put them near each other, usually both on the target.

Every morning he performed bi’nelle dasada and then his physical conditioning with the milk-stones. He spent his lunches talking philosophy with Juraviel, then went with the elf to the archery range for more practice.

His evenings, to his surprise, were most often spent with Tuntun, for the female had been the primary instructor, and friend, of Mather, a man about whom Elbryan desperately wanted to learn more. Tuntun recounted many stories of Mather, from his training days in Andur’Blough Inninness—he had made so many of the same mistakes as Elbryan!—to his exploits in the Wilderlands. How many thousands of goblins and giants had fallen to Mather’s deadly blade! That sword, too, became a topic of many discussions, for Tempest, as the blade was named, was one of but six ranger swords ever crafted, the most powerful swords to ever go out from Andur’Blough Inninness. Of the six, only one was still accounted for, a huge broadsword named Icebreaker, wielded by a rarely seen ranger, Andacanavar, in the far northland of Alpinador.

“You are of a rare breed indeed,” Tuntun remarked one starry evening. “It might be that you are the only ranger alive, though we have not felt the sorrow of Andacanavar’s demise.”

The reverence with which she spoke touched Elbryan and at the same time laid a great weight upon his strong shoulders. He had come to feel special, in many ways superior. Because of the elves, he had been given a rare and precious gift: another language—physical and verbal—another way of looking at the world about him, another way of perceiving the movements of his own body. He had come so far from that frightened waif stumbling out of burned Dundalis. He was the blood of Mather, Elbryan the Ranger.

Why, then, was he so terrified?

To find his answer, Elbryan often visited the Oracle. Each time, it became easier for him to conjure the spirit of Mather, and though the specter never offered any words in response, Elbryan’s own soliloquies allowed the young man to keep things fairly sorted out, to keep his perspective and his nerve.

The winter, a difficult one even in the enchanted valley—as Lady Dasslerond had predicted—passed slowly, the snows coming early and deep and holding on stubbornly as the season shifted to spring.

For Elbryan, life went along at its usual frantic pace, learning and growing. He was truly an archer now, not as proficient as some of the elves, but certainly an expert by the measure of humans. His understanding of the natural world about him would never be complete—there was simply too much for any individual to know—but it continued to deepen with each passing day and each new experience. The entire way in which Elbryan now viewed the world around him was conducive to such learning; truly he was the sponge and all the world a liquid.

The shift came dramatically, unexpectedly, when Elbryan was roused from his bed one blustery Toumanay night by Juraviel and Tuntun. The elves prodded and pushed him, finally getting him out of his low tree house wearing only a cloak and a loincloth. They escorted him to a wide tree-lined field, where all two hundred elves of Caer’alfar had gathered.

Juraviel pulled away Elbryan’s cloak, while Tuntun pushed him, shivering, to the middle of the field.

“Remove it,” she said sternly, indicating the loincloth.

Modesty caused Elbryan to hesitate, but Tuntun wasn’t in the mood for a debate. With a flick of her daggers, one in each hand, she cut away the meager covering, caught it before it dropped two inches, then skittered away, leaving the confused, naked man standing alone, with all the eyes of Andur’Blough Inninness upon him.

Holding hands, the elves formed a wide circle about him. Then they began to dance, the circle rotating to the left. They broke their line often, individual elves leaping into pirouettes or simply following steps of their own choosing, but in general the rotation continued about Elbryan.

The elven song filled his ears and all his body, gradually taking him from his place of modesty, relaxing him, intoxicating him. All the forest seemed to join in—the gusty breezes, the birdsong, the croaking of frogs.

Elbryan tilted back his head, considering the stars, the few rushing clouds. He found he was turning as the circle turned, as if compelled, as if the elven movement had summoned a whirlpool about him, spinning him with its currents. All seemed a dream, vague and somehow removed.

“What do you hear?” came a question near him. “At this, your moment of birth, what do you see?”

Elbryan didn’t even consider the source—Lady Dasslerond standing right before him. “I hear the birds,” he answered absently. “The night birds.”

All the world around him went silent, the dream state shattered by the sudden change. Elbryan blinked a few times as he came to a halt, though, to his dizzy perspective, the stars above him continued on their merry rotating way.

“Tai’ marawee!” Lady Dasslerond cried out, and Elbryan, hardly conscious that she was out in the middle of the field with him, jumped at the sound of her voice. He looked down at her as the two hundred elves echoed the cry of “Tai’ marawee!”

Elbryan considered the words: tai for “bird” and marawee for “night.”

“The Nightbird,” Lady Dasslerond explained. “You have been named Nightbird on this, the evening of your birth.”

Elbryan swallowed hard, not comprehending what this was all about. Juraviel and Tuntun certainly had not prepared him for such a ceremony.

Without explanation, Lady Dasslerond then threw a handful of glittering powder in Elbryan’s face.

All the world seemed to stop, then to start again but more slowly. The elvish singing and all the harmony of the forest had renewed, and he was alone again in the middle of the field, turning as the circle turned. So gradually that Elbryan never noticed it, the elven voices faded away one by one. He realized he was alone long after all the elves had gone, and before he could decipher any meaning to it all, sleep overtook him, right there, naked in the middle of the field.

The night of his birth.

Belli’mar Joycenevial nodded his head as he considered the product of his love. They had named the ranger Nightbird, and so the elf’s dream had not deceived him. This bow, Hawkwing by name, certainly fit all that Elbryan had become.

Joycenevial held the beautiful weapon up before him. It was taller than he, rubbed and stained to glassy smoothness—even in the dim light of the single candle, Hawkwing’s dark green, silver-lined hue shone clearly—with a sculpted handgrip and delicate, tapered ends. The removable high tip was set with three feathers; so perfectly aligned that they appeared as one when the bow was at rest.

Hawkwing and Nightbird—the old elf liked the connection. This would be the last bow he ever crafted, for he knew beyond doubt that if he made a thousand more, he would never near the perfection of this weapon.

Elbryan awoke as he had fallen asleep, alone and naked on the field, except that he found a red strip of cloth tied about his left arm, a green strip tied about his right, both crossing the middle of his huge biceps. He considered them for a moment, but didn’t even think of removing them. Then he turned his attention to the awakening world about him. The dawn had long passed; Elbryan knew that he had missed his sword-dance, for the first time since it had been taught to him. Somehow, that morning, it didn’t matter. The young man spotted his cloak and wrapped it about him, but then, instead of returning to his tree house, he went to the Oracle, where he had left his mirror, blanket, and chair.

“Uncle Mather?”

The spirit was waiting for him, serene in the depths of the mirror. A thousand questions came to Elbryan, but before he could utter even the first, his mind was clouded by images of a road, of a moor and a forest, of a valley of evergreen trees that seemed vaguely familiar.

Elbryan fought to steady his breathing; he was beginning to understand. Dark terror crept up all around him, threatening to swallow him where he sat, and he desperately wanted to ask Uncle Mather about it all, to relieve himself one more time of those doubts.

But this time, Elbryan was a receptacle and not the speaker. This time, he rested back, even closed his eyes, and let that unknown path find its place in his mind.

He came out of the cave even less relaxed than he had been when he had gone in, his face reflecting his fear and uncertainty, more questions raised than answered.

When he got back to Caer’alfar, he was surprised to see the place deserted. He moved quickly to his tree house and found it empty of all his possessions—his clothing, his baskets for collecting the milk-stones.

A new set of clothes, finely made, was laid out on the floor before him. They had to be for him, for they would obviously fit none other in Caer’alfar. Unless, Elbryan pondered, another would-be ranger had been brought in.

He shook that thought away, shrugged off his cloak, and began donning the clothing: deerskin boots, high and soft; supple breeches with a narrow belt made of rope lined with silverel for strength; a soft sleeveless shirt with a leather vest lined in silverel; and finally, a thick forest-green traveling cloak and a lighter-green triangular huntsmen’s cap.

Elbryan looked around, wondering what he was expected to do next. He thought of the field again and made his way there, to find all the elves of Caer’alfar waiting for him, this time standing quietly in neatly ordered rows. In front of the gathering stood Lady Dasslerond and Belli’mar Juraviel. They motioned immediately for Elbryan to join them.

When he got there, Juraviel handed him a full pack, a fine knife strapped on one side, a balanced hand axe on the other.

A long moment passed before Elbryan realized that the elves were waiting for him to properly inspect the gift. He fumbled with the ties and opened the pack, then bent low and gingerly dumped it out onto the ground. Flint and steel, a slender cord of the same silverel-lined rope as his belt, a packet of the same red gel he had seen Juraviel use on the darkfern, the blanket and mirror needed for Oracle—which must have been retrieved soon after he had left the place—and most telling of all, a waterskin and a supply of food, carefully salted and packed.

Elbryan looked up to his elven friend, but found no answer there. Carefully, his hands trembling, he repacked the satchel, then stood tall before Juraviel and the Lady of Andur’Blough Inninness.

“The red band is soaked in permanent salves,” Juraviel explained. “Both bandage and tourniquet. The green will filter air when placed over nose and mouth, will even allow you to pass under water for a short time.”

“These are our gifts to you, Nightbird,” Lady Dasslerond added. “These and this!” She snapped her fingers and Belli’mar Joycenevial stepped forth from the ranks of elves, cradling the beautiful bow.

“Hawkwing,” the old elf explained, handing it over. “It will serve as a staff, as well.” With a simple movement, he removed the feathered tip, taking the bowstring with it, then just as easily replaced it, bending the bow to restring it with hardly an effort. “Fear not, for though it seems delicate, you’ll not break it. Not by striking, not by a bolt of lightning, not by the breath of a great dragon!”

His proclamation was met by a sudden burst of well-deserved cheering for the old elf.

“Draw it,” Juraviel prompted.

Elbryan put down the pack and raised the bow. He was amazed by its balance, by the smoothness of its long and comfortable draw. As the bow bent, the three feathers on its top tip separated from one another, looking like the “fingers” on the end of the wing of a gliding hawk.

“Hawkwing,” the old bowyer said again to Elbryan. “It will serve you as bow for all your days, and as staff until you have earned your sword, if ever you do.”

Tears in his eyes, the old elf handed over a quiver full of long arrows, then slowly turned and moved back to his place in line.

“Our gifts to you,” Lady Dasslerond said again. “Which do you consider the most precious?”

Elbryan paused for a long while, understanding that this was a critical moment for him, a subtle test that he could not fail. “All the supplies and clothes,” he began, “are worthy of a king, even a king of elves. And this bow,” he said with all reverence, looking at Joycenevial. “I am sure that it has no equal and know that I am truly blessed in carrying it.

“But the Oracle,” Elbryan continued, turning back to Lady Dasslerond, his voice firm, “that is the gift I hold most precious.”

The Lady didn’t blink, but suddenly Elbryan knew that he spoke mistakenly. Perhaps it was the slightly crestfallen look of his friend Juraviel that upped him to the truth of his own thoughts.

“No,” he said quietly, “that is not the greatest of your gifts!”

“What is?” the Lady prompted anxiously.

“Nightbird,” Elbryan replied without hesitation. “All that I am; all that I have become. I am a ranger now, and no gift, in all the world—not all the gold, not all the silverel, not all the kingdoms—could be greater. The greatest gift is the name you have given me, the name I have earned through your patience and your time, the name that marks me as elf-friend. There could be no higher honor, no higher responsibility.”

“You are ready to face that responsibility,” Juraviel dared to interject.

“It is time for you to go,” Lady Dasslerond stated.

Elbryan’s first instinct was to ask where, but he held the thought private, trusting that the elves would tell him if he needed to know. When they did not, when they did nothing but bow to him once, then filter out of the field, leaving him, once again completely alone, he had his answer.

The Oracle had shown him the way.

The land was relatively flat and brown, with sparse low shrubs poking here and there. But the gentle slopes were deceiving and the ranger, running smooth, could not usually see very far in any direction. There were the Moorlands—the Soupy Bogs, they had been affectionately called by the settlers on the edge of the Wilderlands. To the child Elbryan, this had been the place of wildly exaggerated fireside tales.

Except that now, he ran through the Moorlands, and recalling those tales of howling beasts and horrid guardians wasn’t very comforting.

The mist was light this day, not closing in on the man as it had the previous day, when Elbryan felt as if watching eyes were with him every step. He came over a rise and saw a silvery stream winding below him, meandering this way and that across the brown clay. Instinctively, the ranger’s hand went to his waterskin, and he found it less than half full. He trotted down to the stream, which was just a few feet across and less than a foot deep, and dipped his hand, nodding when he found that the water was quite clear. The ground here was simply too compacted to be swept up in the light flow. Rivulets of runoff had been crystalline all through the Moorlands, except in those low basins where the water collected and remained, where the ground and water seemed to blend, to melt together into a thick muddy stew.

Elbryan continued his inspection of the stream to make sure that nothing ominous was swimming along its course, then hooked his pack on the stiff branch of a prickly shrub and gingerly removed his boots. He had been running for five days, the last two in the Moorlands. The cool water and the soft bed beneath it felt good indeed on his sore feet; he briefly considered pulling off all his clothes and lying down in the flow.

But then he felt something, or heard something. One of his senses subtly called out a warning to him. The ranger froze where he stood, tuned his senses outward to his environment. The muscles in his feet relaxed, nerves on end, feeling for vibrations beneath him. He turned his head side to side slowly, eyes sharp.

He noted a splash, not so far in the distance upstream.

Elbryan considered his position. The stream flowed around one of the deceivingly high rises, turning out of sight just a couple dozen yards from where he stood.

He heard another splash, closer, and then a voice, though he could not make out the words. He looked around again, this time searching for a vantage point, a perch from which he might ambush any enemies. The terrain wasn’t very promising; the best he could do would be backtrack up the rise and crouch just beyond the ridgeline. He would have to time his move perfectly, though, for various areas of that high ground would be visible from around the upstream bend.

Elbryan dismissed the notion altogether; he was on the eastern edge of the Moorlands by now, not so far from human settlements. Whoever or whatever was coming certainly wasn’t kicking up a storm—it could not be giants. There was no reason for him to think that these would be enemies.

Even if they were, Nightbird had Hawkwing in hand.

He pulled his forest-green cloak tighter about his shoulders, lifted the hood up over his head and cap, then went about his business, crouching low to dip his waterskin in the stream.

The noise increased—by the volume and consistency of the splashing, Elbryan figured there must be about a half dozen bipedal creatures approaching. More important to him, though, was the continuing conversation, not the words, of which he could understand only a few, but the high, grating tone of the voices. Elbryan had heard such voices before.

The splashing and talking stopped suddenly; the creatures had rounded the bend. Elbryan remained crouching. He peeked out around the side of his hood to make sure that they carried no bows.

Goblins, six of them, stood and gawked from barely thirty feet away, one with a spear up on its shoulder, but not yet ready to throw. The others held clubs and crude swords, but thankfully no bows.

Elbryan stayed low. With his posture and his cloak the creatures couldn’t be sure of his race.

“Eeyan kos?” one of them called.

Elbryan smiled under his hood and did not look the goblins’ way.

“Eeyan kos?” the same one asked again. “Dokdok crus?”

“Duck, duck, goose,” Elbryan said under his breath, the name of a game he had played perhaps a decade before. He smiled again as he thought of that innocent time, but it was not a long-lasting sentiment, swept away in the wave of darker emotions as he considered what creatures such as these had done to his world.

The goblin called out again. It was time to answer, he knew, and since he had no idea what the goblin was saying, he merely stood up tall, too tall to be any goblin, and slowly dropped back the hood of his cloak.

Half of the goblin party shrieked; the spear wielder accompanied its yell by rushing three strides forward and hurling its weapon.

Elbryan waited until the last possible moment, then flashed Hawkwing across in front of him, deflecting the spear. He moved the bow around and out as it connected, diverting then defeating the spear’s momentum, turning it harmlessly in midair and then catching it mid-shaft in his right hand as his left brought Hawkwing back to his side.

Suddenly he held the spear, aimed right back at its original wielder. That stopped the goblins cold before they could even begin to charge.

Emotions churned confusingly in the young man. He remembered the teachings of the elves, mostly of tolerance, though they held no love for goblinkind or for any of the fomorian races. However, Elbryan was not in any human settlement, not in any land claimed by his kind, and quite possibly was within the boundaries of goblin territory. If that was the case, would he be justified in waging battle with these six?

Yet, one had just attacked him, though it might have come more from fear than aggression. And Elbryan, whatever logical reasoning he summoned, could not possibly dismiss those memories of Dundalis.

He hesitated; were these goblins responsible for what their kin had done to Elbryan’s home? The one the elves had named Nightbird had to give himself an honest answer; he owed that much, at least, to Belli’mar Juraviel.

A flick of his powerful wrist sent the spear flying back the way it had come, to land with a splash and stick up from the stream just a foot or so in front of the creature who had thrown it. Elbryan cast a warning glance the goblins’ way, then turned sideways to them, focusing on the water, and bent down to finish filling his waterskin.

He had given them one chance; a large part of him, that boy who remembered Dundalis, hoped they would not take it.

He heard and felt the water stirring as the creatures came on slowly. He sensed that at least two had broken away, moving out of the stream to flank him front and back.

Elbryan measured their approach, kept wary for any hint that the spear was coming his way once more.

Everything seemed to stop, all movement, all splashing. The creatures were not more than ten feet away, he knew. Slowly he turned square with the main group of four, rising to stand straight, a foot and more higher than his tallest foe.

“Eenegash!” the closest and ugliest of the group demanded, holding forth its sword, a two-foot blade not unlike the one Olwan had given Elbryan for his patrols.

“I do not understand,” he replied evenly.

The goblins muttered something among themselves; Elbryan realized that they could not understand his language either. Then the ugly one turned back to him.

“Eenegash!” it said again, more forcefully, and it pointed its sword at the staff, then at the riverbank.

“I hardly think so,” Elbryan replied, smiling widely and shaking his head. In a barely noticeable movement, the ranger pulled the feathered tip from the bow, tucking it and the bowstring into his belt.

The goblin gave a threatening growl. Elbryan shook his head again.

The creature rushed to close half the distance and prodded with its sword, a movement more of intimidation than an actual attack. But it was the creature who was surprised.

Elbryan grabbed the staff, right hand over left, reversed his grip with his left as the pole started moving, and snapped it across so quickly in front of him that the goblin never had a chance to move. The staff connected simultaneously on the sword and the goblin’s hand, knocking the weapon from the creature’s grasp and launching it a dozen feet away. A subtle shift, still too quick for the creature to dodge, and Elbryan stabbed the tapered end out straight, striking the goblin on its sloping forehead right above and between the eyes, laying it out straight in the stream.

With a whoop of delight, the other goblins, predictably, came on. Elbryan brought his staff back in, letting go with his left hand, flipping with his right to send the forward tip under. Never breaking the momentum, he extended his right arm out, catching the closing goblin, the one that had run out of the stream to flank the man, completely by surprise, Hawkwing’s tip stabbing right under its chin.

Back in came the weapon, a full and defensive spin between the ranger and the three goblins coming along in the stream. Elbryan caught the staff firmly in his left hand and extended that arm out in similar fashion so that the other flanking goblin was poked away. Back in came the staff, half spun and caught again in the right hand, half spun, angled outward diagonally, and caught again in the left, and then the right hand catching it, too, as the trailing end came around and over, Elbryan shifting the weapon’s angle and striding boldly ahead. The downward chop connected squarely on the head of the center goblin, the spear-wielder, Hawkwing’s incredible hardness splitting wide the creature’s skull with a resounding crack!

Elbryan swept his staff out to the left, knocking aside a club strike, then back to the right, parrying a sword. Back left, back right, each time the angle shifting to defeat the intended attack. Then back left, then left again, knocking wide the creature’s club arm. Elbryan stepped left as well and spun, avoiding an awkward cut of its sword. He came around hard and low, Hawkwing flying before him. The goblin, to its credit, recognized the circuitous attack and managed to get its club down, but Elbryan merely lifted Hawkwing’s flying tip, cracking across the creature’s skinny forearm, shattering bone. The club fell into the stream; the goblin shrieked and clutched at its arm.

Elbryan stepped forward, facing the creature squarely, staff coming horizontal in front of him, and punched out with his left, right, left, Hawkwing swishing about to smack the goblin hard on alternate sides of its head. The ranger dropped his right foot back after the last strike, retracting the staff, then turned sidelong to his current foe, expecting an attack from the sword wielder. Seeing that creature in full flight, Elbryan stabbed the staff back out hard to his left, hitting the dazed and battered goblin right in the face.

He didn’t see but heard the movement as the goblin that had come in at his left struggled to its feet. Hawkwing went swinging again, turning a vertical circle under and then over Elbryan’s right shoulder as he turned and leaped out to the left. Down raced the staff above the angle of the terrified goblin’s pitiful attempt to parry, crashing hard against the base of the creature’s neck. The goblin jolted perfectly still and then, as if the wave of energy had rolled right down to its feet and then come rushing back up, the creature went into a weird backward leap, landing on its feet for a long moment, then slowly falling over.

Elbryan turned and dropped into a defensive crouch, but no enemies presented themselves. The first one he had hit, the leader, was on its hands and knees in the middle of the stream, facing away; too dazed to even get back to its feet. The one he had hit to the right of the stream was still on the ground, squirming and gasping for air that would hardly come. This last one he had hit was surely dead, as was the spear wielder, and the one who had taken four blows to the head lay unmoving at the stream’s edge, its face in the water. The last of the group, the one with the sword, faced Elbryan from twenty paces, hopping up and down, hurling curses that the ranger did not understand.

Casually, in no hurry, Elbryan replaced the feathered tip of his bow and in one fluid motion, bent the shaft around his leg and hooked the bowstring over the bottom edge.

The goblin caught on, howled, and fled.

Up came Hawkwing; three feathers separated. Clear and straight for thirty-five feet.

The arrow slammed the goblin square in the back, lifting it clear of the stream and sending it another five feet. Arms and legs flailing, it flopped heavily, facedown in the water.

Grim Elbryan retrieved the axe from the side of his pack and finished the task at hand.

Then he was on his way, running across the Moorlands.

PART THREE

CONFLICT

Did you go home, Uncle Mather? When you walked away from Andur’Blough Inninness, from your elven home, did you return to the place you had known in your childhood?

I had thought it a vision that led me across the Moorlands then north to a sweeping vale of knee-deep caribou moss and stark pines. Now I wonder if it wasn’t merely a memory returned, a backtracking of the same course the elves had taken on that day when they pulled me from Dundalis. Perhaps they then placed a veil over my memory, that I had no desire to escape Caer’alfar and run back to the place of my kinfolk. Perhaps that last Oracle in Andur’Blough Inninness was no more than a lifting of the veil.

I had not even considered this until my northern trek led me back to these lands familiar. I feared that I had erred in my course, that I had returned home by memory, not by vision.

Now 1 understand. This land is my land, my ranger haunt. It is under my protection, though the proud and hardy folk here would hardly believe they need it, and certainly would refuse it should I ask.

They are more numerous than when I lived here last. Weedy Meadow remains a village of four score—the goblins never attacked after the sacking of Dundalis—and a new village, nearly twice that in number, has been built some thirty miles to the west, even further into the Wilderlands. End-o’-the-World, they call it, and a fitting name it seems.

And Uncle Mather, they have rebuilt Dundalis and have kept its name. 1 do not yet understand how I feel about this. Is the new Dundalis a tribute to the last or a mockery? It pained me when, walking along the wide cart path, I happened upon a signpost—a new signpost, for we never had such things—proclaiming the village limits, the edge of Dundalis. For a moment, I admit, I even held fast a fantasy that my memory of the destruction, of the carnage, was in error. Perhaps, I dared to think; the elves had tricked me into believing that Dundalis and all its folk had died, to keep me from fleeing their custody, or from wanting to flee.

Under the name on the signpost, someone had scrawled “Dundalis dan Dundalis,” and under that, another prankster had added “McDundalis,” both indications that this place was “the son of Dundalis.” I should have understood the implication.

It was with great anticipation that I walked that last mile to the village proper—to see a place that I knew not.

There is a tavern now, larger than the old common house and built on the foundation of my old home.

Built by strangers.

It was such an awkward moment, Uncle Mather, a feeling of absolute displacement. I had come home, and yet, this was not my home. The people were much the same—strong and firm, tough as the deepest winter night—and yet, they were not the same. No Brody Gentle, no Bunker Crawyer, no Shane McMichael, no Thomas Ault, no Mother and Father, no Pony.

No Dundalis.

I refused the invitation of the tavern’s proprietor, a jolly-looking man, and, without a word—I suppose that was the moment the folk of the village began to suspect that I was a bit unusual—headed back the way I had come. I took my frustrations out on the signpost, I admit, tearing off the lowest board, the scribbled references to the original village.

Never had I felt so alone, not even that morning after the disaster. The world had moved on without me. I meant to come and speak with you then, Uncle Mather, and so I crossed by the town, up the slope on the northern edge. There are several small caves on the backside of that slope, overlooking the wide vale. In one of those, so I believed, I would find Oracle. I would find Uncle Mather. I would find peace.

I never made it over that ridge. It is a funny thing, memory. To the elves, it is a way to walk backward in time, to rediscover old scenes from the perspective of new enlightenments.

So it was that morning on the ridge north of Dundalis. I saw her, Uncle Mather, my Pony, as alive to me as ever she was, as wonderful and beautiful. I remembered her so very vividly that she was indeed beside me once again—for a few fleeting moments.

I have no new friends among the current residents of Dundalis, and in truth, I expect none. But I have found peace, Uncle Mather. I have come home.

—ELBRYAN WYNDON

CHAPTER 23

The Black Bear

“It came roaring down that hill,” the man was saying, waving his arm frantically in the direction of the forested slope north of Dundalis. “I got my family into the root cellar—damned glad I dug the thing!”

The speaker was about his own age, the ranger noticed as he approached the group of ten—eight men and two women—who were gathered outside the nearly destroyed cabin on the outskirts of Dundalis.

“Damn big bear,” one of the other men said.

“Twelve footer,” the first man, the victim of the attack, remarked, holding his arms as far apart as he could possibly stretch.

“Brown?” Elbryan asked, though the question was merely a formality, for a twelve-foot-tall bear would have to be brown.

The group turned as one to regard the stranger. They had seen Elbryan about town on several occasions over the last few months, mostly sitting quietly in the tavern, the Howling Sheila, but none, save Belster O’Comely, the innkeeper, had spoken a word to, the suspicious man. Their reluctance was clearly etched on their faces as they regarded the outsider and his unusual dress: the forest green cloak and the triangular cap.

“Black,” the victim corrected evenly, his eyes narrowed.

Elbryan nodded, accepting that as more likely the truth than the man’s previous statement. He knew two things from the color: first, that the man was surely exaggerating the bear’s size and second, that this attack was far from normal. A brown bear might come roaring down the hill, hurling itself upon the cabin as if the shelter were some elk, but black bears were shy creatures by nature, far from aggressive unless cornered, or defending their cubs.

“What business is it of yours?” another man asked, his tone making it seem to Elbryan as if he were being accused of the attack.

Ignoring the comment, the ranger walked past the group and knelt low, inspecting a set of tracks. As he suspected, the bear was nowhere near the size the excited farmer was claiming, probably closer to five or six feet in height, perhaps two to three hundred pounds. Elbryan didn’t really begrudge the man his excitement, though. A six-foot bear could indeed appear twice that height when angered. And the amount of damage to the house was remarkable.

“We cannot tolerate a rogue,” a large man, Tol Yuganick, insisted. Elbryan looked up to regard him. He was broad shouldered and strong, forceful in manner as he was in speech. His face was clean shaven, seeming almost babyish, but anyone looking at powerful Tol knew that to be a deceptive façade. Elbryan noticed the man’s hands—for hands were often the most telling of all—were rough and thick with calluses. He was a worker, a true frontiersman.

“We’ll get together a group and go out and kill the damned thing,” he said, and he spat upon the ground.

Elbryan was surprised that the burly man hadn’t decided to go out alone and hunt the bear.

“And what of you?” the man bellowed, looking at the ranger. “You were asked what business this might be of yours, but of yet I’ve heard no answer.” Tol moved closer to the stooping ranger as he spoke.

Elbryan came up to his full height. He was as tall as the man and, while not as heavy, certainly more muscular.

“Do you think that you belong in Dundalis?” the man asked bluntly, again the words sounding like an accusation, or a threat.

Elbryan didn’t blink. He wanted to scream out that he belonged in this place more than any of them, that he had been here when the foundation of their beloved tavern was that of his own home!

He held the words, though, and easily. His years with the elves had given him that control, that discipline. He was here, in Dundalis, in Weedy Meadow, in End-o’-the-World, to give the folk some measure of protection that they had never known. If an elven-trained ranger had been about those seven years before, then Dundalis would not have been sacked, Elbryan believed, and in the face of that responsibility, the surly man’s demeanor seemed a minor thing.

“The bear will not return,” was all the ranger said to them, and he calmly walked away.

He heard the grumbling behind him, heard the word “strange” several times—and not spoken with any affection. They were still planning to go out and hunt the bear, Elbryan realized, but he was determined to get there first. A black bear had attacked a farmhouse and that alone was enough of a mystery to force the ranger to investigate.

Elbryan was amazed at how easy it was for him to track the bear. The beast had run off from the farmhouse, creating a swath of devastation through the brush, even knocking over small trees, venting a rage that the ranger had never before witnessed in an animal. The tracks were surely those of a medium-sized bear, but Elbryan felt as if he were tracking a fomorian giant or some other evil, reasoning creature, some creature purposefully bent on destruction. He feared that the bear was in the grip of some disease, perhaps, or was wounded. Whatever the source, with every passed scene of utter destruction, the ranger’s fear mounted that he would not be able to spare the creature. He had hoped simply to drive the bear far away into the deeper woodlands.

He moved up the side of one steep hill, peering intently into every shadow. Bears were not stupid creatures; they had been known to backtrack hunters, taking the men from behind. Elbryan crouched by the side of one small tree. He placed his hand on the ground, feeling for subtle vibrations, anything that might offer a hint.

He caught a slight movement of a bush out of the corner of his eye. The ranger didn’t move except to shift his head to better view the shadow. He noted the wind, noted that he was upwind of the spot.

Out came the bear in full charge, roaring.

Elbryan shifted to one knee, fitted a heavy arrow, and, with a sigh of complete resignation, let fly. He scored a hit, the arrow skipping off the bear’s face and burrowing into its chest, but the bear kept coming. The ranger was amazed at the sheer speed of the thing. He had seen bears in Andur’Blough Inninness, had even seen one run off when Juraviel had banged two stones together, but this creature’s speed was outrageous, as fast as any horse might run.

A second arrow followed the first, diving deep into the bear’s shoulder. It bellowed again and hardly slowed.

Elbryan knew that he would not get the third shot away. If it had been a brown bear, he would have taken to the trees, but a black could climb any tree faster than he could.

He waited, crouched, as the bear bore down on him, then, at the last instant, the ranger went into a sidelong roll, down the hill.

The bear skidded to a stop and turned to follow. When Elbryan rolled to his knees, facing up the hill to the bear, the creature went up onto its hind legs, standing tall and imposing.

But leaving some vital areas exposed.

Elbryan pulled the bowstring back with all his strength; Hawkwing’s three feathers were as wide apart as they could go. The ranger hated this business as he sighted the hollow on the bear’s breast.

And then it was over, suddenly, the creature rolling, dead. Elbryan went to the corpse. He waited a while to make sure that it would not stir, then moved to its muzzle, lifting its upper lip. He feared that he would find foamy saliva there, an indication of the most wicked disease. If that was the case, then Elbryan would have his work cut out from him indeed, hunting almost day and night for other infected animals, everything from raccoons and weasels to bats.

No foam; the ranger breathed a sigh of relief. It was short-lived, though, as Elbryan tried to figure what, then, had caused this normally docile animal to go so bad. He continued his inspection of the mouth and face, noted that the eyes were clear and not runny, then moved along the bear’s torso.

He found his answer in the form of four barbed darts, stuck deep into the bear’s rump. He worked one out—not an easy task—and inspected its tip. Elbryan recognized the black, sappy poison, a pain-inducing product of a rare black birch tree.

With a growl, the ranger threw the dart to the ground. This was no accident but a purposeful attack on the bear. The poor beast had been driven mad by pain, and someone—some human, most likely, given the type of the darts—had done it.

Elbryan gathered his wits and began his dance of praise to the spirit of the bear, thanking it for its gift of food and warmth. Then he methodically went about skinning and cleaning it. To waste the creature’s useful body, to leave the bear to rot or even to bury it whole in the ground would, by elven standards—and by Elbryan’s—be a complete insult to the bear, and thus to Nature.

His work was done late that afternoon, but the ranger did not rest, nor did he return to Dundalis to inform the townsfolk of the kill. Something, someone, had brought on this tragedy.

Nightbird went hunting again.

They were not much more difficult to find than the bear. Their hut, a mere shack of logs and old boards—Elbryan got the distinct impression that many of these had come from the ruins of Dundalis—was at the top of a hill. Branches had been tossed all about, for camouflage, but many of these had already withered, their dry and brown leaves a telltale sign.

The ranger heard them long before he caught sight of them, laughing and singing terribly off-key, though the voices were surely human, as he had suspected.

Elbryan glided stealthily up the hill, tree to tree, shadow to shadow, though he doubted the men inside would have heard him had he been accompanied by a hundred villagers and a score of fomorian giants! He recognized the implements of the trapping trade hanging all about the shack, along with dozens of drying pelts. These men knew animals, Elbryan understood. In a vat not far from the back wall of the shack, the ranger found a thick concoction of black liquid, and quickly surmised it to be the same irritant poison that had been used on the bear.

The walls of the shack were in bad disrepair, with cracks between every board. Elbryan peeked in.

Three men lay about on piled skins, black bear mostly, drinking foamy beer from old mugs. Every so often, one would shift to the side and dip his mug into a barrel, first brushing away the many flies and bees drawn to the liquid.

Elbryan shook his head in disgust, but he reminded himself to keep a measure of respect. These were men of the Wilderlands, strong and heavily armed. One had many daggers within easy grasp, hanging on a bandolier that crisscrossed his chest. Another sported a heavy axe, while the last carried a slender sword. From his vantage point, the ranger noted, too, that a bar was in place across the one door.

He moved around to the front of the house and took the dagger from his pack. The door did not fit the opening well, leaving a wide crack on one side, wide enough to admit the dagger’s blade. A flick of the wrist dislodged the bar and Elbryan kicked open the door, striding a single step into the shack.

The men scrambled, spilling beer, one shouting aloud as he rolled across his sword, the hilt catching hard on his hip. They were up soon enough, Elbryan standing impassively by the door, Hawkwing, its feathered tip and string removed, in his hand like some unthreatening walking stick.

“Whad’ye want?” asked one of the men, a barrel-chested brute whose face was more scar than beard. Except for that hardened face with its wild, untended beard, this man could have passed as a brother of Tol Yuganick, Elbryan noted distastefully. Surely their bodies were cut from the same, rather large, mold. The fellow had his huge axe out in front of him, and if Elbryan couldn’t offer a reasonable answer, there was little doubt what he meant to do with it. The swordsman, tall and lean with not a hair anywhere on his head, shadowed the burly man, gaping at Elbryan from over his companion’s shoulder; while the third, a skinny, nervous wretch, moved to the far corner, rubbing his fingers—which weren’t so far from his many daggers.

“I have come to speak with you about a particular bear,” Elbryan answered coolly.

“What bear?” the burly man replied. “We got skins.”

“The bear you maddened with poisoned darts,” Elbryan answered bluntly. “The bear that destroyed a farm in Dundalis and nearly killed a family.”

“Go on now.” The man spat.

“The same poison you have brewing out back,” Elbryan went on, “a rare concoction, known to few.”

“That don’t prove nothing,” the man retorted, snapping his dirty fingers in the air. “Now get on out of here, else ye’ll soon feel the edge of me axe!”

“I think not,” the ranger answered. “There is the matter of compensation—to the farmers and to me for my efforts in hunting the bear.”

“C-compen—?” the tall, bald man stuttered.

“Payment,” said Elbryan. He saw the movement even as he spoke, the man from the corner drawing and throwing a dagger with practiced ease.

Elbryan planted the ball of his left foot and spun clockwise, the dagger flying harmlessly past to stick deep in the wall. The ranger came round as if he would launch a horizontal swipe, but he recognized the move was anticipated: the burly man’s axe was up to block. As soon as he started around, then, Elbryan turned his right foot out and went around counterclockwise, pulling in his hip to avoid a swipe of that axe.

Now he launched his attack, dropping down to one knee, slapping his staff across to, catch the inside of the overbalanced man’s leg. A shift of the angle sent his staff poking straight up, smacking the man’s groin. Faster than a cat, Elbryan retracted the staff a foot, shifted its angle, and poked ahead three times in rapid succession, prodding the burly man in the hollow of his chest.

He fell away and Elbryan came up hard, bringing Hawkwing horizontal above his head in both hands to catch the downward chop of the second man’s sword. Up came the ranger’s knee, slamming the man’s belly, and as he started to double over, Elbryan turned his staff, deflecting the sword to the side. He twisted his staff around the man’s arm, hooking him under the armpit, stepped with his left foot across his body behind the man’s entangled side, then heaved with all his strength, launching the wretch into the air to land heavily on his back and the back of his head.

Elbryan immediately swung about, realizing he was vulnerable. Predictably, another dagger was on its way, and the ranger just got Hawkwing up in time to block its flight. He loosened his grip on his staff as the dagger connected so that it wouldn’t bounce far away. As fortune would have it, the dagger went straight up, and Elbryan seized it, catching it by the tip.

In the blink of an eye, the ranger stood, staff in one hand out before him, his other hand holding a dagger cocked behind his ear, ready to throw.

The skinny man, two daggers in hand, blanched and let his blades drop to the floor.

Elbryan fought hard to restrain the rage that called for him to put that dagger right into the foul man’s chest, a rage that only intensified when the ranger thought of what these three had done to the bear and of the potentially devastating consequences of their foolhardy actions.

With a growl, he let fly, the dagger slamming hard into the wall right beside the man’s head. Never taking his eyes from Elbryan, whimpering all the way, the skinny man slumped to a sitting position in the corner.

Elbryan looked about; the other two were staggering to their feet, neither holding a weapon.

“What are your names?” the ranger demanded.

The men looked curiously at one another.

“Your names!”

“Paulson,” the burly man answered, “Cric, and Chipmunk,” he finished, indicating first the tall man, then the dagger thrower.

“Chipmunk?” Elbryan inquired.

“Skittery type,” Paulson explained.

The ranger shook his head. “Know this, Paulson, Cric, and Chipmunk: you share the forest with me, and I will be watching your every move. Another prank, another cruelty, as with the bear, will bring you more harm than this, I promise. And I will be watching your trap lines—no longer shall you use the jaw traps—”

Paulson started to complain, but Elbryan glared so fiercely at him that he seemed to melt.

“Nor any other traps that inflict suffering on your prey.”

“We’ve to earn our money,” Chipmunk remarked in a shaky voice.

“There are better ways,” Elbryan answered evenly. “And in the hopes that you will find those ways, I’ll demand no coins from you for compensation . . . this time.” He looked at each of them, meeting their stares, his own showing clearly that he was not speaking empty threats.

“And who might ye be?” Paulson dared to ask.

Elbryan shifted back on his heels, considering the question. “I am Nightbird,” he answered.

Cric snickered, but Paulson, locked with that intense gaze, held a hand up in his companion’s face.

“A name you would do well to remember,” Elbryan finished, and he headed for the door, boldly turning his back on the dangerous threesome.

They didn’t begin to entertain any thoughts of attacking.

The ranger went around to the back and dumped out the cauldron of poison. As he left, he took a few of the jaw traps, nasty pieces of toothy iron hinged and set with heavy springs so that they would clamp hard on the leg of any passing animal.

His next stop was the tavern, the Howling Sheila, in Dundalis. A dozen men and women were in the common room, boisterous until the stranger entered. Elbryan went to the bar first, nodding to Belster O’Comely, the closest thing he had to a friend in the area.

“Just water,” the ranger said, and Belster mouthed the predictable words right along with him, then pushed a glass out to him.

“Word of the bear?” the jolly innkeeper asked.

“The bear is dead,” Elbryan replied grimly, and he walked to the far side of the room, taking a seat at the corner table, his back to the wall.

He noted that several other patrons shifted their seats, one woman even bluntly turning her back on him.

Elbryan brought the tip of his triangular cap down low and smiled. He understood that it would be like this. He was not much like these folk; no longer was he much like any human, except for those rare few who had ventured to the valley of the elves, who had spent years beside the likes of Belli’mar Juraviel and Tuntun. Elbryan missed those friends now—even Tuntun. It was true that he had been out of place in Caer’alfar, but in many ways the ranger felt even more out of place here among folk who looked so much like him but who saw the world through very different eyes.

Still, despite the prominent reminders of his position, Elbryan’s smile was genuine. He had done well this day, though he regretted having to slay the bear. His solace came in duty, in his vow that this Dundalis and the two neighboring villages would not share the fate that had befallen his own village.

He remained in the Howling Sheila for nearly an hour, but not a person, save Belster on Elbryan’s way out, offered him so much as a glance.

CHAPTER 24

The Mad Friar

“Tinson,” Warder Miklos Barmine said to Jill as she walked her watch along the sea wall of Pireth Tulme.

Jill regarded the short, stout man curiously. She recognized the name Tinson as that of the small hamlet some dozen miles inland from the fortress. The place was no more than a score of houses and a tavern, a place of rogues and whores servicing the soldiers of Pireth Tulme.

“The Waylaid Traveler,” Barmine added in his typically curt manner.

“Another fight?” Jill asked.

“And something more,” replied the warder, walking away. “Gather ten and go.”

Jill watched the man depart. She didn’t like Miklos Barmine, not at all. He had replaced Constantine Presso only three months before, the previous warder sent north to command Pireth Danard. At first, Jill thought the new warder more her style, a stickler for detail and duty. But he was a letch, a drooling, grabby slob, who took it personally when Jill refused his advances. Even his strict rules for duty had relaxed within the week, Pireth Tulme reverting to its typical partying ways. Also, it had surprised Jill how much she missed Constantine Presso, a decent man—by Pireth Tulme’s standards, at least. She had served under Presso for more than a year, and he had always been a gentleman to her, always respected her decision not to partake in the unending festivities. Now, with Presso gone and the brooding Miklos Barmine in command, Jill feared that the pressure on her would only increase.

She shook that dark thought away, turning her attention to the task at hand. Barmine’s punishment for her refusal to bed with him was always work—little did the fool understand that his punishment was more like a reward to Jill! There had been another fight, the fourth in less than two weeks, at the Waylaid Traveler, the apparently appropriately named tavern in Tinson. What this “something more,” that Barmine had hinted at might be, Jill could not guess, though she suspected it to be nothing extraordinary. The woman shrugged; at least there was something to do now besides walking the wall.

She collected ten of Pireth Tulme’s Coastpoint Guards, using their hangovers as a tool for rejecting more of the others, then set out, double-timing the march down the dirt path. They arrived in dirty Tinson late that afternoon. The town square was empty and quiet—it was always quiet, Jill noted, for on the three previous occasions she had visited the place, she hadn’t seen a single child. The majority of Tinson’s residents slept the day through, preferring the revelry of the night.

A shout from the Waylaid Traveler caught Jill’s attention.

“We must prepare!” came a bellow, a tremendous voice, clear even out here at a distance and with a wall between the speaker and Jill. “Oh, evil, what a foothold you have found! What fools are we to sleep as darkness rises!”

The group of soldiers entered the tavern openly through the front door, doubling the number of patrons. The first thing Jill noticed was a huge, fat man standing atop a table, waving an empty mug, sometimes in a threatening manner to keep at bay the closer patrons, all obviously intent on knocking him from his perch. Jill ordered her troop to filter about, then went to see the man behind the serving bar.

“The mad friar,” the barkeep explained. “He was in all the night, then came back just a short while ago. Has no shortage of money, I can assure you! They say he bartered jewels with merchants on the road, and though he didn’t get a fair price—not even close—he left with pouches full of gold.”

Jill regarded the fat friar curiously. He wore the thick brown robes of the Abellican Church, though they were old and threadbare in many places and weathered, as if he had been out on the open road for a long, long time. His black beard was thick and bushy, and he was tall, half a foot above six feet, and had to weigh near to three hundred pounds. His shoulders were wide, his bones thick and solid, but Jill got the feeling that the extra weight, most of which was centered about his belly, was something fairly recent.

What struck Jill most about him was his almost feverish intensity, his brown eyes showing a luster, a life, beyond anything she had seen in many years.

“Piety, dignity, poverty!” he yelled, and then he snorted derisively. “Ho, ho, what!”

Jill recognized the litany—piety, dignity, poverty—the same one Abbot Dobrinion Calislas had uttered on the fateful day of her wedding.

“Hah!” the huge man bellowed. “What piety is there in whoring? What dignity in foolhardiness? And what poverty? Gold leaf and jewels—ah, the jewels!”

“His song is not for changing,” the barkeep said dryly. Then he yelled out to the guards, “Will you get him down?”

Jill wasn’t sure that they should move in so straightforward a manner against the friar. The man’s remark about whoring, in particular, had seemed to stir more than a few angry grumbles, and she feared that any overt action, a physical assault rather than trying to calm the man, would bring about a general row. She could do little to stop her soldiers, though, given the lax chain of command and the barkeep’s permission.

She started across the room to try and keep things calm, stopping, though, when she heard the barkeep add, too low for any others to hear, “And take care, for he has a bit of magic about him.”

“Damn,” Jill muttered, turning back to see two of her soldiers, one of them Gofflaw, reach up to grab the monk.

“Hah, preparedness training!” the fat man howled joyfully, and he grabbed Gofflaw by the wrist and hoisted the surprised man into the air. Before the soldier could begin to react, the powerful friar lifted him above his head, spun him twice, then tossed him across the room.

A third soldier drew sword and swiped out one of the table legs, bringing the friar tumbling down atop the poor second man who had been reaching for him. The monk hit the ground in a roll, showing surprising agility for one his size, and came right back to his feet, shouting at the top of his lungs and barreling over the next two closest people, one a soldier, one a townsman.

The fight was on in full.

The sheer power of the friar astounded Jill. The man ran every which way, bowling over all who would stand before him, laughing maniacally all the while, even when one of those dodging his charge landed a solid punch about his face or neck. “Prepare!” he roared over and over, and he cried something about a dactyl and then about a demon.

Jill watched him for a few moments, honestly intrigued. The man was obviously out of his mind, or at least he appeared so, but to Jill, who had spent a year and a half in the Coastpoint Guards, a cry for preparedness and virtue did not seem like such a bad thing.

A group of soldiers encircled the friar, one man quickly putting his sword in line and calling for the monk to yield. There came a sudden, sharp flash of blue, and all the soldiers were flying, their hair standing on end. The friar laughed wildly.

And he charged on. He rushed to one terrified woman and picked her up by the shoulders. “Do not lay down for them!” he cried earnestly, and Jill had the feeling that the man had some personal stake in his plea. “I beg of you, do not, for you are part of the encroachment, do you not see? You are part of the dactyl’s gain!”

A soldier jumped on the friar from behind, and he was forced to let go of the woman. He merely howled, though, and shrugged the man away, then charged on.

Jill cut in front of him; he recognized her as a woman and again slowed and softened his approach.

Jill dove at his legs, rolling and sweeping with her own legs, sending the burly friar tumbling headlong. Five men were atop him in an instant, grabbing and twisting. Somehow, the huge friar managed to get back up to his feet, but more soldiers and several of the townsfolk rushed in, finally subduing him. They ushered the man to the door and unceremoniously threw him out.

Jill noted that Gofflaw drew out his sword and moved to follow.

“Let him be!” she commanded.

Gofflaw growled at her, but under Jill’s unyielding glare, he replaced his sword in its sheath.

“And if ye show yerself again,” another of the soldiers yelled, “then know ye’ll feel the bite of a sword!”

“Hear you the words of truth!” the mad friar yelled back at him. “Know me for what I am, and not for the insulting names you give to me. I am the hound of ill omen, the messenger of disaster!”

“Ye’re a drunk,” roared the soldier.

The fat man sputtered something unintelligible and turned away, waving his hand dismissively. “You will learn,” he promised grimly. “You will learn.”

Jill turned to the barkeep, the man merely shaking his head. “He’s a dangerous one,” the man said.

Jill nodded, but she wasn’t sure she agreed. The fat friar had made no move to finish any of his attacks. He had tackled and punched, had thrown Gofflaw halfway across the room, but no one, not even the friar, had been badly injured. To frustrated Jill’s thinking, Gofflaw could use a throw or two across a room. She moved to the door to see the friar shuffling down the muddy lane, weeping and crying out for the “sins of men” and the woeful state of preparation.

He swung about, some score of yards from the tavern entrance, and launched into a diatribe on the coming dark days, about a world unprepared to face the forces of evil, about a darkness being fed by the internal rot of the land.

“The man’s crazy,” one of the soldiers remarked.

“The mad friar,” the barkeep replied.

Jill wasn’t so sure of that. Not at all.

CHAPTER 25

Brother Justice

Master Jojonah looked down from an inconspicuous balcony at the large chamber, bare of any furnishing but for a few practice riggings sitting against the far wall. In the center of the room stood the stocky young man, his face haggard from lack of sleep. He wore only a loincloth and stood defensively, shoulders hunched, arms crossed to cover his belly, and loins. Even his head was bare, for his superiors had shaved it. He uttered a chant repeatedly, using it to bolster his failing strength, and De’Unnero, the new master who had taken Siherton’s place, stalked about him, occasionally stinging him with a riding crop. Behind Quintall stood a tenth-year immaculate.

“You are weak and useless!” De’Unnero screamed, smacking Quintall across the shoulder blades. “And you were part of the conspiracy!”

Quintall’s mouth moved to form the word “no,” but no sound came forth, managing only a pitiful shake of his head.

“You were!” De’Unnero roared, and he whipped Quintall again.

Master Jojonah could hardly bear to watch. Quintall’s “training” had been going on for more than a month now, ever since Father Abbot Markwart, looking old and tired indeed, had seen a vision of Avelyn alive.

Avelyn! The very thought of the young brother sent shivers along Jojonah’s spine. Avelyn had killed Siherton—the body, or what remained of it, had been found only late that spring, almost a year to the day since the tragedy. And worse, if Markwart’s vision was true, Avelyn had survived and had run off with a substantial supply of the sacred stones.

Jojonah closed his eyes and remembered all the times Siherton had warned him about Avelyn’s almost inhuman dedication.

Avelyn would be trouble, Siherton had promised, and the master’s words had proven true. But why? Jojonah had to wonder. What had precipitated the trouble, a fault of Avelyn’s or the man’s lack of fault in an order grown perverse? Indeed, Brother Avelyn Desbris was trouble, a dark mirror that the masters of St.-Mere-Abelle could not bear to gaze into. Avelyn, by any measure that Jojonah could discern, was what a monk was supposed to be, the truest of the true, and yet his manner could not agree with the increasingly secular ways of the monastery. That the Order should be threatened by the piety of a young monk was something Master Jojonah could not come to terms with.

And yet, the master was too tired, too wrapped up in a sense of loss, both for Siherton and Avelyn—and for himself—to try to make some peace within the monastery. Markwart had become almost feverish in his desire to see Avelyn and, more particularly, the sacred stones, brought back, and the Father Abbot’s word was sacrosanct.

The crack of the crop brought Jojonah’s attention back to the scene at hand. He had never held any love for brutish Quintall, but still he pitied the man. The conditioning ranged from sleep deprivation to long periods of hunger. Quintall’s strength, both physical and mental, would be torn away piece by piece and then brought back under the guidance and control of the training masters. The man would be reduced to an instrument of destruction, Avelyn’s destruction. Quintall’s every thought would be focused on that singular purpose; Avelyn Desbris would become the source of all his ills, the most-hated threat to St.-Mere-Abelle.

Jojonah shuddered and walked away, trying hard not to picture the scene when Quintall finally caught up to Avelyn.

The cave seemed a gigantic caricature of a king’s throne room. A huge dais, three steps up, centered the back wall, sporting a single obsidian throne that two large men could sit in together without touching each other. Twin rows of massive columns, each carved into the likeness of a giant warrior, lined the room. Like the throne, they were formed of obsidian, with graceful but somehow discordant lines swirling about them like the fibers of interlocking muscles. The floor and walls were clear of the black rock, showing the normal dullish gray of Aida’s stone, and the single set of doors was made of bronze.

No torches burned within, the room’s light coming from either side of the great dais where a continual flow of lava issued from the back corner of the wall and descended through holes in the floor, diving down into the tunnels of Aida, then reaching out along the mountain’s black arms, engulfing more and more of the Barbacan.

Small indeed did Ubba Banrock and Ulg Tik’narn, powrie chieftains from the distant Julianthes, and Gothra, the goblin king, seem in that tremendous room. Even Maiyer Dek of the fomorian giants felt small and insignificant, eyeing the statue-columns as if they would come alive and surround him, dwarfing his sixteen-foot height. And Maiyer Dek, among the largest of his giant kind, was not accustomed to being dwarfed.

Still, even if all twenty of the columns, and a dozen more besides, surrounded the giant, it would not have been more imposing than the single creature reclining on the throne. All four of the dactyl’s guests felt that imposing weight keenly. They were each among the most powerful of their respective races, leaders of armies that numbered in the hundreds for the giant, in the thousands for each of the powries, and in the tens of thousands for the goblin. They were the darkness of Corona, the bringers of misery, and yet, they seemed pitiful, groveling things before the great dactyl, mere shadows of this infinitely darker being.

Goblins and giants often aligned, but both races traditionally hated the powries almost as much as they hated the humans.

Except on those occasions when the dactyl was awake. Except at those times when the darker forces bound them together in singular purpose. There could be no struggles for power among the mortal leaders of the various races when the dactyl sat on its obsidian throne.

“We are not four armies,” the dactyl roared at them suddenly, and Gothra nearly fell over from the sheer weight of the resonating voice. “Nor three, if the powries consider their respective forces to be allied. We are one army, one force, one purpose!” The demon leaped from its throne and tossed a small item, a fabric patch, gray in color and with the black image of the dactyl sewn in. “Go out and begin the work on these,” the demon ordered.

Maiyer Dek was first to inspect the patch. “My warriors are not stitch women,” the fomorian leader began, but as soon as the words left Maiyer Dek’s mouth, the dactyl leaped down to stand before the giant, and seemed to grow. A feral growl escaped the demon’s lips as its hand shot out, slapping the behemoth across the face with enough force to knock Maiyer Dek to the floor. Then the dactyl began a more insidious attack, a mental barrage of images of torture and agony, and Maiyer Dek, the proud and strong leader, the strongest mortal creature in all the Barbacan, whimpered pitifully and squirmed about on the floor, begging for mercy.

“Every soldier in my army shall wear such an emblem,” the dactyl decreed. “In my army! And you,” the beast said to Maiyer Dek, reaching down and easily lifting the massive giant to its feet. “Bring to me a score and four of your finest warriors to serve as my house guard.”

And so the meetings went, through the days. The demon dactyl had been awake for several years, watching, feeling every slaughter of humans in the Wilderlands, tasting the blood of every corpse into which a powrie dipped its infamous cap, hearing the screams of sailors and passengers as each scuttled ship went under the swells of the merciless Mirianic. The darkness had grown; the humans had become ever weaker. Now the creature saw the time to organize its forces fully, to begin its unified attacks.

Terranen Dinoniel was dust in the earth; the dactyl meant to win this time.

To the twenty-four giants Maiyer Dek brought in, the dactyl presented suits of armor, demon-forged in the twin lava flows of the throne room, full plated, thick and strong. And the dactyl made even finer protection for its four chieftains, great magical bracers, studded with spikes, that would protect the wearer from the blows of any weapon. Among the three evil races, none had earned any reputation of loyalty or honor, but now, with the bracers, the dactyl could hold faith that its four chosen generals would survive the not-unexpected treachery of their underlings.

And those ranks were considerable indeed. Outside the cave, on the tree-covered slopes of Aida, thousands of goblins, powries, and giants milled about their respective camps, glancing up the southern face to the gaping hole that marked the main entrance to the demon’s lair. All three camps were between the mountain’s newest “arms,” two black streaks of cooling lava, red-tipped as the stuff continued its slow roll from the bowels of the mountain, reaching out, southeast and southwest, as if they were extensions of the demon’s own reach. There was no sign of tree or brush within those black lines; all life had been snuffed out beneath the darkness, burned away by the fires, and covered by the cooling lava. Even those creatures closest to the center of the area between the arms felt the residual heat, and on that shimmering air was brought the tingles of promised power, the itchy anxiety to go out and kill.

All for the dactyl.

“What is your name?”

“Quintall.”

The man groaned as the whip struck him again, tearing a red line across his back.

“Your name?”

“Quintall!”

The whip cracked.

“You are not Quintall!” De’Unnero screamed in his face. “What is your name?”

“Quin—” He hadn’t even gotten the word out before the whip, handled expertly by the tenth-year immaculate, ripped all sounds from his body.

Up on the balcony, unseen by the victim and his pair of torturers, Master Jojonah sighed and shook his head. This man was tough, admirably so, and Jojonah feared he would die from the beatings before he would relinquish his identity.

“Fear not,” came a voice behind him, that of Father Abbot Markwart, “The treatises do not lie. The technique is proven.”

Jojonah didn’t really doubt that—he just wondered why in the name of God such a technique had ever been developed!

“Desperation breeds dark work,” the Father Abbot remarked, coming to Jojonah’s side just as the whip cracked again. “I find this as distasteful as do you, but what are we to do? Master Siherton’s body confirms our fears. We know the tricks Avelyn used to escape, and his cache of magic stones is considerable. Are we to allow him to run free to the detriment, perhaps even the downfall, of our Order?”

“Of course not, Father Abbot,” Master Jojonah replied.

“No living monk in St.-Mere-Abelle knows Avelyn Desbris better than Quintall,” Father Abbot Markwart continued. “He is the perfect choice.”

As executioner, Jojonah thought.

“As the retriever of what is rightfully ours,” the Father Abbot said, reading Jojonah’s thoughts so clearly that the master turned to regard him closely, Jojonah honestly wondering if Markwart was using some magic to peek into his mind.

“Quintall will serve as an extension of the church, an instrument of our justice,” Father Abbot Markwart said grimly, more determination in his normally quivering old voice than Jojonah had ever heard before. The master understood the man’s desperation, despite the fact that Avelyn’s crimes and subsequent desertion were not without precedent. Nor did the stolen stones present any real danger to the Abellican Order; Jojonah knew that twice the number Avelyn had taken were sold at fairly regular auctions, that the powers of those stones possessed by merchants and noblemen far outweighed the cache Avelyn held. The only concern any in St.-Mere-Abelle’s hierarchy held about the stolen stones was for the giant amethyst crystal, and that only because it was a stone whose magic they had not yet deciphered. So foolish Avelyn wasn’t really any serious threat to the abbey or to the Order. But that wasn’t the point, wasn’t the source of the Father Abbot’s desperation. Markwart would be dead soon, taken by that greatest enemy: time. And he did not desire to leave behind any legacy of failure—including the existence of the renegade Avelyn.

“We will put him on Avelyn’s trail very soon,” the Father Abbot remarked.

“Unless he continues to resist,” Master Jojonah dared to say.

Markwart issued a coughing laugh. “The techniques are proven: the lack of sleep, of food, the rewards and punishments exerted by the eager young masters. Quintall’s concepts of right and wrong, of duty and punishment, have been systematically replaced by the tenets given him at times of reward. He is a creature of singular purpose. Pity him, but pity Avelyn Desbris even more.” With that, Markwart walked away.

Jojonah watched him go, shuddering at the sheer coldness of the man’s aura. His attention was caught by yet another crack of the whip.

“What is your name?” De’Unnero demanded.

“Quin . . .”

The man hesitated; even from the balcony, Master Jojonah sensed they were near a breakthrough.

De’Unnero started to prompt the tortured man again, but he stopped, and Jojonah recognized that the young master had seen a change in Quintall’s demeanor, a strange light in the man’s eyes, perhaps. Jojonah leaned over the rail, listening to every inflection, every whisper.

“Brother Justice,” the battered man replied.

Master Jojonah settled back on his heels. He still wasn’t wholly convinced that he agreed with the technique—or the purpose—of Quintall’s training, but he had to admit that it seemed effective.

CHAPTER 26

Bradwarden

“Is it fear that inspires them? Is it jealousy? Or is it something more sublime, some inner voice telling them that they and I are not of similar ilk? They do not know, of course, of my days with the Touel’alfar, but certainly it is evident to them, as it is to me, that they and I do not share the same perspective.”

Elbryan slumped back in the chair, musing over his own words. He put the tips of his fingers together and shifted his hands in front of his face, allowing his gaze to drift from the mirror.

When he looked back, the specter of Uncle Mather remained, passively and patiently standing in the mirror’s depths.

“Belli’mar Juraviel warned me that it would be like this,” Elbryan went on. “And, in truth, it seems perfectly logical. The folk of the Wilderlands frontier necessarily huddle together. Their fear isolates them, and they often cannot distinguish friend from foe.

“So it is concerning me whenever I venture into the Howling Sheila. They do not understand me—my ways and my knowledge, and most of all, my duty—and thus they fear me. Yes, Uncle Mather, it must be fear, for what have I that the folk of Dundalis should envy? By their measures, I am poorer by far.”

The young man chuckled and ran his hand through his light brown hair. “Their measures,” he muttered again, and he couldn’t help but feel sorry for the folk of Dundalis, of Weedy Meadow and End-o’-the-World, huddled ever in their cabins. It was true enough that they enjoyed some amenities Elbryan did not: soft bedding, solid water basins, stored food. But the ranger had two things far more valuable, by his way of thinking, two things that he would not trade for all the treasures of all the kingdoms of Corona.

“Freedom and duty, Uncle Mather,” he said firmly. “I draw no lines of property, because those lines serve as barriers both ways. And, in the end, it is a sense of accomplishment, of purpose, and not the wealth attained by such accomplishment, that equates to fulfillment and happiness.

“And so I walk my watch. And so I accept the barbs and open chiding. I take faith in what I am doing, in my sense of purpose, for I, above all others, understand the consequence of failure.”

But I am alone, the young man thought privately, not yet ready to admit the truth aloud. He sat back again for a long moment, then braced his hands on the arms of his chair, preparing to leave.

He felt a soft and subtle vibration. Music?

He knew it was music, though it seemed too soft, too much in the background for him to actually hear it. Rather, Elbryan felt it in his bones, a gentle, delicate sound, sweet as an elvish harp, melodic as Lady Dasslerond’s voice.

He looked at the mirror, at the distant image, and sensed a calm there.

Elbryan went outside his cave immediately, expecting the music to be louder. It wasn’t; it hovered on the edge of his perceptions, whatever way he turned. But it was there. Something was there.

And Uncle Mather wanted him to find it.

He had planned to go to Weedy Meadow that day, then move on with the setting sun to the west, a circuit of End-o’-the-World. Now he could not go, for this subtle music, though Elbryan sensed it was not threatening, was surely intriguing. Had the elves come to visit? Then another thought nagged at the young man, a notion that he had heard this song before, though he could not place it.

The ranger spent the better part of the morning searching out the direction of the quiet notes. He used all his training, all his tools, focusing his senses one at a time in each direction, on every plant and every animal, seeking some hint of the source. Finally, he came upon a set of tracks.

A single large horse, he decided, unshod and walking at an easy pace. There were indeed wild horses in the area, some perhaps that had escaped the tragedy at Dundalis, others that had run off from caravans, and still others whose roots in the region were older than those of the human settlers. They were not numerous, and surely skittish, though Elbryan had entertained the notion of breaking one.

He soon came to believe that this would not be his chance, though, for as he followed the clear trail, he came to the conclusion that he was following, too, the source of the music. Thus, Elbryan believed, the horse was obviously ridden.

That thought didn’t slow the ranger; it only intrigued him even more. Someone had come into his domain, someone not of the villages, for if it was one of the villagers, then this horse would likely have been shod.

Elbryan skipped down one tree-covered hillside, into a narrow vale and to the edge of a rushing river. He crossed with some difficulty, but had no trouble regaining the trail on the other side, for the rider was making no effort to conceal his tracks. Elbryan closed steadily. Soon he could make out the actual notes—of a wind instrument, he noted, and he searched his memory once again, for he was certain that he had heard that peculiar, haunting sound before. He remembered, then, the instrument, piped by a merchant on the occasion of Elbryan’s tenth birthday, a curious thing, a leather bag and a series of pipes—a bagpipe, it was appropriately named.

The ranger moved swiftly and silently over a series of rolling hills. Then he stopped, suddenly, as the music stopped. Elbryan peered out around a tree. There, standing higher on the hill amidst a tangled grove of birch and low brush, stood a tall man, much taller than Elbryan, even considering the ranger’s deceivingly low perspective. He had black, bushy hair and a tight beard. He was naked, at least from the belly up, with a powerful upper body, muscles clearly defined, and an arched back. He held the pipes under one arm, down low, his song finished.

“Well, ranger, are ye liking the way I fill me chanter and drones?” he asked, a wide, white smile across his face.

Elbryan crouched lower, though he was obviously seen. He could hardly believe that this man had noted his approach or that this man knew his title!

“And it took ye long enough to find me,” the man bellowed. “Not that ye would have had I not piped for yer tracking!”

“And who are you?” the ranger called.

“Bradwarden the Piper,” the man answered proudly. “Bradwarden the Woodsman. Bradwarden the Pine Father. Bradwarden the Horse Tender. Bradwarden the . . .”

He stopped as Elbryan came out from behind the tree, the ranger rightly sensing that this introduction could go on for some time. “I am called Nightbird,” he said, though he figured that this man somehow already knew that.

The tall man nodded, smiling still. “Elbryan Wyndon,” he added, and Elbryan nodded, then stared dumbfoundedly when he considered the implications of that long-lost name. To everyone in Dundalis with the exception of Belster O’Comely, Elbryan was known only by the name the elves had given to him.

“Might be that the animals telled me,” Bradwarden remarked. “I’m smarter than I look, not to doubt, and older than ye’d guess. Might be the animals, might be the plants.” Bradwarden stopped and offered an exaggerated wink that Elbryan, still a fair distance down the hill, saw clearly. “Might be yer uncle.”

The ranger rocked back on his heels, unable to find even the words to ask the obvious questions. He was wary, though not afraid, and he continued up the hill, testing every step before he shifted his weight, as if he expected the place to be trapped.

“Ye should’ve killed the three,” the piper went on.

Elbryan shrugged, not understanding.

“Paulson and his cronies,” the tall man went on. “Nothing but trouble. I’d been thinking o’ killing them meself, when I seen an animal chewing off its leg in one o’ their wicked catchers.”

Elbryan started to respond that he had eliminated the cruel traps, but the words were stuck in his throat. As he came around the low brush, he noted the hind quarters of a horse, noted that the man was mounted. As he came around another step, he saw that that was not the case, that the man, and no mount, had been the source of the tracks.

For Elbryan, Nightbird, who had battled fomorian giants and goblins, who had lived with the elves, the sight of a centaur was not completely unsettling. It brought many questions, though, too many for poor Elbryan to begin to sort out. And it brought, too, a memory of a piping song while he and Pony had stood quiet on the slope outside of Dundalis, and he recalled, too, the stories of the Forest Ghost, half man and half horse, that he had enjoyed as a child.

“They be nothing but trouble,” Bradwarden remarked distastefully. “And I’ll kill them if one more scream of me animal friends reaches me ears!”

Elbryan didn’t doubt the claim for a minute. There was something too matter-of-fact about the centaur’s tone, something dispassionate, removed from humanity. A shudder coursed the ranger’s spine as he imagined what this powerful beast, easily eight hundred pounds and cunning enough to completely avoid the ranger for all these weeks, might do to Paulson, Cric, and Chipmunk.

“Well, Elbryan the Nightbird, have ye an instrument to join with me pipes?”

“How do you know of me?” the ranger demanded.

“Now if we’re both for asking questions, then we’re neither to be getting any answers,” Bradwarden scolded.

“Then you answer mine,” the ranger demanded.

“But I already did,” Bradwarden insisted. “Might be—”

“Might be that you are avoiding an answer,” Elbryan interrupted.

“Ah, me little human laddie,” Bradwarden said with that disarming smile, though it surely seemed condescending coming from so far on high, “ye’d not be wanting me to give up me secrets, now would ye? What fun would ye have then?”

Elbryan relaxed and let down his guard. One of his friends had told Bradwarden of him, he figured, one of the elves, most likely Juraviel. Either that, Elbryan decided, or the centaur had eavesdropped when the young man was at Oracle, for Bradwarden knew of Uncle Mather, and of the “little cave.” In any case, Elbryan felt in his heart that this was no enemy standing before him, and he thought it more than mere coincidence that this very day, for the first time since he had come to the region, he had hinted openly of his feelings of loneliness.

“I trampled me a deer this morning,” the centaur said suddenly. “Come along for a meal then; I’ll even let ye cook yer part!” With that, the centaur took up his pipes and started a rousing military march, thundering away on powerful legs. Elbryan ran full out, constantly seeking out shortcuts in the thick underbrush, just to keep pace.

They were not alike, very different in so many ways. True to his words, Bradwarden allowed Elbryan to start a fire and cook his venison, while the centaur ate his portion, nearly a quarter of the deer, raw.

“I do hate killing the damn things,” the centaur said, ending his sentence with a resounding belch. “So cute they be, and appealing to one of me body in more ways than ye’d know. But fruits and berries are naught but ticklings. I’m needing meat to fill me belly.” He rubbed a hand across his stomach, at the point where his human torso connected with the equine bottom half. “And I’ve considerable belly to fill!”

Elbryan shook his head and smiled—all the wider when Bradwarden belched again, a great, thunderous burp.

“You have been in the region all the while?” Elbryan asked. “And I never spotted you nor found any sign.”

“Don’t ye be too hard on yerself,” the centaur replied. “I been in the region longer than yer father’s father was alive. And what might ye spot? A hoofprint or me droppings? Ye’d think them both that of a horse, though if ye inspected the droppings a bit more, ye’d find that me diet’s not quite the same as me horsie friends.”

“And why would I look closer?” Elbryan asked, a sour expression on his face.

“Dirty business, that,” Bradwarden agreed.

The ranger nodded, forgiving himself for missing the signs.

“Besides,” Bradwarden went on, “I knew ye were coming, and ye didn’t know I was here. Unfair advantage, I’d call it, so don’t ye go chastising yerself.”

“How did ye—you know?”

“A little birdie telled me,” the centaur replied. “Sweet little thing that says her name twice in a row.”

Elbryan’s face crinkled at the cryptic statement, but he just shook his head, thinking that it really wasn’t that important. Even as he started to ask a question in a completely different direction, he remembered a certain friend who fit the description. “Tuntun,” he stated more than asked.

“Aye, that’s the one.” Bradwarden laughed. “She warned me not to expect too much from ye.”

“Indeed,” the ranger said dryly.

“So I telled her that I’d be watching over ye,” the centaur went on. “Though I’ve come to know that ye don’t need much watching.”

“Then you are elf-friend,” Elbryan said, hoping to find some common ground.

“Elf-acquaintance, I’d be calling it,” the centaur replied. “They’re a good sort for the wine, and they respect the animals and the trees, but they’re too much for giggling and too long on manners!” To accentuate his point, he let fly the loudest belch Elbryan had ever heard. “Never heared an elf’s belly-thunder!”

Bradwarden laughed riotously, then hoisted a huge skin and poured an amber-colored liquid—Elbryan recognized it as boggle—into his mouth, a considerable amount splashing over his bearded face.

“Ye should’ve killed them,” the centaur said suddenly, spraying more than a little wine with each word.

Elbryan, thinking Bradwarden to be referring to the elves, crinkled his brow incredulously.

“The three men, I mean,” the centaur clarified. “Paulson, Cric, and . . . what’s the third, then? Weasel?”

“Chipmunk.”

The centaur snorted. “Idiot,” he muttered. “Ye should’ve killed them, all three. No respect, I say, and nothing but trouble.”

“Then why has Bradwarden tolerated them?” Elbryan asked. “They have been in the area for some time, I would guess, considering their lodgings, and obviously you knew of them.”

The centaur nodded at the simple logic. “I been thinking of it,” he admitted. “But they didn’t give me an excuse. And,” he paused and offered a sly wink, “don’t ye fear, for I’m not overly fond o’ human flesh.”

“You have tasted it then?” Elbryan reasoned, not taking the bait.

Bradwarden belched again, and then he launched into a long speech about the ills of humankind. Elbryan merely smiled and let the centaur ramble on and on, considering the creature’s words carefully so that he could discover many hints about Bradwarden. Elbryan suspected, and would come to confirm over the next few weeks, that he and the centaur were not so different in purpose.

He was a ranger, a guardian of the frontier humans and also of the forest and its creatures. Bradwarden’s mission, it seemed, was not so different, except that the centaur was more concerned with the animals, particularly the wild horses; he even hinted that he had given many of the wild horses their freedom, since their human masters treated them badly. He hardly cared for the humans. He had seen the raid on Dundalis years before, he confirmed for Elbryan, though the worst he would admit of the tragedy was that it was “a pity.”

Theirs became a tentative friendship, an offered smile and exchange of news whenever the pair happened to be in the same area. For Elbryan, knowing Bradwarden was a wonderful thing indeed. He found that when he next ventured to Oracle, his previous feelings of loneliness did not follow him into the cave.

CHAPTER 27

The Fat Prophet’s Warning

News that she would soon be transferred to Pireth Vanguard, far to the north, did little to change Jill’s sullen mood. By all reports, the weather was better on the northern side of the Gulf of Corona, more alive, with brisk winds and a greater change of the season. In Pireth Tulme, even the winter was one long gray sheet of clouds and cold rain, differing from the summer only in terms of temperature.

But Jill had settled into a routine here, akin to the continually gloomy season. Each day seemed as the last, an existence of perpetual watch and work. Seconds, minutes, and hours seemed to drag on endlessly, and yet, at the same time, once the weeks had passed, it seemed as if they had flown away.

The incident at the Waylaid Traveler had brought some measure of excitement, some break in the routine. Jill had taken the image of the mad friar back with her, could hear his words still, and found in them a kinship to that which lay in her own heart. There was no sense of duty or honor in Pireth Tulme, none in the Kingsmen or the Coastpoint Guards, none in all of Honce-the-Bear, she feared, or in all of wide Corona. And now this man, for speaking the truth with a level of enthusiasm that exceeded even the orgies in Pireth Tulme, this man, who would not be surprised by the tragedy that had touched young Jill’s life, who would have expected it and called for preparation against it, this man, this holy prophet, was tagged “mad.”

Jill sighed deeply every time she considered the man who had called himself the hound of ill omen. His words rang so true in her ears, echoing in the quiet lulls between the groans and shrieks that endlessly emanated from the rooms behind her. The mad friar foresaw disaster; Jill only wished that he had sung out his tune in a small frontier village several years ago.

Would the people of that village have heeded his warnings? Probably no more so than the soldiers of Pireth Tulme, their party resuming from the moment they returned from Tinson.

But despite her feelings, Jill kept her vigilant watch, day after day, often long into the night. And she kept her honor and virtue, refusing to give in to the temptations of the celebration, refusing to surrender to the hopelessness—and that precisely was the way Jill viewed the hedonism around her, The soldiers of Pireth Tulme engaged in the revelry, the pleasures of the flesh, to avoid noticing their empty souls. They had sacrificed their hearts, so to speak, for their loins.

So be it. Jill stoically suffered the barbs of her comrades, particularly from Warder Miklos Barmine, who seemed to covet her all the more since she would not give in.

Perhaps Pireth Vanguard would be better, she sometimes dared to hope; but inevitably, her wishes fell back on the dark reality that was life in Honce-the-Bear in God’s Year 824.

It was a gray morning—no surprise there—with Jill on the wall, seated between crenelations, her legs dangling over the two-hundred-foot drop, her gaze on the dreamy mist that hung over Horseshoe Bay. Pireth Tulme was especially quiet after a night of tremendous drinking, a night which Jill had spent on the tower roof, quietly tucked under the beam of the fortress’ lone catapult, her blanket tight about her.

She kept her senses tuned totally to the present, thinking of nothing but the rocky pillars standing like quiet sentinels in the foggy bay, the continual lap of the ebb tide waves against the rocks so far below, the occasional bleat of a sheep in the sloping field on the other side of the fortress.

And of the square sail that was drifting her way through the gray mist.

She scrambled to her feet and leaned out over the battlement, peering hard out to sea. It was indeed a sail, moving toward Pireth Tulme and neither in nor out of the Gulf of Corona. Jill’s first instinct was to find some way to warn the obviously wayward craft. The fortress did have a signal barrel, a cask of volatile ingredients—though it hadn’t been used in so many years that Jill feared it wouldn’t even burn brightly—that was designed for signaling the larger fortress of Kingsmen some dozen miles inland, close beside the catapult. Jill realized that she wouldn’t likely rouse enough help to get the barrel up in the air in time, and so she began waving her arms and calling out loudly, warning the ship’s crew of the rocks and the impending disaster.

How Jill’s mouth dropped open in shock when the vessel responded with the swish of its own catapult, a huge rock smashing against the cliff face some thirty feet or so below her!

It was exactly the situation for which the young soldier had trained all these years, just as Jill had imagined it might happen. And yet, for some reason, it seemed all too unreal for Jill. She stood there another long moment, perfectly stunned.

She noted then that the vessel was not alone, but was moving in accord with other craft, low to the water. One—at least one—had already gone by Pireth Tulme, making for the beach of Horseshoe Bay, and two flanked the sailing ship on the right, a third on its left.

A second ball soared in, this one soaring high over the fortress wall, and over the back wall as well, bouncing down the green field.

Jill cried out at the top of her lungs, then again a moment later, the ships moving ever closer, when she heard no response. She could see the activity on the deck of the sailing ship now, small forms darting this way and that, tacking hard to put the large caravel in between the bay’s many sentry stones. She noted their red berets.

“Powries,” she muttered under her breath. She had no time to wonder where they could have stolen or captured the ship; she cried out again, then turned to view the tower door.

There should have been a second sentry there, the relaying voice to the soldiers within. Jill shook her head, her short shock of blond hair bouncing about. Frustration boiled in the young woman, mingling with desperation. Another shot came thundering in, this one scoring a hit on Pireth Tulme’s front wall, taking down some stones.

Jill ran along the wall, angling for the door. She noted the bay as she went, saw that the low craft was nearing the beach and that another was already there, its hatch open and dozens of red-capped dwarves pouring onto the shell-strewn sand!

Yet another shot came in as Jill grabbed the heavy door’s latch and pulled it wide, this missile not of stone, nor pitch, but a jumble of dozens of wide-flying grapnels.

“Oh, damn,” she sputtered, seeing many of the hooks gaining a firm hold on the walls. She screamed into the tower then, calling for all hands to the walls, warning of powries in the bay.

Then she ran, drawing her sword, cursing at every step. They had been caught unaware; she noted no allies had yet exited the tower even as she got back to the front wall. Likely, half the soldiers either didn’t believe that call or were simply too drunk to heed it, and the other half probably couldn’t even find their damned weapons!

The ropes were tight from the ship to the wall, with lines of dwarves on each, moving steadily with surprising strength, hanging under, hands and ankles locked about the cord. Jill first tried to dislodge the grapnel, but found that it was too tightly secured, with too much weight on the heavy line. Then she went at the line ferociously, hacking and chopping, chipping her sword from one ill-aimed blow, the blade ringing off the stone wall: The ropes were thick and strong, and Jill knew then that she could not cut them all down, could not cut more than one or two down before the evil powries began gaining the wall.

“Hurry!” she cried, glancing back to the open tower door.

Finally, Miklos Barmine wandered out, rubbing his eyes, blinking repeatedly as if the light, though the day was dim, stung him profoundly. He started to call out to Jill, to ask her what all the shouting was about, but he stopped, as he noted the woman at work on the heavy rope.

Another man came up behind the warder. “To the walls! To the walls!” Barmine cried desperately, and the man disappeared again into the blackness of the tower, crying out for his comrades.

A final hack from Jill sent the rope flying free, half a dozen powries splashing down hard into the cold waters. Jill ran to the next line but moved right past it, seeing that a dwarf was nearly to the wall some distance down. She got to the spot first, slashing the powrie hard as it tried to scramble to the stone. The creature grabbed on stubbornly, but Jill hit it again, right across the face, and it fell away, shrieking, to its doom.

Jill went to work on the rope. Soldiers were coming from the tower by this point, but powries were coming over the front wall. Jill wasn’t halfway through the heavy cord when she had to stop and run to fight another of the dwarves as it pulled itself onto the parapet. The creature drew a small sword but too late to parry the woman’s first savage attack, Jill’s sword slashing across the dwarf’s eyes, blinding it. The dwarf countered viciously, but Jill had already stepped beside it, then behind it, and when the powrie finished its wild swinging, coming back to full defensive posture, Jill locked one arm over its shoulder, her other under its crotch, and lifted and twisted, sending it plummeting from the wall. She didn’t even have time to slice once at that particular rope, though, for another dwarf was already running her way, hooting and howling, whipping a cudgel about in the air before it.

Charging soldiers met the red-capped dwarves all along the wall, battling fiercely. Jill saw a pair of dwarves go flying over, saw a man slump to his knees, hands clutching a mortal chest wound.

Then she was fighting again, hopping back from the swing of that nasty cudgel—she saw more than a few spikes protruding from its wide end. On she came with a snarl, stabbing straight ahead with her sword, then, when that attack was neatly deflected, kicking her foot out beneath the sweep of the cudgel, connecting solidly with the dwarf’s belly.

The powrie didn’t even flinch, came right back to the offensive with one, two, and then a third swiping attack.

Jill was backing steadily, but realized that she would soon run out of room, for she sensed that another powrie was fast coming in at her back. She started ahead a step, then turned about abruptly, dropping to one knee and lunging ahead, her free hand catching the second dwarf’s swinging sword arm, her own sword driving deep into its chest.

Jill came up in a short run, bowling the wounded powrie away, then she pivoted again and came in hard, moving too close for the cudgel to score a solid hit and accepting the weakened blow in exchange for her own attack, a stab into the dwarf’s throat.

Breathing hard, the woman surveyed the scene.

They could not win. The Coastpoint Guards of Pireth Tulme were fighting well, but they were badly outnumbered and they had lost their one advantage: the walls. If they had been prepared, if they had been alert, then most of the powrie lines would have been cut before the dwarves ever gained the wall. If the soldiers had drilled for such an attack, then their defenses would have been coordinated, then the signal barrel would already be in the air, spinning high and far for reinforcements. Jill did see that a detachment of six soldiers was at the catapult, three working the levers, three desperately trying to hold a handful of powries at bay. She should get to them, she realized, but she understood, too, that there was no chance of that. Fighting was general all along the wall, more and more powries pouring in, and another group, those from the two barrelboats that had gone into Horseshoe Bay, screaming wildly and charging up the sloping field behind the fortress.

Pireth Tulme was lost.

Jill saw Warder Miklos Barmine shouting commands from the wall near the tower, powries swarming all about him. He took a vicious hit, then another, but responded with a slash of his own, knocking one powrie from the wall. One of Jill’s female comrades came to the tower door then, but she was swept away by a host of bloody caps as they charged in.

Barmine continued to scream, though his words soon became but grunts and howls of agony. He was bloodied in a dozen place and took hit after hit, though he stubbornly continued to swing that sword.

Then Jill lost sight of him, finding herself facing another dwarf. This one came in hard and, thinking that it had the woman by surprise, launched a wild sidelong swing. Jill dodged easily, then kicked out behind the flying weapon, just nicking the powrie on the back but solidly enough so the overbalanced dwarf fell from the parapet eight feet to the ground below.

Another was quick to take its place, snapping off a series of thrusts with its short sword. Jill managed to glance back toward the tower, saw the host of powries flooding in, saw Barmine kneeling, his face, his arms, all his body covered in blood.

Spurred by the gruesome sight, she attacked fiercely. Up went her sword, cutting across left to right, then back again, then another strong backhand, each swing sounding with the ring of metal on metal. She shifted her right foot forward with the last stroke, then turned her blade and came straight ahead, driving the powrie back. But another dwarf was behind it to bolster the defense, and another behind that. Jill heard the dying scream of a soldier to her rear and fully expected that she would soon be overwhelmed.

She started forward, then leaped atop the wall, hopping from high point to high point, once over the surprised powrie’s stabbing sword. She outdistanced all three with a few long strides, moving to the far corner of the front wall.

There was yet another rope secured at that point, the last dwarf on it barely five feet from the wall.

Jill glanced back at the carnage. Many powries were down, but more remained, and each of the still-standing soldiers was surrounded, battling desperately. Barmine was kneeling but offering no resistance, a powrie wiping its beret across his face.

Jill winced as the dwarf lifted its cap up high and in the same motion, slammed its spiked cudgel into the dying warder’s face.

She had seen enough.

She could have taken out the dwarf on the rope, but doing so would have allowed the three pursuing her to catch her. Jill sheathed her sword instead, pulled her belt off, and leaped out from the wall, beyond the climbing dwarf. She caught the rope with one hand, barely, and hung on with all her strength, two hundred feet of empty air below her.

The powrie immediately reversed direction, deftly turning about on the rope with sure, strong grips. Its three companions, with typical powrie loyalty, went to work at once on the grapnel and rope, caring not at all if they dropped a comrade along with the dangerous woman.

Jill had no time for a fight. She kicked out to the side, trying to keep the dwarf at bay, but her main focus was on getting her belt, held fast in her other hand, up over the rope. She looped it up on one try, but lost her grip on the rope and started to tumble.

Her free hand somehow caught hold of the other end of the belt. She was holding both ends now, hanging lower, and then she was sliding away from her enemy, sliding fast into the mist, toward the ship, which was holding steady more than a hundred feet from shore.

The other end of the rope was fixed to the yard of the mainmast. There were many powries on that deck, though none had, as yet, spotted her. She figured she’d let go as she came over the prow, in the hope that she would land on deck clear enough for her to roll a few times to absorb the impact. If she could get across the deck to the stern catapult or more particularly, to the cauldrons of pitch and the firepit near the catapult, then she might be able to cause more than a little havoc.

Her plan was moot, as it turned out, for as Jill approached the front of the craft, the rope gave way, and suddenly her descent was much sharper than her forward momentum. She let out a scream, thinking that she would slam headlong into the ship’s prow.

Luck was with her and she hit the cold sea short of the ship. She came up sputtering, her mouth full of water, her ears still filled with the sound of dying men ringing down from the fortress walls. Anger welled within her, directed at both the powries and her own comrades. Had they been prepared, this disaster would not have befallen them. Had they heeded their own code of conduct, the powries would have been repulsed.

She had lost her sword in the fall, but Jill didn’t care. Feral growls escaped her lips as she started to swim around the vessel, moving all the faster for fear that her limbs would soon be too numb to propel her. She got around to the stern and found the anchor line, a heavy rope down from the port side. Her arms aching from cold and weariness, she grabbed hold and pulled herself up the ten feet to the rail. She peeked over even as the catapult fired again, a ball of flaming pitch soaring up over Pireth Tulme’s wall. Jill noted that the missile was far more likely to burn a host of powries than any human, but the dwarves hardly seemed to care, howling with glee as they loaded the next ball.

Three of them had the ball, cradled in a heavy blanket, up above their heads near the basket when Jill hit them with a flying body block. They fell away toward the taffrail, but could not let go of their load. Over the rail the pitch ball went, taking the three powries with it.

A fourth was on Jill in a moment, grabbing for her throat She couldn’t believe the weight of the diminutive thing! Nor the strength! In an instant, the powrie had her on her back and was choking her hard.

She tried desperately to break its grip, locked her fingers about its thumbs and turned them outward.

She might as well have been pulling against iron shackles.

Jill changed tactics and began slugging the dwarf in the face instead, then poking for its eyes. It held on tight and even tried to bite her fingers.

Soon Jill’s hands were flapping inconsequentially at the powrie’s barrel-like torso, her strength fast deserting her. She would die as Pireth Tulme died, she realized, again silently cursing the unpreparedness, the slovenly men and women to whom she had been forced to entrust her life. She would die, not of any fault of her own, but because the Coastpoint Guards had grown weak.

Her hands flailed wildly; darkness crept into the edges of her vision. One hand banged against the powrie’s solid waist, against a metal ball above the dwarf’s belt.

The hilt of a dagger.

Jill had struck the dwarf four times before it realized that it was being stabbed. With a howl, it finally let go, scrambling about to evade the jabbing dagger.

Jill wounded it again, between its flailing arms and right in its chest, and then again, higher, in its throat. The dwarf rolled away, but Jill could hardly move to follow. She lay there for what seemed like minutes, then finally found the strength to come up to her elbows.

The powrie was near the rail, facedown.

Jill took in another blessed gulp of air and staggered to her feet. She turned to the catapult, its arm low and ready to fire, then looked at the vats of burning pitch, wondering what mischief she might cause.

The powrie slammed her hard from behind, driving her into the bent beam. Jill came about, dagger slashing, cutting a line across the dwarf’s face, just inches above the garish cut she had put in its throat. The dwarf fell back a couple of steps, but came on again.

Jill dropped to her knees and lowered her shoulder, accepting the impact. She curled her legs under her and lifted the dwarf high, stepping fast and shoving with all her strength, putting the creature into the catapult basket. Jill rolled away immediately, falling to the side, grabbing at the release pin and pulling hard.

The powrie was almost out of the basket when the catapult fired, launching the dwarf in a wild, spinning flight straight up, arms and legs out wide.

Many other dwarves heard the scream, took note of the curious missile, and turned to the stern deck; Jill was out of time. She kicked over the pitch barrels, spilling one onto the capstan that held the anchor line and knocking another down the stairs to the lower main deck. Then she turned to the taffrail, thinking her only escape to be the cold water.

Again sheer luck saved her, for she found a boat hanging from the stern. She had it falling free in an instant, then, with powries scrambling up to the stern deck, with fires growing all about her on the capstan and on the catapult, she leaped out as far as she could, taking care to avoid the burning pitch that was floating in the water and the three dwarves; bobbing low, barely keeping their heads above the waves. They made for the boat as did Jill, the woman overtaking one and easily dispatching it with her borrowed dagger.

Powries weren’t so tough in the water, she noted as she closed on the second. She swam right by that one, realizing if she delayed, the third would get to the boat before her. She caught that last floundering dwarf, stabbing it hard on the shoulder, then swimming right by it, grabbed desperately for the small craft.

A crossbow quarrel skimmed the water right beside her head.

Jill worked to get behind the boat, to use it as a barrier against the powrie archers on the deck. She knew that the angle was all wrong, though, that they were too high above her, the boat too close, and that they would get fairly clear shots no matter where she moved

And she knew from the profound numbness that was creeping into her limbs that she had to get out of the water, and quickly.

The groan of wood alerted her to the powries’ newest problem. She dared to peer over the small boat’s rail, and saw that the ship’s anchor line had burned through, and the ship, caught on a swell, had swung hard about. Suddenly, the archers had more on their minds than the woman in the water.

Jill started to climb into the boat, but had to stop and turn to strike again at the struggling powrie. Finally she was in the boat, setting the oars, then pulling away with all her strength, the third powrie frantically trying to catch up.

It got near enough for Jill to slam it on the head with one of the oars.

CHAPTER 28

Siblings

She dragged herself onto the beach, battered, cold, and angry. She looked back at the small boat, even then being dashed against the rocks, tossed about by the powerful surf. She had drifted all through the rest of that fateful day, all through the night and the better part of the next morning as well. She had meant to go right from the battle to the nearest spot she could find to land the boat, to then run off and find some help, and lead the charge back to Pireth Tulme. The powrie ship was barely out of sight when her wounds overtook her, pains and aches she didn’t even realize she had suffered. The heat of battle had left her body and unconsciousness had descended over her like some great hunting bird, wings out wide to block the light of day.

She had awakened that night, drifting somewhere in the gulf, praying that the currents had not pushed her out into the open Mirianic. Luck was with her, though, for the coastline remained in sight, towering black mountains marking the southern horizon. It had taken Jill hours to manage to row the craft near shore and then to find some place where she could put in. She had settled for a narrow inlet, but as soon as she entered, she found that many sharp rocks were in the water, lurking right below the surface. Jill worked the small boat hard, but understood the futility. So she shed her red Coastpoint jacket and her heavy boots and went over the side, fighting the undertow every inch of the way through the icy water.

The rocks took her boat.

She didn’t recognize any landmarks but figured she must be somewhere west of Pireth Tulme on the north coast of the Mantis Arm. Her suspicions were confirmed when she moved inland, found a road, and then, an hour of walking later, a signpost pointing the way, three miles hence, to Macomber.

Jill found herself circumventing the town and approaching it from the west, not from the east the way any stragglers fleeing Pireth Tulme would. She tried to straighten her still-damp clothes, but realized that she would be conspicuous indeed to any, walking as she was without boots, and without the dirtied, calloused feet of a peasant woman. And though she was not wearing the telltale red jacket, a woman dressed in a simple white shirt, tan pants, and bare feet was not a common sight. Jill wished that she had a cloak, at least, to gather closely about her.

She got more than a few curious looks from the townsfolk as she passed the fairly sizable settlement of more than three score buildings, some two stories high. Some folk pointed, all whispered, more than a few turned their shoulders and scurried away, and it seemed to the young woman that they were on edge. Perhaps word of the disaster had preceded her.

These suspicions were bolstered by the snatches of conversation Jill caught, words of a contingent of Kingsmen riding hard to the east. She nodded to herself; she should go out and join the force, should go to Pireth Tulme to avenge—

The thought hit Jill like a cold slap. To avenge what? Her comrades? The letch Miklos Barmine? Gofflaw, whom she’d imagined killing several times herself?

She found a tavern, its sign too worn for her even to make out the name, though the image of a foaming mug was clear enough. Before she entered, a familiar voice, raised in dire warning, assaulted her.

“What demons do we invite into our midst?” the man inside cried, and Jill knew before she saw him that he was surely standing atop a table, one finger pointed high into the air.

She went in expecting a brewing row, but found instead that the mad friar, this time, had a fairly attentive audience.

And a large one; there had to be forty people inside, filling the tavern from wall to wall. Jill sifted through the crowd to get to the bar, started to order a mug of ale, but then realized she had no money. She turned instead, put her elbows on the bar, and watched the monk and, more particularly, the reactions of his audience.

She heard whispers of a fight, of goblins, some said, though others more accurately named the enemy powries. Estimates of the enemy force ranged from a thousand warriors to a thousand ships full of warriors.

Jill wanted to tell them that it was but one captured sailing vessel and no more than five barrelboats, but she kept quiet, fearing to reveal too much of herself and also thinking it would do these folk good to be afraid.

The mad friar apparently shared her feelings, for his speech became more dire, more frantic, as if he envisioned an army of monsters marching down the road, right to the border of Macomber.

The fever reached a critical point, and then, all of a sudden, it broke. The barkeep came around the bar with a heavy club, moving pointedly for the fat monk. “Enough from you,” he warned, waving his weapon. “Whatever happened is the business of the Kingsmen, and not for the folk of Macomber!”

“All the world must prepare!” the fat man retorted, throwing his arms out wide, inviting the people to join.

But it was too late; he had pushed past the fear and into the realm of anger, and when the barkeep called for assistance, the man found no shortage of volunteers.

The mad friar put up a terrific fight, tossing men about, howling about his “preparedness training!” In the end, though, predictably, the monk was sailing out the door to land unceremoniously in the street.

Jill was beside him at once, on one knee as he sorted himself out. He reached into a pocket of his robe and produced a small flask, popping the top and sucking a huge swig. He did well to stifle his belch and looked at Jill as if embarrassed.

“Potion of courage,” he explained dryly. “Ho, ho, what!”

Jill regarded him sourly, then rose and offered an arm. “You are consistent,” she chided.

The friar looked at her more closely. He knew he had seen her before, but he could not place her. “Have we met?” he asked finally.

“Once,” Jill said, “in a place not so far away.”

“I would not forget so pretty a face,” the friar insisted.

Jill was too bedraggled to blush or even to care. “Perhaps if I were still wearing my red jacket,” she said, though she could hardly believe she had just admitted her position to this man.

He paused for a long moment, then his face brightened in recognition—and then it darkened immediately as he realized the implications. “Y-your home,” he stuttered, as if not knowing which direction to go. “Pireth Tulme.”

“Never would I call Pireth Tulme my home,” Jill retorted. The mad friar started to speak again, but she stopped him with an upraised hand. “I was there,” she said grimly. “I saw.”

“The rumors?”

“Powries,” she confirmed. “Pireth Tulme is no more.”

The friar held out his flask, but Jill refused. He nodded and put it back under the folds of his weathered robes, his expression more serious. “Come with me,” he bade her. “I have an ear for what you might need to say.”

Jill considered the offer for a long moment, then moved away with the man to a room he had rented in a small inn on the outskirts of Macomber. He expected her to speak of desertion, but of course, her tale, spoken simply and truthfully, was far different. She saw respect mounting in the man’s brown eyes and knew that he was a friend, knew that he would not turn her in to the military authorities, that he held as little respect for them as did she.

When she finished, when she explained that she was glad again to hear his voice and could now appreciate his dire warnings, the friar smiled comfortingly and put his hand over hers.

“I am Brother Avelyn Desbris, formerly of St.-Mere-Abelle,” he confided, and Jill understood she was probably the first person he had told his true name in a long, long time. “It would seem that we are both dispossessed.”

“Disappointed would be a better word,” Jill replied.

A dark cloud passed over Avelyn’s face. He nodded. “Disappointed indeed,” he said softly.

“I have told you my tale,” Jill prompted.

It came out in a burst of emotion Avelyn had not known since that night he had cried for his dead mother. He told Jill much—more than he would have ever believed he could confide—holding back only the specifics of the Ring Stones, the secret island, the method and fatal result of his escape, and the fact that he carried with him a stolen cache of powerful magic. Those things did not seem paramount to Avelyn, anyway, not when weighed against the tragedy of the Windrunner, the loss of his dear Dansally Comerwick.

“She told you her name,” Jill put in quietly, and Avelyn’s brown eyes misted at the realization that this woman could understand the significance of that.

“But you have not,” Avelyn said to her.

“Jill,” she answered after a short hesitation.

“Jill?”

“Just Jill,” she assured him.

“Well, Just Jill,” Brother Avelyn said with a widening smile, “it would seem we are two lost lambs.”

“Yes, mad brother Avelyn Desbris,” she replied in the same singsong voice, “two lost lambs in a forest of wolves.”

“Pity the wolves, then!” Avelyn cried, “Ho, ho, what!”

They shared laughter, a relief of tension both of them so desperately needed—Jill for her recent trials and Avelyn because he had spoken openly at last of his dark past, had relit the candles about those desperate images and feelings that had driven him out on the road.

“Piety, dignity, poverty,” the monk said distastefully when he had caught his breath.

“The credo of the Abellican Church,” Jill replied.

“The lie,” Avelyn retorted. “I saw little piety beyond simple rituals, found little dignity in murder, and poverty is not a thing the masters of St.-Mere-Abelle tolerate.” He gave a snort, but Jill knew she had him beaten on this point.

“Ever vigilant, ever watchful,” she recited dryly, and Avelyn recognized her words as the motto of the Coastpoint Guards. “Tell that to the powries!”

They laughed again, all the louder, using the very sound of mirth as a shield against tears.

Jill spent the night in Avelyn’s room; the monk, of course, acting the part of a perfect gentlemen. He considered the tale he had told her, his life’s story, and then looked to regard himself, the extra hundred pounds, the battered appearance.

“Ah, Jill,” he lamented. “You should have seen me in my idealistic youth. What a different man I was then, before I saw the terrible truth of the world.”

His thoughts hung on those words for a long, long while, and then it struck him that if he were to truly call this woman his friend, he would have to search hard for a part of himself that he had thought long lost. To be a friend to Jill, to be a proper companion to anyone, would mean recovering some of that idealism, some of that belief that the world was not so dark and terrible and that, with effort, it might get even better.

“Yes,” the monk whispered over the sleeping woman, “we’ll find our way together.”

The next morning, they purchased some supplies, including a short sword, boots, and a warm cloak for Jill, and then they walked out of Macomber together, down the road to the west, ignoring the stares and whispers, feeling somehow as if they shared a secret and a wisdom the rest of the world, fools all, could never comprehend.

That bond alone held Jill together with Brother Avelyn over the first weeks of their journey; they were siblings, Avelyn insisted, two alone against the encroaching darkness. Jill accepted a large part of that argument, but hardly considered herself brother to the mad friar. The man drank almost constantly, and whatever town they entered, Avelyn found some way to get into a fight, often brutal. So it was in the town of Dusberry along the Masur Delaval halfway between Amvoy and Ursal. Avelyn was in the tavern, as usual, standing atop a table, spouting warnings and curses. Jill came in just as the fight broke out, two dozen men swinging at the closest body, not bothering to ask if it was enemy or ally. In these general rows, as opposed to the occasions when all in the bar teamed up against the monk, Avelyn more than held his ground. The huge bear of a man tossed his attackers with ease, punched and twisted deftly, hollering “Ho, ho, what!” every time he felled another.

Jill came in hard and fast, simply to defend herself as she made her way to her comrade. She, too, could handle the drunken townsfolk without much effort, turning easily as one man lunged for her, walking right past his lumbering reach, then kicking back hard on his instep, sending him down to the floor.

“Must you always?” she asked when she at last reached Avelyn’s side.

The monk replied with a wide grin. Then he quickly brushed Jill aside with his right hand, straightening the man who was charging in at her back with a stiff left jab, then knocking him flying with a heavy right cross.

“Ho, ho, what!” Avelyn boomed. “The town will be the better for it!”

He started away, but Jill kicked him hard in the rump. He turned to her, wounded emotionally at least, but she would not back down, pointing resolutely at the door.

It wasn’t until they had exited the tavern, the fight raging still, that Avelyn suddenly stopped and looked at his beautiful companion, a most curious expression on his face. Not even blinking, he reached under his robes, then quickly retracted his hand.

It was covered in blood.

“My dear Jill,” Avelyn said, “I do believe I have been stabbed.” His legs started to buckle under him, but Jill caught him and guided him off the main road to a porch in a nearby alley. She thought to leave him there, to run off and find Dusberry’s healer—every small town had one—but Avelyn caught her by the arm and would not let her go.

Then she saw it. Brother Avelyn produced a grayish-black stone, its polish so deep that it seemed almost liquid, so smooth that Jill felt as if she could slip right into it. Her gaze lingered on the stone for a long while, the young woman sensing there was something extraordinary, something magical about it.

“I need to borrow some of your strength, my friend,” Avelyn said, “else I shall soon perish.”

Jill, on her knees before him, nodded, eager to help in any way.

Avelyn wasn’t satisfied with that response, though, fearing that Jill did not understand the true measure of what he needed from her. “We shall become one,” he said, his voice growing ever more breathless, “more intimate than anything you have ever known. Are you prepared for such a joining?”

“I hardly think you are in condition—”

“Not physically, oh no, not that!” Avelyn quickly corrected, wheezing out a laugh despite his obvious agony. “Spiritually.”

Jill rocked back on her heels, regarding Avelyn curiously. A physical union she could not abide—not with this man, not with Connor! But this cryptic talk of a spiritual joining did not seem so imposing. “Do what you must,” she begged.

Avelyn regarded her a while longer, then finally nodded. He closed his eyes and began chanting softly, falling into the magic of the powerful hematite. Jill likewise closed her eyes listening to the inflections of the chant.

Soon she no longer heard them, but rather felt them as if they were emanating from within her own body. And then she felt the intrusion, the spirit of Avelyn making its way into her.

Just his body was there, she realized, as again his spirit sought entry. Jill tried to break down her defenses, knew logically that if she did not let Avelyn have his way, he would surely die. She knew, too, that she had come to trust this man. He was a friend, of like mind and, on most points, morals.

She focused all her strength, trying vainly to invite the man in, trying vainly to facilitate the joining.

Then she was screaming, not aloud—or perhaps aloud, she was too consumed to know. Avelyn came closer, so much closer. Too close. They seemed to be as one; Jill caught images of the brown and gray walls of a monastery, of an island coveted with lush vegetation and trees with wide-fingered branches. Then she felt as if she was falling, looked into the face of a hawkish man who was falling beside her.

And then she felt the pain, of a stab wound, sharp and hot. It was not on her; she knew that. But it was right there beside her, pulling at her life force, sucking her into its depths. She resisted, tried to push Avelyn away, but it was too late now. They were joined and the monk fed as a vampire would feed.

Jill’s eyes popped wide in horror and she jumped, startled, to find that the monk was still reclining in front of her.

The pain became another sensation, hot and private. Too private and yet shared. Jill instinctively recoiled, but she had nowhere to hide. She had let Avelyn in, and now she must suffer the experience.

For Avelyn, the union of spirits proved something wondrous. Even as he explored this unfamiliar use of hematite, he gave to Jill his understanding of the stones—and it was so easy! He felt her response immediately, Jill passing her energy through the hematite into Avelyn’s wounded body as smoothly as any fifth-year student of St.-Mere-Abelle. It struck Avelyn profoundly then that the monks might be teaching the usage of the stones in a terribly wrong manner, that if the instruction came in the spiritual mode, through the use of hematite, the students might progress much faster. Jill, he knew, would come away from this with more than a casual understanding of how to use the magic stones, and she was strong! Avelyn felt that. With practice, and more joinings, she could quickly rival all but the most powerful stone users of St.-Mere-Abelle—and all because of this simple technique.

But dark images began to wash over Avelyn, scenes of men running amok with stone power. He dismissed the notion of training stone use through this method as quickly as he had entertained it, for he realized that the discipline involved in handling such power could not be taught in any easy way. Suddenly he felt guilty for what he had just given this woman he hardly knew, felt as if he had somehow betrayed God, giving a blessing without first asking for any guidance or sacrifice.

It was over in a few moments, with Avelyn back in his nearly healed body. Jill turned away, could not look upon the man.

“I am sorry,” Avelyn said to her, his voice weary but all trace of physical pain gone. “You have saved my life.”

Jill fought away the black wings of her past, the barrier that had for so long protected her against intimacy, the barrier that Avelyn had not crashed through but had somehow circumvented. With great effort, she managed to turn back and face him.

He was sitting upright now, smiling sheepishly, the cloud of pain and death gone from his plump features. “I am—” he started to apologize again, but Jill put a finger over his lips to silence him. She stood up and offered her hand, helping the portly monk to his feet.

Then Jill started down the road, like all the other roads that led them out of all the other towns. She offered not a word as they walked long into the night, replaying those terrible moments of their joining over and over in her mind, constantly telling herself that it had been necessary, and trying to fathom the images that Avelyn had given her, images, no doubt, from the monk’s past. There was something else, though, some gift that Avelyn had left behind. Jill had never even heard of the magic stones before, let alone used one, but now she felt as if she could handle them fairly well, as if their secrets had been unlocked to her in the blink of an eye. On this point, as well, she kept quiet, not knowing yet whether Avelyn had given her a gift or a curse.

Avelyn, too, did nothing to break the silence. He, too, had much to contemplate: the feelings he had viewed within the tortured woman and the scenes that the joining had shown him—images of a slaughter in a small town, probably somewhere in or near the Wilderlands. And Avelyn had a name for the place, a name the woman could not remember. He inquired privately about it in the next town the pair ventured through, and then, as the monk gained more and more knowledge, he began to steer Jill generally north.

It was with mixed feelings that Jill followed Brother Avelyn into Palmaris. The woman desperately wanted to seek out Graevis and Pettibwa, to tell them she was all right, to hug them and fall comfortably onto Pettibwa’s soft bosom. All of that was, of course, tempered by her realization that she was, in effect, a deserter. A meeting with Connor could prove disastrous, and if Grady happened to spot her or learn of her visit, the greedy man would likely set the Kingsmen on her trail, if for no other reason than to ensure his inheritance.

Jill did go out one night, while Avelyn went down into the common room of the inn they had chosen, spouting his diatribes. She made her way silently across town, taking up a spot in the alleyway across from Fellowship Way. She sat there as the minutes became an hour, taking some comfort in the fact that many patrons came and went; apparently her little disaster hadn’t ruined the Chilichunk name. Sometime later, Pettibwa came out of the inn, rubbing her hands on her apron, wiping the sweat from her brow, smiling, always smiling, as she went about the business of her life.

Jill’s heart tugged at her to go out and embrace the woman, to run to Pettibwa as she would have run to her natural mother.

Something within, fear for Pettibwa, perhaps, stopped her though.

And then, quickly, the plump woman was gone, back into the bustle of the Way.

Jill left the alley hurriedly, thinking to go back to her room across town. Somehow she wound up on the back roof of the Way, in her private spot, basking one final time in those familiar feelings. Up here, she was, in effect, in Pettibwa’s arms. Up here, Jill was Cat-the-Stray again, a younger girl in a world less complicated, with feelings less confusing.

She spent all night watching the stars, the gentle drift of Sheila, the occasional lazy cloud.

She returned to her room as dawn was breaking over Palmaris, to find Avelyn snoring loudly, his breath smelling of ale and more potent drinks, one eye blackened.

They remained in Palmaris, a city large enough to suffer the likes of the mad friar, for several more days, but Jill never ventured near Fellowship Way again.

CHAPTER 29

Of Singular Purpose

They gave him but two stones: a smooth yellow-hued sunstone and a cabochon garnet, a carbuncle, the deepest shade of red. The former, among the most valued stones at St.-Mere-Abelle, could protect the man from almost any stone magic, could kill all magic in an entire area and render all spells useless within it, and the latter, the seeking stone could show him the way to magic. Thus was Brother Justice equipped to find and destroy Avelyn.

He set out from the abbey one dark and dreary morning, riding an ash-gray mare, not swift of hoof but long in heart. The horse could go for many hours, and Brother Justice, so focused on the completion of his vital task, pushed her to her limits.

He traveled first to Youmaneff, the village where Avelyn Desbris had been born, some three hundred miles from St.-Mere-Abelle. He went to the small cemetery on the hill outside the place first, found the stone raised in memory of Annalisa Desbris, and noted with some satisfaction that the name of Jayson Desbris had not been added.

“You have come to tell me of my son Avelyn?” the old man asked as soon as Brother Justice, his brown robes marking him as an Abellican monk, knocked at his door.

The simple question, asked so very sincerely, put the monk on edge.

“Is he dead?” Jayson asked fearfully.

“Should he be?” Brother Justice retorted.

The old man blinked many times, then shook his head. “Forgive my lack of manners,” he bade the visitor, moving to the side of the door and sweeping his hand, an invitation for the monk to enter. Brother Justice did so, his head bowed to hide his cruel smile.

“I had only assumed that a visit from a man of St.-Mere-Abelle would be to give tidings of Avelyn,” Jayson explained. “And since the visit was not from Avelyn—”

“Where is Avelyn?” The monk’s tone was flat and cold, a snapping question that sent Jayson back on his heels and had the hair on his neck standing on end.

“You would know better than I,” the old man replied quietly. “Is he not at the monastery?”

“You know of his long journey?” the monk asked sharply.

Jayson shook his head, and Brother Justice sensed that he was truly confused.

“I last saw my son in the fall of God’s Year 816,” Jayson explained, “when I handed him into the care of St.-Mere-Abelle, into the arms of God.”

Brother Justice found he believed every word, and that fact only made him all the more angry. He had hoped for information from Jayson Desbris, a direction to take that he might end this foul business quickly and efficiently. But Avelyn had apparently not come home, or at least, had not made contact with his father. Now the monk was torn, not knowing whether he should kill the old man, erasing any trace of his pursuit of Avelyn should he come home, or simply brush away any sense of misgivings Jayson might hold, putting the visit in a more congenial light.

That would not work, Brother Justice realized, for if Avelyn did come home and learn of a visit from a monk, then he would know that this had been no social call. Still, to slay the old man might make things even more complicated, for then he would be marked by the local officials and perhaps even hunted.

There was one other way.

“I fear to tell you that your son is dead,” he said with as much conviction as he could muster—and that was not considerable.

Jayson leaned heavily on a table, and seemed suddenly very much older indeed.

“He fell from the abbey walls,” Brother Justice went on, “into All Saints Bay. We have not recovered his body.”

“Then why did you come here with questions as to his whereabouts?” came a sharp question from the side of the room. A large man, perhaps ten years older than Brother Justice, stormed into the room, his dark brown eyes filled with outrage.

Brother Justice hardly paid the man any heed—at least outwardly. He kept his focus on Jayson and tried to cover his previous questions. “Avelyn has taken his long journey,” the monk said quietly, and that reference, put in terms of a spiritual flight, slowed the mounting anger in Avelyn’s brother Tenegrid.

“He is with God now,” Brother Justice finished.

Tenegrid came right up to the monk, glaring down at the shorter man. “But you never found his body,” he reasoned.

“The fall is too great,” Brother Justice said quietly. He had his hands in front of him, buried within his voluminous sleeves. They were not clasped, rather, his right hand was cupped, fingers set tight, forearm muscles twitching from the strain.

“Be gone from this house!” Tenegrid commanded. “Foul messenger who comes and taunts with questions before speaking the truth!” It was an obviously misplaced anger, an expression of pain and with no real resentment aimed at Brother Justice. Tenegrid was wounded as much by the sight of his grief-stricken father as by the news of his brother’s death. Brother Justice understood this, though he hardly sympathized.

Still, the vicious monk would have let it go, but then Tenegrid made a dangerous mistake.

“Be gone!” he repeated, and he put his hand on the stocky man’s strong shoulder and started to push him toward the door. Faster than his eyes could follow, Brother Justice’s cupped hand snapped up and out to the right, striking Tenegrid squarely across the throat. The man fell away a couple of staggering steps, grabbed the back of a chair for support, and then fell over anyway, the chair tumbling down about him.

It took considerable willpower for Brother Justice, his blood so hot for the kill, to turn away for the door. He wanted to vent his rage on this brother of foul Avelyn, wanted to rip the man’s head right off before his father’s eyes and then slowly murder the father as well. But that would not be prudent, would likely make his course to Avelyn, the grandest prize of all, much more difficult.

“We of St.-Mere-Abelle are sorry for your loss,” he said to Jayson Desbris.

The old man incredulously looked up from his son, who was still lying on the floor holding his wounded throat and gasping for breath, to see the monk depart.

The one obvious lead fruitless, Brother Justice had to turn to his magic, to the carbuncle, a stone also called Dragon Sight for its ability to detect things magical. He rode out of Youmaneff shortly thereafter, finding no magical emanations in or about the pitiful village. This was worse than a cold trail, Brother Justice realized, for this was no trail at all.

The world seemed wide indeed.

His first contact with magic came a few days later on the open road when he happened by a merchant caravan. One of the merchants had a stone—and admitted as much when Brother Justice cornered him alone inside his covered carriage. It was merely a diamond chip, useful for saving the candles and oil on long journeys.

The monk was soon again back on the road, riding steadily and making a general course to the north. The largest city in Honce-the-Bear was Ursal, so that, he figured, might be a good place to start. Brother Justice knew the pitfalls, though. Many merchants in Ursal likely possessed stones; the monastery was not averse to selling them. His garnet would lead him down a hundred different avenues, to one dead end after another. But still, considering the limited range of the Dragon Sight stone—it could not locate magic more than a few hundred feet away—Brother Justice would have more of a chance in a confined city than in the vast open spaces of central and northern Honce-the-Bear.

He wasn’t a third of the way to Ursal, though, when his course took a different direction, when the trail suddenly heated up.

It happened purely by chance in a hamlet too small even to have a name, a place a certain “mad friar” had passed through only a few weeks before on his way to Dusberry on the Masur Delaval. The reaction of the inhabitants to Brother Justice’s brown robes tipped the monk off to the fact that he was not the first Abellican monk to come through this place recently. People sighed when he walked in, seemed fearful at first, and then, as if recognizing that he was a different man than they had originally feared, they sighed again, this time in obvious relief.

When questioned, they were all too ready to give an account of the “mad friar” who had visited their village, offering portents of doom and starting a wild fight in the tavern. One man showed Brother Justice a broken arm, still far from healed.

“Not good business for the church, I’m thinking,” the man offered, “to have one o’ yer own wandering about hurting folks!”

“More than a few folk have turned away from St. Gwendolyn of the Sea since the fight,” the bartender of the tavern added.

“This monk was of St. Gwendolyn?” Brother Justice asked, recognizing the name of the monastery, a secluded fortress nestled high on a rocky bluff, perhaps two days’ ride to the east.

The man with the broken arm shrugged noncommittally, then turned to the bartender, who likewise had no answers.

“He wore robes akin to yer own,” the bartender remarked.

Brother Justice wanted desperately to inquire if the man carried any magical stones, if there was any magic about him at all, but he realized that these two would not likely have held back such information if they had it, and he didn’t want to tip his hand too much to anyone, fearing that Avelyn would be all the more difficult to find if he realized he was being hunted.

So the monk got a description, and though it was not an exact image of the Avelyn Desbris he had known, it was enough to hold his curiosity. So, suddenly, he had a description, a title—“the mad friar”—and a direction, the folk of the hamlet uniformly insisting the monk had gone down the western road with his companion, a beautiful young woman of about twenty years, close beside him.

The trail was warm, and it led Brother Justice from town to town, across the countryside to Dusberry on the Masur Delaval. He picked up even more clues as he went, for in one skirmish in a bar this mad friar had apparently sent a pair of men flying with a blue shock. Graphite.

Less than a month after he had set out from the tiny hamlet, confident that he was steadily gaining on this rogue monk, Brother Justice walked through the fortified gates of Palmaris.

Only two short days later, Brother Justice used his Dragon Sight stone to detect the use of strong magic, coming from the northeastern quarter of the city, the high ground of rich houses overlooking the Masur Delaval. Convinced that his prey was in reach, a lion staring down the face of an old and weary zebra, the monk rushed through the streets, through the crowded marketplace, knocking over more than one surprised person. He was a bit apprehensive when he got to the gates of the indicated house, a huge structure of imported materials: smooth white marble from the south, dark wooden beams from the Timberlands, and an assortment of garden artwork that could only have come from the galleries of the finest sculptors in Ursal. Brother Justice’s first thought was that Avelyn had hired on with this obviously wealthy merchant, perhaps to perform some necessary feat with the stones, perhaps merely as a court jester. The fierce monk tried to hold hard to that hope, for, logically, he could not dismiss his doubts. Would Avelyn, who held the stones as most sacred, rent out their powers? Only in emergency, Brother Justice realized, and since Avelyn could not have been in Palmaris for more than a couple of weeks, this was not likely a familiar house to him.

That left another possibility, one the monk did not wish to entertain. He went over the gate easily, lighting down in the front yard without a whisper of sound. There were many hedges and high bushes; he could get to the door without drawing notice from within or from the wide street behind him.

He understood his error before he had gone a dozen paces when he heard the growl of a sentry dog.

Brother Justice spat a curse and saw the animal, a massive, muscled beast, black and brown with a huge bony skull and wide jaw full of gleaming white teeth. The dog hesitated only a moment, taking full measure of the man, then came on in a dead run, lips curled back to show Brother Justice those awful teeth with every stride.

The monk crouched low, bent his legs, and tightened his muscles, measuring the dog’s swift approach. The beast came in fast and hard, but just as it was about to leap for the man’s throat, Brother Justice confused it by jumping high into the air, curling his legs under him.

The dog skidded to a stop, its momentum too great for it to effectively change its angle of attack, and then Brother Justice came down hard on its back, kicking both his legs straight down as he descended.

The dog’s legs splayed wide; it gave one yelp, then lay still, its back broken, its lungs collapsing.

The monk, convinced that the animal could not cry out any further warnings, walked on toward the house. He decided to take a straightforward approach and went right to the front door, knocking hard with the large brass knocker, another imported and sculpted item, he knew, this one in the shape of a leering, stretched face.

As soon as he saw the handle begin to turn, the monk lifted one foot and went into a spin, timing it perfectly so that his foot connected with the door just as it began to open. The man on the other side, a servant, flew to the floor as the door swung wide and Brother Justice entered.

“Your master?” the monk asked flatly.

The stunned man stammered, taking too long for the impatient monk’s comfort.

“Your master?” Brother Justice demanded again, grabbing the man by the collar and lifting him to his feet.

“He is indisposed,” the man replied, at which Brother Justice slapped him hard across the face, then clutched him on the neck, a grip that left no doubt in the man’s mind that this intruder could rip out his throat with hardly an effort. The man pointed toward a door across the foyer.

Brother Justice dragged him along. He let go before he reached the door, though, tossing the poor servant to the floor as he felt the first waves of intrusion, magical intrusion, an attack aimed his way and coming from within the room.

The monk quickly took out his yellow sunstone, falling immediately into its defensive magic. The attack was fairly strong—though he would have expected more from powerful Brother Avelyn—but the sunstone was among the most potent of all the stones of St.-Mere-Abelle, its defenses even more complete than the chrysoberyl more commonly used, and its power was more tightly focused than any other, a simple shield against magic. In an instant, a yellowish glow surrounded the monk, and the waves of intrusion were halted.

The monk snarled in defiance and kicked at the heavy door. It jolted but did not open. He kicked again and again, repeatedly slamming the lock, until finally, the wood of the jamb gave way, the door flying wide to reveal a portly man, richly dressed, standing behind a large oaken desk, a loaded crossbow in hand.

“You have one shot,” Brother Justice said evenly, striding directly into the room, his eyes locked on those of the merchant. “One shot, and if it does not kill me, I will torture you to a slow death.”

The man’s hands trembled; Brother Justice knew that without even looking at them. He saw the merchant flinch as a line of sweat rolled from his brow into one eye, saw the man chewing his lip.

“Not another step!” the merchant said with all the courage he could muster. Brother Justice stopped and smiled wickedly. “Can you kill me?” he asked. “Is this the end you desire?”

“I desire only to defend what is mine,” the merchant replied.

“I am no enemy.”

The merchant stared at him incredulously.

“I had thought you to be another,” Brother Justice said calmly, turning his back on the merchant to close the door as tightly as the shattered jamb would allow. He sneered at the curious servants gathering in the hall to keep them at bay. “I am hunting a dangerous fugitive, one who employs the magic of the stones,” he explained, turning back to the merchant, a disarming look on his face. “I had not thought that any but he would be so powerful with the magic.” Brother Justice did well to hide his wicked grin as the crossbow slipped down.

“I am always ready to lend aid to those of St. Precious,” the merchant declared.

Brother Justice shook his head. “St.-Mere-Abelle,” he corrected. “I have traveled the breadth of Honce-the-Bear in my most vital quest. I had thought it to be at its end. Forgive my entrance; my Father Abbot will reimburse you for all the cost.”

The merchant waved his hand, his face brightening at the mention of the man. “How fares old Markwart?” he asked, his tone one of familiarity.

Again the monk restrained his feeling of outrage that this man—this simple, pitiful, wretched merchant—could speak of Father Abbot Markwart as if he were the man’s equal. Obviously he had dealt with Markwart—where else would he have garnered so powerful a stone?—but Brother Justice understood the relationship between the merchants and the abbey far more clearly than did the merchants. Father Abbot Markwart was always willing to take their money, but never in exchange for honest respect.

“Perhaps, then, I can help you with your quest,” the merchant offered. “Ah, but where are my manners? I am Folo Dosindien, Dosey to my friends, to your Father Abbot! You must be hungry or perhaps in need of a drink.” He lifted his hand and started to call out, but Brother Justice cut him short.

“I require nothing,” he assured the merchant.

“Nothing but help in your search, perhaps,” the man said teasingly.

The monk tilted his head, somewhat intrigued. The man had at least one powerful stone—he knew that and suspected it to be hematite. Many things could be accomplished with such a stone.

“I seek a fellow monk,” Brother Justice explained. “He is known as the mad friar.”

The merchant shrugged; the name obviously meant nothing to him. “He is in Palmaris?”

“He came through, at least,” the monk explained, “not more than two weeks previous.”

The merchant sat down behind his desk, his features tightening with concentration. “If he travels, if he is an outlaw, then likely he would have sought out the lowlier regions of the southern docks,” he reasoned. He looked up at the monk, his expression resigned. “Palmaris is a large place.”

Brother Justice did not blink.

“I have offered my name,” the man prompted.

“I have no name to offer,” replied Brother Justice, and the tension grew once more, instantly emanating from the monk’s cold stare.

Dosey cleared his throat. “Yes,” he said. “I wish that I had more answers to give to one of Markwart’s underlings.”

Brother Justice narrowed his eyes, not appreciating the sentiment, the way the foolish merchant tried to dominate him by referring to his superior in such familiar terms.

“But there is a place,” the merchant whispered, coming forward suddenly in his chair, “where one might get answers. Answers to any question in all the world.”

Brother Justice had no idea where this conversation was going, had no idea what to make of the man’s sudden, almost maniacal expression.

“But not until we have dined,” Dosey said, falling back in his chair. “Come, then, I will set for you a table unrivaled in Palmaris, that you might return to St.-Mere-Abelle with kind words for Markwart’s dear old merchant friend.”

Brother Justice played along, and, indeed, the merchant Dosey was not exaggerating. His servants—the man Brother Justice had dropped to the foyer floor and three women, one undeniably beautiful—brought in course after course of the finest cuts of meat and the sweetest fruits. Juicy lamb and thick cuts of venison buried in brown sauces and mushrooms, oranges that exploded in a shower of juice as soon as the integrity of their peels was breached, and large, round, yellow melons that the monk had never before seen but that were sweeter than anything he had ever tasted.

He ate and he drank, neither to excess, and when the meal was over, some two hours later, he again sat quietly and let the merchant guide the conversation.

The man rambled on and on, telling mostly stories of his dealings with the various monasteries of Honce-the-Bear, even with St. Brugalnard in faraway Alpinador. Brother Justice knew that he was supposed to be impressed, and he worked hard to pretend that he was as the minutes dragged on into yet another hour. Dosey interrupted his tales only for an occasional belch; so lost was he in his own sense of importance that he hardly bothered to gauge the monk’s reaction. Brother Justice figured that the man was accustomed to dealing with people in need of or with great desire for his wealth, and, thus, he could ramble on and on to an attentive, though captive, audience. Such were the trappings of power that Dosey did not realize what an ultimate bore and ridiculous buffoon he truly was.

But Brother Justice needed the merchant, as well, or at least it seemed plausible that the man might aid the monk in his all-important quest. That alone held the monk at the table long after the sun had set.

Finally, so suddenly that the surprise shook the monk from his almost dreamlike state of boredom, Dosey announced that it was time to get some answers and that these things were better done in the dark.

The mysterious tone of his voice set the monk on his guard, though, in truth, Brother Justice really didn’t expect much from the merchant. Perhaps the fool Dosey would use his hematite to invade the bodies of several innkeepers from the lowlier sections of the city, using their forms to inquire about the mad friar.

The pair went back to Dosey’s study, to the great oaken desk. Dosey had his manservant retrieve a second chair, placing it at the desk’s side, and then he bade the monk to sit and relax.

“I could go,” the merchant offered, and then he shook his head, as if not liking that notion, almost as if he were afraid of that thought.

Brother Justice made no move at all to reply, no verbal or body language to let the man know that he was even the least bit intrigued.

“But perhaps you should see for yourself,” the merchant went on, a wry smile on his face as he spoke. “Would you like to go?” he asked.

“Go?”

“For your answers.”

“I know not of this place of which you speak,” Brother Justice admitted. “You have a stone, that much I know.”

“Oh, much more than a simple stone,” Dosey teased. He reached under the lapel of his fine gray jacket and produced a pin, a large broach, and held it out for Brother Justice to see. Now the monk could not fully hide his interest. The central stone of the broach was a hematite, as he had suspected, an oval of liquid gray, deep and smooth. Encircling it, set in the yellow gold, were a series of small, clear, round crystals. Brother Justice did not immediately recognize them, for they might have been several different types, but he sensed that they were indeed magical, in some way tied to the powers of the hematite.

“My own design,” Dosey bragged. “The fun of the stones is in combining their powers, is it not?”

The fun, Brother Justice silently echoed, hating this man and the irreverence with which he spoke of something so sacred. “This broach presents a combination not known to me,” the monk admitted.

“Simple clear-crystal quartz,” Dosey explained, running his finger about the large broach’s edge. “For distant sight.”

A stone of divining, Brother Justice then realized, and he was beginning to catch on. With the clear quartz, a man could send his vision across the miles; perhaps combining that with the spirit-walking of the hematite . . .

“With this, you can go to a place to find your answers,” Dosey promised, “a place that only I know of. The home of a friend, a powerful friend indeed, one that would impress your Markwart, to be sure!”

Brother Justice hardly noted the familiar reference to the Father Abbot this time, so caught up was he in the implications. His intrigue was fast shifting to trepidation now, as he got the distinct feeling that he had stumbled on to something potentially dangerous. He recalled Dosey’s fearful expression when he hinted that he would make the journey, a mixture, it seemed, of the sheerest horror and the highest titillation. What manner of being could so inspire such a reaction? What, then, lay at the end of this spirit-journey?

A shudder coursed up the monk’s spine. Perhaps the monastery should reconsider its practice of selling stones to fools like Dosey.

The thought flew away in an instant, for this monk, this Brother Justice, had been trained to be unable to hold long to any ill feelings, any questions at all, concerning the decisions of his superiors.

“Go,” Dosey bade him, handing over the broach. “Let the stone guide you. It knows the way.”

“Am I to possess the body of another?”

“The stone knows the way.” It was spoken simply, calmly, and, somehow wickedly. That part of Brother Justice, that small flicker of memory that recalled his life as Quintall, recognized Dosey’s expression as that of an older boy pressing a youngster to mischief.

He took the broach, felt its power in his hand, eyeing Dosey cautiously all the while. His physical body would be vulnerable while spirit-walking, he knew, but he doubted that Dosey would strike against one of Markwart’s emissaries. Even if he did attack, Brother Justice, already using the hematite, figured that he would have little trouble possessing the merchant’s body. And Dosey likely knew the same thing, and that understanding, the monk decided, would give him the insurance he needed.

So Brother Justice sat back in the chair, closed his eyes, and let the magic of the broach engulf him. He visualized the hematite as a dark liquid pool and he waded in slowly, letting the physical world dissipate into gray nothingness. Then his body and spirit were apart, two separate entities. The monk looked about the room from this new perspective, but his eyes could not remain fixed on anything but the clear stones surrounding that hematite. They pulled at him as forcefully as anything he had ever felt, a compulsion too great to ignore. Doubts about the wisdom of his choice, about the wisdom of selling such powerful stones to fools, flapped up about him, flashes of dark wings that beat at the will of the powerful monk.

He was sinking, ever sinking, into that crystal glare, away from the room, away from his corporeal body and the fool Dosey.

And then he was flying, faster than thought, across the miles. Time and distance warped. It seemed as if an hour went by, but then as if only a second had passed; what appeared as an infinite plain was crossed by a single step. On and on Brother Justice flew, north to the Timberlands, to the Wilderlands, across great lakes and deep forests, and then to mountains, towering peaks.

So many times he thought he would collide with jags of stone only to watch them rush under him at the last possible second. He had never imagined such an attunement of stone magic, that these crystals could be so focused in their divination. It was something dangerous and beyond his understanding—and he knew as much about the stones as any man alive, with, as far as he knew, the exceptions of only Father Abbot Markwart and Avelyn Desbris!

He crossed the range into a huge, high valley, a great plateau ringed by the towering mountains. Below him, massed like ants, were the campsites of armies. He wanted to go lower, to distinguish the individual forms, to see what force had gathered in such unbelievable numbers, but the compelling crystals would not let him out of their grasp. He flew on above the plateau to a singular, smoking mountain, its southern face tree covered, but with two black arms reaching down, reaching out to encompass the gathered armies.

Brother Justice nearly swooned, his senses overwhelmed by the sheer speed at which his spirit entered a series of connecting narrow tunnels. Every breakneck turn jolted him, though his physical form was hundreds of miles away. Every dip and sudden rise blurred his vision, scrambled his thoughts.

He came up fast on a pair of great bronze doors, inlaid with a myriad of designs and symbols. They opened but a crack, and through that tiny space flew his disembodied spirit into a huge chamber lined by stone columns that resembled gigantic sculpted warriors. He soared through their twin lines, his attention stolen as he approached the far end of the chamber, a raised dais, and a creature whose strength was beyond anything Brother Justice had ever known, whose emanations of power and of evil mocked life itself.

The flight stopped, leaving Brother Justice standing right before the dais. He considered his own form, for normally spirit-walkers were invisible. Not in here, though. The monk could see himself, as he appeared within his corporeal trappings, except that he was a singular shade of gray and translucent, so that he could look right through his form to see the gray stone beneath his feet.

But that spectacle couldn’t hold Brother Justice’s attention for any length of time, not with this huge monstrosity leering at him from on high. What monster was this? the monk wondered as he studied the reddish skin and black eyes, the bat wings, horns, and claws. What manifestation of hell had come to walk the material world? What demon?

The questions spiraled into a singular line of thought, a singular fear that threatened to break the monk’s very mind. He knew! From his lessons, years of religious training, years of his masters imparting the fears of that which opposed their God.

He knew!

You have destroyed the fool Dosey, then, the creature telepathically imparted to the monk, and have stolen his treasure. The instant that last thought ended, Brother Justice felt an intrusion that he could not deny, a sudden scouring of his brain, of his identity, his intentions. Sheer revulsion saved him, catapulted his spirit out of that terrible place like a slingshot snapping back through the tunnels, across the plateau, above the swarming soldiers that he knew then were an army of evil, across the mountains and then the forests, the lakes, careening all the way back to Palmaris, to the merchant’s study, and back into his body so suddenly that the physical form nearly toppled over.

“Do you know now?” Dosey asked him even as his eyes blinked open.

Brother Justice looked into that maniacal expression and saw the result of contact with such a creature clearly etched on Dosey’s face. He wanted to shake the man and ask him what he had done, what he had awakened—but it was far beyond that, Brother Justice realized before he ever uttered a word. The man had passed the point of redemption and had perhaps awakened a dangerous curiosity in the demon.

Up came the monk’s hands, locking fast on Dosey’s throat. Dosey grabbed at the monk’s wrists, tugging futilely, trying to cry for help, scream, anything. The muscles on Brother Justice’s arms stood taut and too strong to fight. The monk drove the feeble merchant to his knees and held fast long after the struggling stopped, long after the merchant’s arms fell slack at his sides.

His mind whirling with outrage and fear, Brother Justice stalked about the house, finding the servants and the merchant’s family.

He left long after midnight, battling his confusion with a wall of sheer anger. The broach was in his pocket, the house of Folo Dosindien was dead.

CHAPTER 30

Symphony

“I am at peace, a greater sense of belonging than I have ever known,” the ranger said at length after more than half an hour sitting in his wooden chair in the darkness, staring at the barely perceptible mirror. He gave a chuckle at the irony of his own words. “And yet, Uncle Mather, I count my current friends as but two, and one of them is no more than a shadowy image, a specter that cannot speak!”

Elbryan laughed again as he considered the preposterous illogic of it all. “I belong here,” he declared. “This area, these towns—Dundalis, Weedy Meadow, and End-o’-the-World—are my towns, these folk, my folk, though they hardly tolerate the sight of me. What is it then that gives me acceptance in this place, a greater sense of peace and belonging than I knew among the Touel’alfar, who became my friends, who cared for me much more deeply than any of the folk of the three villages, than any but you and Bradwarden?”

He stared hard at the image at the edge of the dark mirror for a long while, considering his words, seeking his answers.

“It is duty,” Elbryan said finally. “It is the belief that here I am doing something to better the world—or at least my corner of the wide world. With the elves, I felt a sense of personal growth, learning and training, perfecting my skills, always moving toward something better. Here, I use those skills to better the world, to protect those who need protection—whether or not they believe they need protection.

“So here I belong. Here I fit into a necessary niche and know that my daily toils, my watchful eye, my rapport with the forest—creatures and plants—is surely valuable, if not appreciated.”

Elbryan closed his eyes and kept them shut for a long moment, his mind filling with the thoughts of the many duties left to him this day. He soon realized that Uncle Mather would not be in the mirror when he again opened his eyes, for the trance was broken. That was the way it always happened, the needs of the day dispatching the spirit soon before the dawn, turning Elbryan’s thoughts from philosophical to pragmatic. He used the Oracle regularly now, sometimes two or even three times in a week, and he never failed to bring up the image of his relative, the ranger who had gone before him. He wondered often if he might also find the image of Olwan in that mirror or of his mother or Pony, perhaps.

Yes, Elbryan would like to converse with Pony, to see her again, to remember that innocent time when patrolling was play and nightmares were not real.

He left the small cave, crawling out past the large tree roots, with a sincere smile on his face, rejuvenated and ready for the day’s work, as always. He was hoping to find Bradwarden, for the centaur, after weeks of Elbryan’s teasing, had at last promised him an archery contest. Perhaps Elbryan would make his prize, should he win—and he had no reason to believe that he would not—an indenture of the centaur, forcing Bradwarden to accompany him on his coming visit to the forest about the western village of End-o’-the-World.

First things first, the ranger told himself. He took up Hawkwing, removed its feathered tip and its string, and went to a place he had claimed as his own, a nearly treeless hillock much like the one he had frequented in Andur’Blough Inninness, one that lifted him up into the heavens on starry nights and brought him the first rays of dawn and the last rays of the sunset.

The ranger quickly removed his clothes, the grass feeling scratchy but not unpleasant to his feet. He greeted the dawn with his dance, weaving the staff about as he would wield a sword, stepping slowly, perfectly balanced, the moves coming with hardly a thought, since the movement memories were ingrained deep within his muscles. The sword-dance was perfected now, and there were no steps to be added, no more difficult maneuvers, no increase in speed. These movements alone would continue to heighten Elbryan’s balance, his sense of control over his body. In the half hour that it now took Elbryan to perform the dance, he would put his body through every movement needed in battle, he would reinforce in his muscles the memory of which action properly followed which. Truly the ranger was a thing of beauty, moving with animal-like grace but with human control. A combination of strength and agility, a balanced, thinking warrior. The greatest gift of the Touel’alfar was his name, Nightbird, and all the training that had come with it. The greatest gift of the elves was this harmony the man had achieved, this joining of two philosophies, of two ways of looking at the world, of two ways to do battle.

Sweat glistened in the morning light, beading and rolling about the man’s hard, sculpted form. For though he was not moving quickly, the energy required to maintain the balance of the sword-dance was tremendous, often a working of muscle against muscle or an isolation of a muscle group so completely that it was worked to its limits.

When he was done, Elbryan gathered up his clothing and ran to a nearby pond, diving into the chilly water without hesitation. A quick swim refreshed him, and he dressed and went at once to his morning meal, then set off to find the centaur.

To Elbryan’s relief, Bradwarden was in the appointed area, though not exactly in the spot where he had told Elbryan their contest would be held. To make things even easier for the tracking ranger, the centaur was playing his pipes this morning, a haunting melody that seemed akin to the dawn, gentle and rising, rising, until the notes burst forth as the rays of the sun, cresting the long bill and spreading wide. Following that music, compelled by its notes, Elbryan soon came upon the half-equine beast, standing amid a tumble of boulders.

The centaur stopped his playing when he spotted his friend, his white smile growing wide within his bushy black beard. “I feared ye would not have the courage to show yer face!” Bradwarden roared.

“My face and my bow,” the ranger replied, holding Hawkwing up before him.

“Aye, that elven stick,” the centaur remarked. Bradwarden held aloft his own bow then, the first time Elbryan had seen it, and he was truly astonished. Mounted sidelong on a platform, the thing would have passed for a fair-sized ballista!

“You throw arrows with a tree?” the ranger scoffed.

Bradwarden’s smile didn’t lessen a bit. “Call ‘em arrows,” he said evenly, placing his pipes on the ground and hoisting a quiver that would have passed for a sleeping bag for Elbryan, with arrows each as long as the man was tall. “Call ‘em spears. But if ye get hit by one, know that ye’ll call ‘em death!”

Elbryan didn’t doubt that for a minute.

Bradwarden led the way out of the area to an open meadow upon which he had placed a series of six targets, each a different distance from the appointed line.

“We’ll be starting close and working our way to the back,” the centaur explained. “First one to miss a target is the loser.”

Elbryan considered the rules, so befitting the centaur’s blunt style. Normally in a test of archery, each contestant would be granted a specified number of shots, with the best total score serving as the measure. With Bradwarden, though, it was a simple challenge of hit or miss.

Elbryan stepped up and let fly first, confident that the first target, no more than thirty paces, would pose no difficulty. His arrow slapped into the target near the bull’s-eye, a straight, level shot.

Without a word of congratulations, Bradwarden lifted his monstrous bow and drew back. “Ye only stung the giant,” the centaur remarked, then let fly. His great bolt thudded into the target near Elbryan’s arrow and overturned the whole three-legged thing. “Now,” the centaur declared, “the beast is properly killed.”

“Perhaps I should shoot first at each target,” Elbryan said dryly.

The mighty centaur laughed heartily. “If ye don’t,” he agreed, “then ye’ll be aiming high for the clouds and hoping yer bolt drops straight down on the mark, don’t ye doubt!”

Before the centaur had even finished, Elbryan’s second arrow thudded dead center into the next target, ten paces farther away than the first.

Bradwarden hit it as well, and again the target fell over.

They were up to the fifth target in no time, the first three having been knocked flat, and the fourth still standing, for Bradwarden’s great arrow, though true in aim, had not pushed it all the way over. This fifth target, some hundred yards away, was the first for which Elbryan had to elevate his shot. Not much, though; so strong was Hawkwing that the arrow’s flight was barely arched, cutting a sure line through the gentle wind to strike perfectly.

The centaur, for the very first time, seemed honestly impressed. “Good bow,” he muttered, and then he took aim and let fly.

Elbryan clenched a fist, thinking himself victorious as he marked the flight. Bradwarden’s arrow did hit the target, though, barely catching hold in its outer edge, as far to the left of center as it could go.

Elbryan turned a wry gaze on the centaur. “A bit of luck,” he remarked.

Bradwarden pawed hard at the ground. “Not so,” he insisted in all seriousness. “I aimed for the beast’s weapon hand.”

“Ah, but if it was left-handed . . .” the ranger replied without hesitation.

Bradwarden’s smile was gone. “Last shot,” he said evenly. “Then we’ll be picking out farther trees to substitute for targets.”

“Or leaves,” Elbryan replied, and lifted his bow.

“A bit too much,” the centaur said suddenly, and the ranger eased the tension on his bowstring, having almost lost his concentration and the shot.

“Too much?”

“Too much faith in yerself,” the centaur clarified. “Next, ye’ll be wanting to wager.”

Elbryan paused and thought hard on that line, then looked back to consider the centaur’s last shot, so near a miss. Or had it been planned that way? he had to wonder. Was Bradwarden setting him up? Certainly the centaur was a fine archer, but was he even better than Elbryan had recognized?

“Me pipes’ll be needing a new bag,” Bradwarden mused. “Not a difficult chore, but a dirty one—taking a hide.”

“And if I win?” Elbryan asked. His eyes betrayed his idea, roaming to the centaur’s strong back.

Bradwarden started to laugh, as if the notion that Elbryan might win was absurd. The centaur stopped abruptly, though, and glared hard at his human companion. “I know ye’re thinking ye might be riding me, but if ever ye try, I’ll be giving human flesh another taste.”

“Just to End-o’-the-World,” Elbryan clarified. “I wish to be there and back in a hurry.”

“Never!” the centaur declared. “Only a maiden I’d let ride, and then she’d be letting me,” he finished with a lewd wink.

Elbryan didn’t even want to conjure the image.

“What, then?” he asked. “I’ll wager against you, but the prize must be named.”

“I could make ye a real bow,” the centaur chided.

“And I could put an arrow up your arse from a hundred paces,” Elbryan retorted.

“Big target,” the huge centaur admitted. “But what might ye be needing, me friend, not that ye’ve a chance at winning.”

“I already told you,” Elbryan replied. “I enjoy my walks, but I fear that I need a faster method to cover the ground about the three towns.”

“Ye’ll never climb on me back.”

“Do you lead the wild horses?” Elbryan asked, surprising the centaur.

“Not I,” Bradwarden replied. “That’s the work of another.” A strange smile came over the centaur, a strange expression as if he had found the solution to some puzzle. “Aye,” he said at length, “that’ll be yer prize. If lightning hits me arrow—for that’s the only way ye’ll beat me—I’ll take ye to the one who leads the wild herd. I’ll take ye, mind ye, but then ye’ll make yer own deals.”

Elbryan realized that he was being duped, that this prize, in Bradwarden’s estimation, was more a punishment. The ranger felt the hairs on the back of his neck standing up, felt a tingling of trepidation. Who might this leader of the herd be to inspire such uncharacteristic respect from cocky Bradwarden? Along with the realization came an undeniable sense of intrigue, however, and so the ranger agreed.

Up came Hawkwing and off flew the arrow, striking hard on the far distant target.

Bradwarden gave a grunt of respect, then let fly, his arrow, too, hitting the mark.

“Three,” said Elbryan, and he put up his bow three times in rapid succession, each bolt flying unerringly.

Bradwarden followed and scored three hits.

“Fourth, fifth, sixth!” Elbryan cried, letting three more shots fly, the first hitting the fourth target squarely, the second striking the fifth—splitting Elbryan’s previous shot on that target—and the last zipping into the final target, dead center.

The centaur sighed, beginning to understand that he had, for the first time, possibly met his match in a human. He got the fourth target easily enough, and then the fifth, but his shot at the last in line skipped off the top of the target and flew away into the brush beyond the far edge of the meadow.

Elbryan smiled widely and clenched a fist. He looked up at Bradwarden and found the centaur eyeing him with an expression he had not really seen from the creature before: respect.

“Ye’ve got yerself one dragon-killer of a bow, me friend,” Bradwarden offered. “And be sure that I’ve not seen a steadier hand.”

“I had the best bowyer,” Elbryan replied, “and the best tutors. None in all the world can match the archery of the Touel’alfar.”

Bradwarden snorted. “That’s because the skinny little folks don’t dare to get close to an enemy!” he replied. “Come on then, let us go and get our arrows, and then I’ll show ye something fine.”

They gathered together their arrows and their belongings and set off at once, the centaur leading Elbryan deep into the forest, past the pine and the caribou moss, down a deep valley, then up its other side. They walked for several hours, speaking little, but with the centaur often lifting his pipes to play. At last, the sun moving low in the western sky, they came to a secluded grove of pines, neatly tended into roughly a diamond shape. It sat on the gentle slope of a wide hill, surrounded on all sides by a meadow of tall grass and wildflowers. Elbryan could hardly believe that he hadn’t found this grove before, that his ranger instincts hadn’t guided him to a place so naturally perfect, so in tune with the harmony of the forest. This grove—every flower, every bush, every tree and stone, and the trickling brook that crossed it—was something more than the ordinary forests of the region. It was something sacred, something befitting Andur’Blough Inninness, and not of the tainted world of men.

There was some magic here; Elbryan felt that as clearly as he had felt the magic of the elven valley. Reverently, almost as if in a trance, the ranger approached, Bradwarden at his side. They crossed the outer line of thick evergreens into the heart of the grove and found bare paths weaving through the dense undergrowth. Elbryan walked along without speaking a word, as if fearing to disturb the stillness, for not a hint of a breeze came in through that wall of pines.

The path meandered, joining another, then forking three ways. The grove was not large, perhaps two hundred yards across and half again that measure in length, but Elbryan was certain that the paths, if straightened and laid end to end, would cover several miles. He looked back often to Bradwarden for guidance, but the centaur paid him no heed, just followed silently.

They came to a dark, shady spot where the path forked left and right around a great jut of rock covered with a thick patch of short yellow flowers. Elbryan glanced both ways, then, figuring that the paths converged just the other side of the boulder, went right. He soon came to the expected joining, and, looking ahead, he almost continued on.

“Not so perceptive for one trained by elves,” the centaur remarked, Bradwarden’s deep voice shattering the stillness. Elbryan spun around, meaning to hush him, but all thoughts of that, all thoughts of Bradwarden at all, left him as he glanced past the centaur, to the back side of the boulder that had split the path. Elbryan glided back, moving beside the centaur, staring hard at the pile of rocks, eight feet by six and roughly diamond shaped. The ranger glanced all about. They were in the very center of the grove, he realized, and he realized, too, that this cairn was the source of the magic, that the tree-lined borders of the grove seemed to be a reflection of this place.

He went down to one knee, studying the stones, marveling at the care with which they had been placed. He touched one and felt a gentle tingling there, the emanation of magic.

“Who is buried here?” the ranger whispered.

Bradwarden snorted and smiled. “Not for me to tell,” he replied, and Elbryan couldn’t discern if the centaur meant that he did not know, or that it was not his place to reveal the person’s identity.

“Put in the ground by the elves,” the centaur said, “when I was no bigger than yerself.”

Elbryan looked at him curiously. “And how long ago might that be,” he asked Bradwarden, “in the measure of human years?”

The centaur shrugged and pawed the ground uneasily. “Half a man’s life,” he replied; as exact an answer as Elbryan was going to get.

The ranger let it go. He didn’t need to know who was buried here. Obviously the man, or elf or whatever it might be, was important to the Touel’alfar; obviously they had graced this place, this cairn and the grove that had grown about it, with more than a small measure of their magic. He could be satisfied with that; Bradwarden had promised to show him something fine, and indeed the centaur had fulfilled that pledge.

There remained, however, the matter of Elbryan’s prize for winning the archery contest. He looked up at the centaur.

“Ye just keep coming here,” Bradwarden remarked, as if reading Elbryan’s thoughts, “and ye’ll find the one who leads the horses.”

The notion filled the ranger with both excitement and fear. They left the grove soon after, to find an evening meal. Elbryan returned later that night, and then again the next day, but it wasn’t until his fourth journey, some two weeks later, after he had returned from his rounds to End-o’-the-World, that he found Bradwarden’s payment.

It was a brisk autumn day, the wind whipping—though inside the grove, the air remained still—leaves and clouds alike, the puffy white mountains drifting swiftly overhead across the rich blue sky. Elbryan went right to the heart of the grove, paying homage to whoever was buried there, then came back to the edge, wanting to feel the breeze in his face.

Then he heard the music.

At first he thought it was Bradwarden at work with his pipes, but then he realized that it was too sweet, a subtle vibration in the ground and air, a natural song. It didn’t increase in volume or intensity, just played on, and Elbryan soon realized it to be a heralding call, the run of hooves and the wind. He turned and ran along to the southern tip of the grove, though he had no idea of what might be guiding him.

Across the wide meadow, past the flowers and the grass, he saw perfection of form, a huge stallion, milling about the shadows of the distant trees.

Elbryan held his breath as the great horse, shining black except for white on the bottoms of its forelegs and a white diamond above its eyes, came out onto the open field. It was taking his measure, Elbryan knew, though he was not downwind and too far for most horses even to notice him.

The stallion pawed the ground, then reared and whinnied. It came forward in a short burst, a show of strength, then turned and thundered away into the forest.

Elbryan breathed again. He knew the magnificent steed would not return that day, and so he walked away, not in the direction in which the horse had run but back toward Dundalis. He found Bradwarden, at work crafting some devilish arrows, and the centaur’s face immediately brightened.

“Welcome back,” Bradwarden offered with a chuckle. “I see ye’ve already been to the grove.”

Elbryan blushed to think that his emotions were so clearly displayed on his face.

“I telled ye,” the centaur gloated. “So fine a creature is—” He stopped and laughed again.

“The stallion has a name?”

“Different to all,” Bradwarden remarked. “But ye must be knowing it if ye want to get close to him.”

“And how might I learn it?”

“Silly boy,” said Bradwarden. “Ye do not learn it, ye just know it.”

The centaur walked off then, leaving Elbryan with his thoughts.

The ranger was back at the grove the next day, and the next after that, and every day, until finally, more than a week later, he heard, or rather, felt the music once more, this time from the west.

“Smart,” he quietly congratulated when the horse came into view on the edge of the shadows, for the stallion’s approach was downwind this time, that it might get a scent of this intruder to the grove without offering its own scent in return.

After a few minutes, the horse came out onto the open field, and again Elbryan’s breath was stolen away by the sheer beauty of the thing, by its muscled flanks and wide chest, by the intelligence of its features, those knowing black eyes.

A word came to the ranger then, but he shook his head, not understanding. He took a step forward and the horse ran off, breaking the spell and ending the encounter.

Their third meeting came only a day later, the same way as the previous, the stallion approaching tentatively from the west, eyeing Elbryan and pawing the ground.

That word was in his head again, a word that perfectly described the appearance of the great horse.

“Symphony!” the ranger called out, stepping boldly from the grove. To Elbryan’s surprise, to his delight and his horror, the horse reared and neighed loudly, then fell back to all fours and pawed hard at the ground.

“Symphony,” Elbryan repeated over and over as he cautiously approached. What other name could so fit such a horse? What other word could describe the beauty and harmony, the working of muscle with muscle, the songlike vibrations, as if all of nature heralded the run of the great stallion.

Before the ranger even realized it, he was within five strides of the great horse.

“Symphony,” he said quietly.

The horse nickered and threw back his head.

Elbryan moved closer, his hands out wide to show that he was not a threat. Respectfully, he put his hand on the stallion’s neck, stroking firmly and evenly. Slowly, slowly, the horse’s ears came up.

Then the great stallion leaped away, thundering back into the shadows, into the brush.

The pair met day after day, each time growing more comfortable. Elbryan soon realized that this horse was meant for him, as surely as if the elves had put him here as companion for the ranger—and that thought, too, did not seem so ridiculous.

“Did they?” he asked his uncle Mather at Oracle one night. “Is Symphony, for I know that to be the stallion’s proper title, a gift to me from the elves, from Juraviel, perhaps?”

There came no reply, of course, but hearing his own words, Elbryan discovered one distinct flaw in his reasoning.

“Not a gift, then,” he said, “for no such animal could ever be given. But surely the elves have played some role, for this was no chance meeting and the response from the horse was not as would be expected from a creature running fully wild all its life.

“The cairn,” Elbryan whispered a moment later, discovering his answer. It seemed so perfectly clear to him then; the magic of the cairn had somehow brought Symphony to him—no, it had brought the two of them together, ranger and stallion. Now more than ever, Elbryan wanted to know who was buried there, what great man—or elf or centaur, perhaps—had been placed so reverently in the ground by the Touel’alfar, with magic strong enough to tend that perfect grove, strong enough to call Symphony and to give the horse such intelligence. For surely it was the magic of the cairn that had done all of this; Elbryan knew that without doubt.

The next day, he rode Symphony for the first time, bareback, clutching tight to the horse’s thick mane. The wind rushed past his ears, the landscape flying along beneath, such a thrill of the run, such a smoothness of stride, that Elbryan would have sworn he was flying across a cushion of air.

As soon as he dismounted, back in the meadow by the grove, Symphony turned and ran off, and Elbryan made no move to stop the stallion, for he knew that this was not the normal rider-horse relationship, not a relationship of master to beast but a friendship of mutual respect and trust.

Symphony would come back to him, he knew, would let him ride again, but on the stallion’s own terms.

Elbryan gave a salute to that place on the forest’s edge where the stallion had disappeared, a motion of respect and understanding that he and Symphony had their own separate lives but were joined now.

CHAPTER 31

Home Again, Home Again

Over the next couple of weeks, as they marched along the trails, Avelyn showed Jill just how much he had come to trust her, for he began formally tutoring her in the ways of the stones. At first, the monk used the conventional methods, the same lessons that had been given to him in St.-Mere-Abelle. He saw at once, though, that Jill was far beyond an average beginning student, was nearly as strong as he had been when Master Jojonah had played the out-of-body game with him that first time. Avelyn understood the source. Jill was naturally strong, but surely not as strong as he had been. But she was no beginner. That joining by means of the hematite when he had been sorely wounded had given her an understanding of accessing the powers on a level that other monks spent months, even years, trying to attain. As their friendship deepened, their trust becoming so strong, Avelyn again dared to use the hematite to instruct Jill. Not only was her gain exponential, but so was the monk’s understanding of this secretive woman—and of her dark past.

“Dundalis.” The word fell from Jill’s lips like the peal of a church bell, a chime that could be of celebration, of hope and the future promise of eternal life, or one that could signify death. The young woman ran a hand through her hair, which had grown thick to her shoulders again, and looked at Avelyn suspiciously. “You knew,” she accused.

Avelyn shrugged, having no practical response.

“Somehow you discovered my history,” the woman went on, using excitement, a sense of betrayal, to block away the more urgent feelings that were welling up inside her as she considered that long-lost name, the name of the village that had been her home and apparently the name of a new village, built on the same spot. “In Palmaris,” Jill reasoned, “you spoke with Graevis!”

“Pettibwa, actually,” Avelyn admitted dryly.

“You dared?”

“I had no choice,” Avelyn retorted. “I am your friend.”

Jill stuttered incoherently for a moment, trying to sort it all out. Avelyn had led her north of the city, along the Masur Delaval to its delta, then turning inland, heading for the wilderness. It had happened in a roundabout manner; Jill feared that she might be wandering into once-familiar territory, but really nothing had sparked recognition within her, not until the pair had ventured into a town called End-o’-the-World and had heard that name “Dundalis” spoken aloud. She wanted to lash out at Avelyn at that moment, but she could not deny his last words. Indeed the monk was her friend, among the best of friends Jill had ever known. She need only look at the gift he was giving to her with the stones to confirm that he loved her.

“You run from ghosts, my friend, my dearest Jill,” Avelyn explained. “I see your pain and feel it as though it were my own. It is evident in every stride you take; in every smile you feign—yea, feign, I say, for have you really smiled, Jill? In all of your life?”

Tears welled in the young woman’s shining blue eyes and she looked away.

“You have, I say!” Avelyn insisted. “Of course you have! But that was before the disaster, before the ghosts began to walk in your footsteps.”

“Why did you bring me here?”

“Because here those ghosts have nothing to hide behind,” Avelyn remarked firmly. “Here, in this new village that was once your home, you will confront those ghosts and banish them to the peace they deserve, and the peace you deserve.”

It was spoken with such resolve, such strength, that Jill could no longer be angry with him. Brother Avelyn was indeed her friend, she knew, and he wanted only what was best for her, would fight and die for her sake. But still she feared that his decision was folly, based on his underestimating the pain within her. Avelyn could not truly appreciate that grief; nor could Jill, but she feared it lurked right below the surface and, if loosed, would surely consume her.

She nodded mutely, having no answers, having only fears. She walked in the back door of the tavern, then to the private room she and Avelyn had rented. She didn’t know what memories the familiar name might conjure, but she wanted to be alone when she faced them.

He had been angered beyond words, had spat and kicked down the door of his room, had even broken the jaw of one woman of the night who had offered her wares. For Palmaris had deceived him as much as his encounter with the merchant Dosey had unnerved him. Brother Justice had not gained on his intended prey—had, in fact, lost ground, wandering aimlessly about the large city. Only chance had brought him in contact with a man named Bildeborough and a rake named Grady Chilichunk, drunkards both.

Brother Justice found their stories, sputtered for the price of a few cheap ales, quite interesting. Especially Grady’s, when the man mentioned that he had seen yet another Abellican monk only a month before, talking with his mother, Pettibwa, in Fellowship Way. “How uncommon that two of you should come out together,” Grady remarked, not politely. “Normally your kind are so reclusive; and what do you do to entertain yourselves within those abbey walls?”

The implications were clear, considering the man’s lewd manner, and Grady and Connor shared a laugh.

Brother Justice used a fantasy of twisting the fool’s head off to force a smile. The monk remained polite long enough to learn that this other Abellican monk, whom he suspected to be Brother Avelyn, had gone out to the north to the Wilderlands and the Timberlands, to a place called Weedy Meadow.

There were no merchant caravans going north from Palmaris at that time, with autumn settling thick over the land and the promise of a deep winter, but that hardly deterred the resourceful Brother Justice. He set out alone, moving swiftly, running more than walking, determined to make up the ground and be done with this business.

She remembered that long-ago morning on the tree-covered slope, looking at the sky, at the shining Halo, with its rainbow of colors, its heavenly allure. She remembered the music filling all the air. She had not been alone that morning, Jill now realized, for she had called out her discovery.

“A boy,” she whispered to the empty corners of her small room. The name “Elbryan” nipped at the edges of her mind, but with it came an overwhelming sense of grief and loss: that black wall of pain that caused her to shrink away, that had made her put the glowing ember in Connor Bildeborough’s face.

Jill took a deep breath and forced all the memories away. She did not sleep at all that night, but still, she was packed for the road early the next morning, leading a groggy—and hungover—Avelyn by the hand out of the inn, tugging him down the eastern road, toward the village known as Dundalis.

They arrived late that afternoon, the sun settling on the western horizon, the long, slanted shadows rolling out from the buildings of the new village. Jill didn’t recognize the place, not at all, and she was surprised by this fact. She had held her breath along the last expanse of road before Dundalis came into sight, expecting to be overwhelmed by sudden memories. It simply didn’t happen like that. This was Dundalis, built on the remains of the former Dundalis, but it resembled Weedy Meadow, End-o’-the-World, or any other frontier village as much as it resembled its namesake—at least at first glance.

Avelyn let Jill lead him through the village, down the one main road, heading north. There was an old, broken-down fence on the northern edge of town, formerly a corral, Jill realized, and beyond it was the slope.

The slope.

“I saw the Halo from there,” she remarked.

Avelyn smiled, but only briefly, remembering his most vivid encounters with the Halo, so far, far away on board a swift sailing ship on his most important and sacred mission.

“It was real,” Jill whispered, more to herself than to Avelyn. She took some satisfaction in that, in knowing that the small fragment of her past life that was clear to her was indeed something real and not imagined. Looking up from the northern edge of Dundalis to the slope that separated the town from the valley of evergreens and caribou moss, to the slope that had been so important to her in her youth, Jill knew beyond any doubt that her memory of sighting the majestic Halo was indeed real. She felt it again, that tingling sensation, that removal of mortal bonds to soar into the infinite universe.

“The boy,” she remarked.

“You were with someone?” Avelyn asked, trying to coax her on.

Jill nodded. “Someone dear,” she replied.

The moment passed; Jill turned back toward the town. She paused before she got all the way around, though, staring hard at the old corral fence. “I used to play on that fence,” she announced. “We would climb up to the top rail and bet on how long we could walk it.”

“We?”

“My friends,” Jill said, without really thinking about her answer.

Avelyn had hoped that his latest prompt would get her to name some of those lost friends, but he wasn’t too disappointed with its failure. The trip north had been a wise thing, the monk believed, for now, only a few minutes after entering Dundalis, Jill had recaptured more of her past than she had known in many years.

“Bunker Crawyer,” she said suddenly, her expression turning curious.

“A friend?”

“No,” Jill replied, pointing to the old fence. “It was his corral. Bunker Crawyer’s corral.”

Avelyn smiled widely, but hid it when Jill turned to regard him, her frustration evident. It was coming back, but painfully slowly, for now she was growing quite impatient.

“Let us go and get lodging for the night,” the monk offered. “We passed an inn on our way to this place.”

Avelyn knew that another memory had come over Jill, this one more powerful, as they approached the front door of the place called the Howling Sheila, a large tavern near the center of Dundalis. The woman looked not at the building, but at the ground beneath it, her expression shifting from curiosity to fear to outright horror.

She turned away, trembling, and Avelyn caught her even as she started to run. If he let her go, the monk suspected that she would run all the way back to Weedy Meadow, all the way back to End-o’-the-World, all the way back to Palmaris!

“You know this place,” Avelyn said, holding her fast.

Jill’s breath came in gasps; she smelled smoke, thick and black. Though she was outside, she felt as if she were suffocating, closed within a space that was too tight.

“You know!” Avelyn declared forcefully, giving her a shake.

Jill’s deep breath resonated like a growl and she turned, pulling free of the monk, staring hard at the tavern, at its stone foundation. “I hid in there,” she said, working hard so that her voice would not break apart. “While all the town burned down around me. While all the screams . . .”

Her words faded to a choking sniffle, her straightened shoulders slumped suddenly, and she would have fallen to the ground had not Avelyn held her tight.

There was no other inn in Dundalis, and besides, Avelyn had not come all this way simply to allow Jill to run again from her terrible past. He paid for a single room, for there was but one vacancy, pointedly explaining to the jolly Belster O’Comely that there was nothing romantic or lewd between him and the girl, that they were merely good friends and traveling companions. That was the first time he had ever bothered to offer such an explanation, Avelyn mused as he led Jill up the stairs from the common room to their sleeping quarters. The monk believed that they might remain in this town for some time, and since the community was so small and so closed, he felt the need to protect Jill’s reputation. She would face enough trials in Dundalis, Avelyn knew, without hearing the nasty whispers of gossiping townsfolk.

Jill went right to sleep, overcome by the sheer power of the memory. Avelyn remained with her for a long while, fearing that disturbing dreams would visit her.

She slept soundly, perhaps too drained for dreams. Finally Avelyn could not ignore the commotion from the common room below any longer. Most of the village was gathered there, the monk knew, and for all of his love for Jill—and he did indeed love the girl, as a father might love a daughter—the battered monk had needs of his own.

He was downstairs soon enough, drinking and talking amid a huge crowd, for many of the area trappers had come in to lay in provisions in preparation of the coming winter. They were a tough bunch indeed, reclusive and opinionated, men and a few women who lived by their weapons and their cunning, and Avelyn was soon enough arguing with one rake that a town whose history was as dark as that of Dundalis should be better prepared to face the danger.

When the trapper scoffed that the most dangerous thing in the area was the occasional hungry raccoon, Brother Avelyn promptly put his fist in the man’s face.

The monk was alone with Belster O’Comely in the common room when he woke up, a slab of steak positioned over one eye.

“Ho, ho, what?” he asked the innkeeper. “Best training the folk around here have seen in years!”

Belster gave a laugh. The folk of Dundalis were a hardy bunch, not shying from the occasional fight. In a weird way, Avelyn—who had fought well, though he hardly remembered it—had earned a bit of respect that night, though most of the men and women who had been in the common room thought him mad.

Belster presented him with a piece of paper, a bill. “They decided that you would pay for the last round of drinks,” the innkeeper remarked.

“Ho, ho, what!” Avelyn howled, and he was smiling wide as he turned over the pieces of silver.

That jolly smile turned to one of warmth as the monk entered his rented room to find Jill curled up about her pillow, seeming like such a little lost girl. Avelyn knelt by her bed and stroked her thick golden hair, then kissed her on the cheek.

CHAPTER 32

Darkness Rising

Elkenbrook was a village not unlike Dundalis or Weedy Meadow, except that, being on the western border of Alpinador, it was a colder place, with more hardy evergreens and fewer deciduous trees. Winter in Elkenbrook began in the eighth month of the year, Octenbrough, usually within a few weeks of the autumnal equinox, and lingered on until the month of Toumanay had passed, giving way to a short spring and shorter summer. The folk of Elkenbrook were light skinned and light of eye and hair, as was true of most of their Alpinadoran brethren. And, again as befitted the race, they were undeniably hardy, tall and square shouldered, accustomed to hardship. Even the children of the Alpinadoran frontier—and most of the still-wild kingdom was considered frontier!—could wield a weapon, for goblins and fomorian giants were much more common up north than in the more civilized southern kingdoms. The settlement, in attitude and posture, reflected this, for Elkenbrook, unlike the villages of northern Honce-the-Bear, was walled by an eight-foot fence of spiked logs.

Thus, when the scouts of Elkenbrook reported goblin sign, the hardy folk were not too concerned. Even when giant footsteps were noted mingled in with those of the wretched smaller humanoids, the village leaders only shrugged stoically and began sharpening their long broadswords and heavy axes.

It wasn’t until the very moment before the attack, eight hours after the dawn, the pale sun already touching the western horizon, that Elkenbrook truly appreciated its enemy and understood its doom. Normally the goblins would have come in as a mob, a rushing horde, barreling past the trees and scrub, throwing themselves wildly against the pickets and barricades. This time, though, the wretches ringed the village, completely encircling it with ranks ten deep! And the goblin line was bolstered every twenty paces by a fomorian giant wrapped in layers and layers of thick furs.

The folk of Elkenbrook had never known such a huge gathering of goblins, could not conceive of the notion that the hateful, selfish creatures could ever band together in such numbers. Yet here they were, countless spearheads glistening in the last slanted rays of day, countless shields, emblazoned with the standards of many different tribes, standing side by side.

As one, the village folk held their breath, too overwhelmed to speak, to offer any new directives or strategies. Often marauding goblins would send in a messenger before the attack to ask for surrender, to barter for a bribe, warning that battle would otherwise be joined. The usual answer to such a request came in the form of the messenger’s head staked before the village wall.

This time, though, more than a few of the village folk were considering their options should an emissary approach.

The goblins held their line for several minutes, then, on command, their ranks parted, doubled in depth as each warrior stepped left or right, a single, brisk movement.

Out from the gaps in the line came the next surprise, a goblin cavalry, the diminutive creatures astride shaggy ponies. Goblin riders were not unknown but were considered a rarity—never had any of the folk of Elkenbrook imagined that so many could be together.

“Four hundred,” one man estimated, and that guess put the goblin cavalry alone at twice the number of Elkenbrook’ s entire population.

Just as stunning to the hardy folk was the manner in which the goblin lines had parted. “Trained army,” another man muttered.

“Disciplined,” yet another agreed, his expression incredulous—and desperate, for it was no secret among the Alpinadorans that the only thing that had kept the fierce and prolific goblins from overrunning the entire northland was their inability to band together. Goblins fought goblins more often than they fought humans—or any other race, for that matter.

Directly before Elkenbrook’s main gate, four creatures emerged from the ranks: a huge fomorian, nearly three times a tall man’s height, wrapped in furs and the skin of a white bear and carrying the largest club any of the villagers had ever seen; an incredibly ugly goblin, its face scarred and disfigured, one arm chopped away just below the elbow; and two curious creatures, goblin sized but not goblin shaped, with barrel-like stout bodies and spindly arms and legs that seemed too skinny to support them. Most striking of all about these last two creatures were their berets, shining bright red in the fast-dimming light.

“Bloody Caps,” one man offered, and there were nods of agreement, though none of Elkenbrook’s folk had ever before actually seen one of the infamous powries.

Again, the enemy line held its formidable posture as the seconds slipped by. Then one of the powries motioned to the giant; and the fomorian, grinning wickedly, lifted the dwarf high into the air. His eyes locked firmly on Elkenbrook, the dwarf removed his beret and waved it about in the air, high above his head.

The folk recognized the dramatic movement as a signal and braced for the charge, determined to take their toll, whatever the final outcome. What they heard, though, was not the thunder of hooves or the howls of charging goblins but the creaking swish of powrie war engines. Great stones, twelve-foot spears, and balls of burning pitch soared through the air, turning the tensed, frozen town into a frenzy of screams and cries, splintering logs, and hissing flames.

Few folk remained on the wall when the second volley roared in, for they were engaged in tending wounded, in battling flames, and shoring up defensive barricades. Most did not see the charge then, a splendid thing indeed; but they heard it, the very ground shaking under their feet.

The third volley, more than two hundred spears hurled by the rushing infantry, flew in just before the cavalry arrived, and thus as the riders poured through the many openings in the walls, they found more dead villagers than remaining defenders. Those folk who had survived the bombardment soon envied their dead companions.

Elkenbrook was flattened before the sun dipped below the horizon. Maiyer Dek of the fomorians, Gothra of the goblins, and Ubba Banrock and Ulg Tik’narn of the powries stood at the center of the massacre, hands and eyes uplifted, crying out to their leader, their god-figure.

Far away, on its obsidian throne in Aida, the dactyl heard them and savored the kill, the first organized attack by its trained minions. The demon could smell the blood and taste the fury as surely as if it had been on the scene with its chieftains.

And this was but the first, the appetizer, the dactyl knew, for its army continued to grow, black masses swarming into the embrace of Aida’s dark arms, and Alpinador’s lonely villages were merely a testing ground. The real challenge lay in the south, in the most prosperous and populous kingdom, in Honce-the-Bear.

They would be ready as winter began to relinquish its grip on the land, when the snows receded enough to free up the higher passes.

They would be ready.

Jill meandered this way and that on the forested slope north of Dundalis. The first snows had fallen, a light and gentle blanket, and the air was chill, the sky above showing the richest blue hue. That air alone brought to the young woman familiarity, a crispness that she had not known in the city of Palmaris nor in Pireth Tulme, where the dull and damp fog seemed eternal. Jill had known this air, so crisp and so clean, in her youth, in this place; and images of that past life flitted past the edges of her consciousness now, brief glimpses of what had once been.

She knew that her life had been happy, her youth full of freedom and wild games. She knew that she had had many friends, coconspirators in one grand and mischievous scheme after another. Life had been somehow simpler and cleaner, hard work and hard play, good food fairly earned, and laughter that came from the belly, not from any sense of good manners.

Still, the details of that past existence escaped her, as did the actual names, though many of the faces returned. Such was her frustration that bright morning as she walked about the forested slope to the tip of the ridge, to a pair of twin pines overlooking the wide vale of ever-white mossy ground and squat trees, their dark branches dusted by the recent snow.

More images came rushing to her as soon as she sat in the nook of those pines. She pictured a line of hunters weaving in and out of the trees in the mossy vale. She envisioned shoulder poles, and recalled her excitement that the hunt had apparently been successful.

Then the images began to crowd back, of herself running to the group, losing sight of them as she entered the low vale, weaving in and out of the barrier pines and spruce, running with a friend. She remembered rushing through that last obstacle, the feel of the prickly pine branches on her arms, and coming face-to-face with the returning hunters—yes, she could see their faces, and among them was her father!

She remembered! And their poles were laden with the deer they would need, and with . . . something else.

Jill’s eyes opened wide, the memory suddenly too vivid, the recollection of that ugly, misshapen dead thing assaulting her, telling her mind to run away.

She held the image fast, though her breath would hardly come to her. She remembered that morning, that bright morning, so much like this one. She had seen the Halo, and then the hunters, including her father, had returned with the winter provisions—and with the goblin.

“The goblin,” Jill whispered aloud, the very name assuring her that this past event had been the foretelling of doom for Dundalis, for her home, her family, and her friends.

She fought hard to steady her breathing, to keep her hands from trembling.

“Are you well, my lady?”

She nearly jumped out of her boots, spinning fast to face the questioner: a monk of the Abellican Church, wearing the same style brown robe as Brother Avelyn, its hood pulled back to reveal a shaven head. He was much shorter than Avelyn, but with wide shoulders, obviously strong.

“Are you well?”

He asked the question softly, gently, but Jill sensed a hard edge to his voice and that his concern was merely for show. He studied her intently, she noted, staring long at her hair, at her eyes and lips, as if he were taking a measure of her.

Indeed he was. Brother Justice had heard many descriptions of the woman traveling beside the mad friar, and as he looked upon this woman now, upon her lips, so thick and full, her stunning blue eyes, and that thick mane of golden hair, he knew.

“You should not be up here all alone,” he mentioned.

Jill scoffed and brushed her fingers across the hilt of her short sword, not to threaten but merely to display that she was not unarmed. “I served in the army of the King,” she assured the monk, “in the Coastpoint Guards.” The way the man’s eyes narrowed in recognition suddenly caught Jill off guard and made her think that perhaps she had not been wise in mentioning that fact.

“What is your name?” he asked.

“What is your own?” Jill snapped back, growing ever more defensive. It struck her as curious that a brother of the Abellican Church should be this far to the north and should be out alone away from the village. She considered Avelyn’s story then, his abandonment of the order. Might there be consequences for such an action? Might the mad friar’s increasing reputation have brought unwanted recognition from the strict order?

“My name has never been important,” the monk replied evenly, “except to one. To a man once of my order but who deserted the way and who stole from my abbey. Yes,” he said, viewing clearly Jill’s growing look of apprehension, “to Brother Avelyn Desbris, I am Brother Justice. To your companion, my girl, I am doom incarnate, sent from the church to retrieve what he stole.”

Jill was up on her feet, backing steadily, sword drawn.

“You would attack a lawful emissary of the church?” the monk demanded. “One whose title as Brother Justice is fair and true, and who carries the punishment rightfully earned by the outlaw monk you name as your companion?”

“I will defend Avelyn,” Jill assured the man. “He is no outlaw.”

The monk scoffed, standing easily. Then suddenly, brutally, he leaped ahead, fell low in a spinning crouch, and kicked up hard at Jill’s extended sword.

A deft twist by the woman turned the sword out of harm’s way, allowing Brother Justice merely a glancing hit that forced Jill back a step.

Brother Justice squared himself, ready to spring again, his respect for the woman growing. She was no novice to battle, this one, with finely honed reflexes.

“It is rumored that you, too, are an outlaw,” he teased, edging closer, “a deserter from Pireth Tulme.”

Jill didn’t flinch, didn’t blink.

“Perhaps the Coastpoint Guards will offer a bounty,” the monk said, and he came on fiercely, spinning another kick, then turning straight and kicking out three time in rapid succession, his foot snapping hard at Jill from various heights. She dodged each, side-stepping, then came in hard with a thrust of her own.

Her conscience held her, forced her to realize that she was about to kill a human being.

She needn’t have worried, for her sword would never have gotten close to striking the deadly monk. Brother Justice let it come in at him, turning subtly at the very last moment, his left arm rolling under, then up and out, against the flat of the blade. He stepped ahead as he parried, launching a heavy right cross.

Jill retreated immediately, but got stung on the ribs, her breath blasted away. She staggered backward, setting her feet as she went, ready to fend off the expected attack.

As her thoughts cleared, she saw that the monk was not pursuing, was not capitalizing on the advantage he had earned. He stood calmly, a dozen feet away, one hand in a pocket of his robe. To Jill’s amazement, his eyes closed.

The woman’s questions were lost suddenly in a dizzying rush, for though the monk had not physically moved, he came at her again, at her very spirit, and suddenly the woman was fighting, through sheer willpower, to retain control of her body!

Intense pain shot through Jill’s body and soul, and through the monk’s, as well, she knew—though that thought gave her little comfort. She felt his obscene intrusion as a shadowy wall, pushing into her, pushing her away from her own body. At first, she felt overwhelmed, felt as if she could not possibly resist. But soon she came to understand that in this body—in this, her home battleground—she could indeed withstand the monk’s wicked intrusion. The shadowy wall edged back as Jill pushed hard with all her considerable willpower. She envisioned herself as a light source, a blazing sun, rightful owner of this mortal coil, and she fought back.

Then the shadow was gone, and Jill staggered a step and opened her eyes.

He was right in her face, leering at her. She understood then that his mental attack had been but a ruse, a distraction from which he could recover much faster than she.

She knew that, in the split second of consciousness she had remaining. She knew all of it and yet that knowledge brought only despair, for he was too close, too ready, and she could not hope to defend.

Brother Justice knifed his hand into her throat, dropping her back to the snow and dirt. A single clean blow, but a punch pulled, for the monk did not want the woman dead. Her knowledge would be valuable in locating treacherous Avelyn, he presumed, and her presence as his prisoner would certainly aid in bringing the outlaw monk to him.

He did not want the woman dead, not yet, but the monk knew that when his business with Avelyn was finished, this woman, Jill, too, would have to die.

Brother Justice cared not at all.

CHAPTER 33

The Telling Blow

Elbryan sat far in the back of the Howling Sheila, pushing his chair right into the corner that he might have the security of walls on both his rear flanks. The ranger wasn’t expecting trouble—the people of Dundalis might not like him, but they had never been openly hostile—it was simply his training at work, always reminding him to place himself in the most defensible position.

The crowd was loud this night, the tavern packed full, for a light snow was falling outside and the people feared that it might intensify. A blizzard could effectively shut the folk in their homes for a week straight.

The drinks were flowing, the conversation rowdy and mostly about the weather, except in one corner of the bar where a fat, brown-robed man and several townsfolk were arguing about the potential of a goblin raid.

“Happened before,” Brother Avelyn declared dryly. “Whole town flattened and only one—or perhaps none—survived.” The monk snorted and hoped his slip would not be noticed. Jill’s secret was his to keep, and hers—and hers alone—to reveal.

“But only after Dundalis’ hunters killed a goblin in the woods,” protested a man named Tol Yuganick, a bear of a man, though he did not seem so large next to three-hundred-pound Avelyn. “And that was nearly a decade ago. The goblins would not come back. No reason.”

“And not with Dusty on the prowl,” another man laughed, turning to glance across the room to the ranger, alone at his table in the back corner. The other three townsfolk joined in the laughter, more than willing to do so at Elbryan’s expense.

“And who is this man?” Avelyn wanted to know.

“An attentive ear for your tales of doom,” remarked Tol, quaffing his entire mug of beer, so that his lips and chin were covered in foam.

“And was it not Elbryan who took care of that marauding black bear?” asked Belster O’Comely, moving down to that end of the bar, wiping it rather enthusiastically to force two of the men away. “The same bear that sacked your own home, Burgis Gosen!”

The smaller man, Burgis, shied away at the declaration.

“Bah!” Tol snorted, a cloud of anger crossing his brutish features. The huge man had never appreciated Belster’s relationship with the strange Nightbird and had said so often and loudly.

Belster held his ground behind the bar. For a long time, the innkeeper had kept his friendship with Elbryan quiet and low-key, knowing that his own reputation might be at stake. Lately, though, Belster had begun changing that. He had recently commissioned a specially designed saddle from the local leather-worker, and had made no secret that it was for Nightbird, payment for some work the ranger had done for him.

“The bear was sick and dying anyway,” Tol Yuganick blustered on. “Doubt that Elbryan there, our lord protector, ever saw the damned thing.”

Several grunts and nods of agreement followed. Belster, understanding that he would get nowhere with this surly crowd, just shook his head and moved along with his work. He knew that any reminder of the bear incident bothered Tol, for the hunter had sworn to get the bear himself—and would have been paid a fairly substantial reward if he had!

Brother Avelyn, too, ignored Tol Yuganick’s cheering gallery. He studied the man in the distant corner, the one Tol had referred to sarcastically as “our lord protector,” with new interest. Perhaps this one understood the truth of the world, he mused.

“I should think you would all be grateful,” the monk remarked absently, more thinking out loud than any directed comment.

A moment later, Avelyn, still focused on the man across the room, felt a hard poke against his chest.

“We need no protecting!” Tol Yuganick declared, moving his contorted, though still childish, face right before the monk’s.

Avelyn looked long and hard at the man, at the cherubic features so twisted by an almost maniacal rage. Then the monk glanced back over his shoulder, to see Belster shaking his head resignedly; the barkeep knew what was coming.

Avelyn stepped back and produced a small flask from under his cloak. “Potion of courage,” he whispered to Burgis Gosen, giving a wink, and then he took a deep draw. He finished with a satisfied “Aaah!” then rubbed his free hand briskly over his face while replacing the flask in his thick robes.

Then Avelyn eyed Tol squarely, matching the man’s ominous expression with one of pure excitement. Tol growled and came forward, but Avelyn was ready for him.

“Ho, ho, what!” the monk bellowed as Tol moved to poke him in the chest again. With a single sweeping left hook, Avelyn laid the big man low.

Two of Tol’s companions jumped the monk immediately, but they were shrugged away and the fight was on.

Behind the bar, Belster shook his head and sighed deeply, wondering how many would be left standing to help him clean up the mess.

Brother Justice smiled wickedly as he approached the Howling Sheila, as he heard the commotion of a fight, confirmation that Brother Avelyn was within. The monk had shed his telltale brown robe in favor of the more normal dress of a villager. He wondered if his old friend Avelyn would recognize him without the Abellican trappings, and that thought prompted the man to pull low the hood of his traveling cloak.

Better for the surprise.

Avelyn was outnumbered five to one—and those odds were only due to the fact that three other men were fighting on his side, or at least, against the mob that was moving against the monk.

Elbryan, on his feet and ready, watched it all curiously, not quite knowing what to make of the wild monk, as Avelyn, fighting wonderfully, kept bellowing out for “preparedness,” and calling the brawl a “readiness exercise.” The ranger was not unhappy at seeing Tol Yuganick and his friends getting a beating, as long as things didn’t get too out of hand.

Elbryan allowed himself a smile when brutish Tol pulled himself up from the floor and charged the monk with a roar, only to have the huge man sidestep at the last possible second, tripping Tol over a trailing leg, then helping him along with a stiff forearm to the back of the flying man’s head.

“Ho, ho, what!” Avelyn howled in glee.

So Elbryan stood back from it all, figuring it to be one of those dangers for the villagers to work out on their own. He kept Hawkwing, unstrung, ready at his side, though, already deciding that no deadly revenge would be taken once the monk was put down.

If the monk was put down, Elbryan soon corrected his thinking, for the fat man moved with the grace and precision of a trained warrior. He dodged and punched, took a hit and laughed it away, then buried his latest attacker with a heavy punch or a well-placed knee. He flipped two men at once over his huge shoulders, laughing all the while. A chair shattered against his back, but while Belster O’Comely groaned at the hit, the monk only laughed all the louder, giving his habitual cry, “Ho, ho, what!”

Elbryan leaned on his staff, thinking this quite a show. As soon as his posture eased, he was challenged almost immediately as an enthusiastic villager used the opportunity of a general fight to take a punch at the disliked ranger.

Elbryan casually put Hawkwing out vertically in front of him, picking off the punch with the hard wood. The attacker moaned and clutched his hand, and Elbryan pulled hard down and toward himself with his upper hand so that the staff’s lower end shot up and out, right between the groaning man’s legs.

Elbryan retracted the weapon and poked it straight out, setting it firmly against the man’s chest and pushing him away to fall, clutching hand and groin, to the floor. Then the ranger went back to watching, thinking that the mad monk would soon tire. If the man made but a single mistake, the mob of villagers would overwhelm him.

Then Elbryan would step in.

The ranger smiled once more as Tol Yuganick attacked again, only to be hammered away. Elbryan’s grin faded fast, though, his expression turning to one of curiosity, as a newcomer slipped in the tavern doors, moving easily through the battling crowd. When one man turned to punch at him, the newcomer leveled him with a series of three sharp; perfectly placed blows, launched with such rapidity that the man hadn’t even moved to respond to the first when the third dropped him.

Even without the fighting display, Elbryan knew that this was no ordinary villager. The man walked with the balanced gait of a warrior and sifted through the crowd with the focus of an assassin—and like an assassin, his face was half-covered, a scarf pulled up high and tightly tied.

It wasn’t difficult for the ranger to discern the man’s target.

What enemies had this wild monk made? Elbryan wondered, as he, too, worked through the tangled crowd, angling to intercept the newcomer.

The deadly punch was headed for Avelyn’s throat, though the fat monk, already engaged with two others, never saw it coming. Elbryan’s staff picked it off in midair; deflecting the blow up high. The newcomer, his balance and timing perfect, hardly noticed, but followed with his second strike, his other hand coming across hard.

Elbryan snapped his staff down low, quite hard, stinging the man on the forearm.

Now Brother Justice did turn his sights on Elbryan, spinning to face him with the sudden knowledge that this, too, was no ordinary villager who had come to Avelyn’s aid. A man tried to jump on the monk’s back then, but Brother Justice elbowed him hard in the chest, then the neck, then the face in rapid succession, sending him tumbling away. None of those nearby who had seen the defense wanted any part of the stranger, and none in the tavern—except perhaps for Tol, who was still on the floor—wanted a fight with Elbryan. That left the two, Elbryan and Brother Justice, standing face-to-face, an island of calm in a raging sea, weirdly isolated from the rest of the thrashing mob.

The monk leaped ahead, feigning a punch and kicking straight out for Elbryan’s knee. Elbryan put his staff up high to block the expected punch, but even though he seemed to fall for the ruse, the ranger was not caught. He spun a reverse circuit off his back foot even as Brother Justice kicked, moving his leg out of range.

Brother Justice came ahead hard, trying to beat the turn, to catch his foe on the back before Elbryan could get all the way around.

Elbryan halted in mid-spin, reversed his energy, and sent the staff straight out and back. He turned right under the weapon and launched it again in a straight poke, driving his opponent backward. Then the ranger went into a flurry: poking, swishing the staff side to side, then pulling it straight across, and alternating a series of heavy blows, left hand leading, right hand leading.

Brother Justice picked every attack off, his arms waving in a blur, hardened forearms smacking against the polished wood. He tried to find some hole in the ranger’s press, some opening through which he might go on the attack once more. But Elbryan’s form was perfect, each strike following the previous too closely for any countering move.

Still, the ranger did not get through the defenses of the skilled monk, and soon enough, didn’t even have Brother Justice backing any longer.

The attack flurry played itself out, Elbryan coming to a crouched stance, Hawkwing horizontal in front of him. Now the monk did come on fiercely, chopping at the staff as if he meant to snap it in half.

Elbryan was ready, had anticipated the move perfectly. He brought the staff in close to his chest, Brother Justice’s downward swipe falling short, then rolled Hawkwing over the descending arm and snapped it down hard. In the same motion, Elbryan came ahead a step and thrust both his hands, and thus the staff, straight out horizontally, driving it under the monk’s chin.

Brother Justice fell away as the wicked strike came in. He rolled his free arm up, taking some of the momentum from the blow, then knifed his hand out straight, scoring a hit of his own.

The two staggered apart, Elbryan gasping for breath, Brother Justice trying to shake away the dizziness. Immediately the mob rolled in around them, for all the Howling Sheila was flying fists and breaking chairs.

“Ho, ho, what!” came the exuberant bellow above the din, and it was obvious to Elbryan that the fat monk was enjoying this row.

Elbryan heard the movement behind him, recognizing it as an attack. He spun, Hawkwing extended, to pick off a lumbering hook, then brought the high tip of his staff down hard diagonally, drawing blood on the face of Tol Yuganick. Seeing the huge man dazed, Elbryan let go his weapon with one hand and snapped his palm into Tol’s chin, dropping him heavily to the floor. Then the ranger began his scan again, seeking the newcomer, this skilled fighter, this assassin. The ranger elbowed through the brawl, blocking punches whenever necessary, felling with three shortened blows yet another villager who tried to pounce upon him.

Brother Justice moved in a wide circuit of the dangerous ranger. He took a small pin from the rope belt of his robe and held it in tight, against his sunstone. Sunstones were used as wards, primarily against magic but also against various poisons. The stone’s magic could be twisted, though—could be inverted.

Soon the monk spotted the ranger, predictably walking a guard near fighting Avelyn. Slowly Brother Justice closed, using bodies as camouflage.

Elbryan noted the man’s approach and was ready when the deadly monk came in. He started for Elbryan but shifted suddenly and darted fast for Avelyn, who was standing with his arms high above his head, spinning Burgis Gosen in circles.

Elbryan had to move fast, had to throw his weight to the side frantically to intercept. He noted the tiny flicker of silver in the newcomer’s hand, noted that the man held some weapon.

He caught the newcomer by the wrist, accepted a punch from the man’s other hand in exchange for his own strike with Hawkwing. Brother Justice had the better balance at that time, though, and Elbryan took the worst of it. He staggered to one knee, trying to find a defensive posture, expecting to be pummeled.

The attack never came. Elbryan saw a shadow cross before him—Burgis Gosen in Avelyn-launched flight—and when the tangle sorted out, the newcomer was not to be seen.

Only then did Elbryan realize that the wrist of the arm with which he had grabbed the assassin was bleeding, a thin line of red. Not a serious wound, surely, but one that seemed to burn with an anger of its own. The ranger shrugged it away and hustled to the side of the fat monk.

Avelyn was ready for the charge, his hands moving in swift defense. Elbryan had no time for that, though. “I am no enemy!” he declared, but when Avelyn, howling his usual “Ho, ho, what!” punched out anyway, Elbryan skittered down to one knee, hooked his staff behind the fat man’s legs, and uprooted him. The monk fell hard to the floor.

Elbryan was over him in an instant, more to protect him from the angry crowd than in any fear of retaliation. “I am no enemy!” he yelled again, and he caught the fat man by the wrist and yanked him to his feet, then rushed him out of the tavern.

The fight continued without them; Avelyn had merely given the villagers and the visiting trappers an excuse for a wild party.

Brother Avelyn was full of questions, full of protests, but the ranger would hear none of them. He ushered the monk away, his own eyes darting from shadow to shadow, expecting the deadly stranger to be about. Finally they got behind the back wall of the northernmost house in the village, just beneath the forested slope.

“Preparedness training,” Avelyn explained, and the look on his face showed that he meant to carry on the fight out here, with just this one “trainee.”

One good look at Elbryan changed Avelyn’s mind, though. Lines of sweat streaked the ranger’s face and his breath came in short gasps. Elbryan held up his wrist, staring at the wound, presenting it as explanation to the now-curious monk.

Avelyn caught the arm and held it up in the moonlight. It was not a serious wound, a tiny slice, too small to have been caused by a dagger, even. That alone told the monk that this man was in serious trouble. For a wound so minuscule to cause such pain could only mean . . .

Avelyn fumbled to find his hematite. He suspected poison and understood that the longer it took him to go after the insidious substance, the more deeply he would have to join his spirit with his patient’s and the more agony it would cause both of them.

As soon as he started, however, Brother Avelyn found a frightening twist. This man had been poisoned, no doubt about it, but the poison was not based in any substance, in any herb or plant or any animal venom. It was magically based; the monk could feel that keenly. As such, it was quite easy for Avelyn to counter the effects with his powerful hematite, and soon Elbryan was breathing steadily again, soon the burning pain was no more.

“No enemy?” Avelyn asked when he saw that Elbryan was fine and steady.

“No enemy,” the ranger replied. “But know that you will make enemies, my friend, with such talk and such—”

“Preparedness training,” Avelyn finished with a wink.

“Indeed,” the ranger said dryly. “And they will surely prepare the ground for your interment if you continue to battle with some of the scoundrels about Dundalis.”

Avelyn nodded and shrugged helplessly. “Your wound will heal,” he assured the ranger, and then he started away, into the dark night, heading back toward the Howling Sheila, where the fighting was gradually diminishing.

Elbryan watched him go, taking some comfort in the fact that the man swerved for the inn’s side door and was apparently going to his room, not back to the common room. The fat monk was in real trouble, the ranger realized, for that man he had fought, that man with the poisoned needle, was much more than an overzealous ruffian. Elbryan didn’t know exactly where he might fit in to such a private affair, but he expected that he and the fat monk—and likely the deadly stranger, as well—had not seen the last of one another.

CHAPTER 34

Justice

Brother Avelyn was not overly concerned when he returned to his room to find that Jill was not about. The woman had mentioned her plans to walk to the valley beyond the north slope, and the monk was confident that Jill could take care of herself. In their weeks together, it seemed to Avelyn that Jill looked after him more than he protected her.

So the monk, exhausted from fighting and then curing the stranger’s magical poisoning, his mind heavy with drink, plopped down on his bed and was soon snoring loudly. His dreams were not content, though, not with the prospects of a magic-wielding assassin nearby. Likely, the man was in no way connected to Avelyn, but still the fugitive monk remained concerned.

He awoke late the next morning, to find himself alone in the room. Again, he was not concerned, figuring that Jill had come in after he had fallen asleep, and was long up and about, probably down in the common room having her breakfast.

“Or lunch,” the monk remarked aloud with a self-deprecating chuckle. “Ho, ho, what!”

When he got downstairs, though, Avelyn saw no sign of Jill; indeed, Belster O’Comely informed him that he had not seen the woman all night. “Perhaps she found better company to keep,” the innkeeper said snidely, leaning on the broom he was using to sweep up the remnants of the previous night’s activities.

“Indeed would Jill be better off away from one as mad as I,” Avelyn replied, wincing with every word, for his head was pounding. The monk had long ago noted, with complete frustration, that the hematite, powerful as it was, could do little to relieve a hangover.

Avelyn ate a light meal, then shuffled outside and promptly regurgitated it. He felt better after. The day was cool and gray, the sky spitting light snow every so often. “Oh, where are you, girl?” Avelyn asked loudly, more frustrated than afraid. The question would have to wait, though, for the monk made his weary way back to his room and went back to bed.

He didn’t wake up again until the next morning, to discover, once more, that Jill was nowhere to be found. Now Avelyn was indeed growing fearful; it wasn’t like Jill to disappear for so long without forewarning him or without finding some way to contact him. That, combined with the presence of this magic-wielding assassin, surely concerned the monk. Perhaps the incident in the common room was no accident. Perhaps the monastery was on his trail. Had they caught him at last, up here in the most remote corner of Honce-the-Bear? And had Jill paid dearly for Avelyn’s crimes?

He went to speak with Belster again, and, after hearing from the innkeeper that Jill still had not been seen, Avelyn begged the innkeeper to tell him how he might locate the stranger who had shuffled him out of the fight.

“The ranger?” Belster asked incredulously, and from his tone, it was obvious to Avelyn that few inquired as to this man’s whereabouts.

“If that is what he calls himself,” Avelyn replied.

“He calls himself Elbryan,” Belster explained, “to me, at least, though to others he carries another title. And he’s one of the rangers, do not doubt.” He saw that the term held no meaning for Avelyn. “Some say they’re elf trained, others that they’re merely misfits who find some comfort in thinking themselves better than anyone else, walking their vigilant patrols, protecting all the land—not that there’s any need for protection, of course.”

“Of course,” Avelyn politely echoed. He found that he was beginning to like this man called Elbryan more and more with every word. “Where might I find this ranger, then?” the monk pressed.

Belster’s shrug was surely sincere. “Here and there,” he replied. “Walks the woods from here to End-o’-the-World, from what I’m told.”

Avelyn’s expression soured and he looked down at the bar. “What of the other stranger?” he asked. “The small mysterious man who fought so well?”

Belster’s face screwed up. “There are many strangers in Dundalis this season,” he answered. “And all of them fight well, else the forest would have taken them by now!”

“The small and agile man,” Avelyn tried to clarify, “the one who battled Elbryan so fiercely.”

Belster nodded his recognition. “He was in here again last night,” the innkeeper explained. “No fighting this time.”

Avelyn took a deep breath and cursed himself for sleeping the afternoon and all the night through while a potential clue to Jill’s whereabouts was right below him.

“Direct me, then,” the monk said at last. “Point me in the most likely direction where I might find Elbryan.”

Again Belster shrugged, then he considered the fact that every time he had seen Elbryan enter Dundalis, it was down the north road. He pointed to the north. “That way,” he declared, “up and over the slope, through the vale, and turn west.”

Avelyn automatically looked that way, though of course, all he could see was the north wall of the Howling Sheila. He nodded as he considered the words, glad for them. Traveling north, he might find Elbryan, it would seem, and he would also be able to search for signs of his dear Jill.

He set off after a quick meal, huffing and puffing up the forested slope, then, after a long pause spent staring down at the stark pines and white ground, he started down the back side of the ridge, into the valley, angling northwest.

There were no signs to be found—Brother Justice had made certain of that—and oblivious Avelyn passed by within thirty feet of the concealed entrance to the cave that now served as Jill’s prison.

She had not been treated badly . . . until Brother Justice had returned, the night before last, in a foul mood and visibly bruised, to find that she had nearly escaped her tight bonds. Then the monk had beaten her severely and had subsequently tied her up so tightly that her hands and feet were now completely numb.

When she wouldn’t—couldn’t—tell him anything about the staff-wielding stranger who had intervened in the inn, the ferocious monk had beaten her again, and now one of her eyes was swollen closed.

Brother Justice had spent all that next day with her, talking mostly to himself about how he might get word to the fat monk that he held her captive. Then the assassin had gone out; Jill knew that his plan still was not fully clear and that he was simply searching for more information. Now, with a gray morning fast turning to midday outside, Brother Justice had not returned.

Jill hoped that Avelyn had killed him; Jill, who could not possibly get out of the bindings and gag that the monk had put on her this time, hoped that Avelyn had first forced the man to disclose her whereabouts!

To Avelyn, who had lived all of his life in the more populous and defined central region of Honce-the-Bear, and who had lately traveled the breadth of the land along well-defined roads, with clear landmarks and signposts, the prospects of finding the ranger had not initially seemed dismal. It wasn’t until Avelyn got deep into the wide forest, where the view varied little from direction to direction, where the landmarks were so much more subtle, that he understood the true scope of his hunt. The distance from Youmaneff to St.-Mere-Abelle was over two hundred miles, the distance from Dundalis to End-o’-the-World but two score, yet, given the winding trails and the areas where there were no trails at all, Avelyn soon realized that he would have had a better chance of finding the ranger had he been pursuing the man in the miles from his home to the abbey.

He wandered in circles, taking care to note the direction of the sun as it slipped behind the gray canopy, looking for some sign. Of course Elbryan, trained by the elves, left little or no trail at all, and Avelyn’s frustration steadily mounted. He wasn’t even sure, after all, that Elbryan had left Dundalis in this direction.

Thus, by midday, the monk was ready to give up the hunt. He would return to Dundalis—and perhaps Jill would be there waiting for him—and then take the more conventional road through Weedy Meadow to End-o’-the-World. There was simply no possibility, he now understood, that he would find the ranger in this forest.

But Avelyn was no ranger, and this was not his domain, and while he had no chance of locating Elbryan, the ranger had little trouble finding him.

The monk was huffing and puffing along a flat trail, arching around the base of a hillock, when he first heard the hooves. He scrambled for some brush, thinking to hide, and then, when that seemed futile, he fumbled about his magical stones, trying to sort out some defensive measures.

A moment later, Avelyn relaxed as a powerful black stallion thundered by.

“No rider,” the monk said aloud, mocking his own worries. “Ho, ho, what!”

“But a beautiful horse nonetheless,” came a remark from right behind and above him. “Would you not agree?”

Avelyn froze in place, a lump rising in his throat. He turned slowly to see the ranger crouched in the brush along the side of the hillock, just a few feet back. “H-how did you—” the monk stammered. “I mean, you were there all along?”

Elbryan shook his head and smiled.

“But how . . .”

“You were busy listening to the horse,” the ranger explained. Avelyn glanced back the other way to see the stallion standing tall and pawing the ground, looking at him and Elbryan with eyes that seemed too intelligent for such a creature.

“His name is Symphony,” Elbryan explained.

“I am not well acquainted with horses,” Avelyn admitted, “but he seems a wonder.”

Elbryan uttered a soft clicking sound, and Symphony responded by lifting his ears and nickering. The stallion pawed the ground once more, then thundered away back along the trail.

“You will have a hard time catching that one again!” Avelyn blurted, trying to ease his own tension. He looked back at Elbryan. “Ho, ho, what!”

Elbryan didn’t blink and the ranger’s lack of interest stole the bubbly grin from Avelyn’s face.

“Well, yes,” the monk began uncomfortably. “Why am I here, then, you would like to know. Of course, of course.”

Elbryan squatted perfectly still, arms across his bent legs, fingers locked together, his gaze fixed upon the man.

“Well . . . to find you, yes, yes,” Avelyn finally explained, finding his wits against that uncompromising stare. “Of course, yes, I came into the forest looking for the one they call the ranger.”

Elbryan gave a slight nod, prompting Avelyn to continue.

“Well, it is about the fight, of course,” he said. “About the man, actually, the one who tried for me but poisoned you.”

Elbryan nodded; this visit wasn’t totally unexpected, since the stealthy fighter from the Howling Sheila was still in the region, as was this monk whom Elbryan believed the assassin’s target. Elbryan suspected that the mad friar would need help, and suspected, too, that he would find little among the folk of Dundalis.

“He attacked you again?” the ranger asked.

“No—no,” Avelyn stammered. “Well, yes, actually, or he might have. I cannot be sure.”

Elbryan sighed wearily.

“It is my companion, of course,” the nervous monk went on. “Beautiful young woman, and a fighter, too. But she is gone, nowhere to be found, and I am afraid—”

“You should be afraid,” Elbryan replied. “That was no ordinary brawler in the common room the other night.”

“The magical poison,” Avelyn reasoned.

“The way he moved,” Elbryan corrected. “He was a warrior, a true warrior, long trained in the art of battle.”

Avelyn nodded enthusiastically, but the ranger’s words only heightened his fear that this was indeed no coincidental attack that the fighting monks of the Abellican Church were after him.

“You must tell me of this man,” Elbryan said, “everything you know.”

“I do not know anything,” Avelyn replied in exasperation.

“Then tell me everything that you suspect,” the ranger demanded. “If he has your friend, then you need my help—help I willingly give, but only if you remain forthright with me.”

Avelyn nodded again, glad for the words. Elbryan rose and moved down to the trail, Avelyn following close behind.

“I do not even know your name,” the monk remarked, though he remembered the name that Belster had given to this man.

“I am El—” the ranger began reflexively, but he caught himself and looked hard at the monk, the first man who had actively sought out his help since he had left Andur’Blough Inninness, the first man who would admit that he needed the ranger’s assistance. “I am Nightbird,” Elbryan said evenly.

Avelyn cocked an eyebrow at that curious title, not the response he had expected. Whatever the man’s reasons for offering a different title were not important, Avelyn decided, and so he accepted the name without further question. The pair walked back toward Dundalis then, Avelyn telling Elbryan his suspicions about the pursuit from the church. Of course, the conversation grew uncomfortable for Avelyn when the ranger asked why St.-Mere-Abelle might be after the monk, and Avelyn had not the time nor the inclination to explain all the events that had led to his fateful decision. How does one justify murder and theft, after all? Elbryan didn’t press the point, however; at that time, all that truly seemed relevant was that Avelyn’s companion was missing, possibly kidnapped by a man the ranger knew to be dangerous.

And Avelyn’s description of his companion, added to the fact that the monk hinted that they had come to Dundalis for her benefit, gave the ranger much to think about.

The hunt began soon after, Elbryan searching hard to find some trail leading out of Dundalis, while Avelyn inquired of Belster and some other patrons in the Howling Sheila whether the stranger had returned to the inn today.

Their answers came near dusk, when Avelyn returned to his room to find a note pinned to his bedding. It was short and to the point, confirming the monk’s worst fears. If Avelyn wanted to save his companion, he was to travel to the slope overlooking the pine valley, alone, and wait at an appointed spot.

He showed the note to Elbryan down in the Howling Sheila’s common room, the pair ignoring the many derisive remarks aimed at them by the early customers there.

“Go, then,” the ranger bade the monk.

“And you will be there?”

Elbryan nodded.

“But it says that I have to go alone,” the monk protested.

“To our enemy, you will seem alone,” Elbryan assured him, and, after considering this man beside him, after recalling the fact that this one called Nightbird had moved to within five feet of him without his ever knowing it, Avelyn nodded his agreement, took back the note, and started out of town.

All the way, the monk fumbled with his pack of gemstones, then, on sudden intuition, he stored all but three—graphite, hematite, and protective malachite—in the nook of a tree. If his suspicions were correct, this man had come for him, but even more for the stones. If Avelyn carried them with him, and the dangerous warrior managed to wrest them away, then the monk would have no bargaining power with which to save himself and even more important, to save his dear Jill.

At the appointed place, a bare spot on the side of an otherwise full-branched pine tree some twenty feet below the ridge, Avelyn did not have to wait for long.

“I see that you decided to follow my instructions, Brother Avelyn,” came an all-too-familiar voice. “Very good.”

Quintall! It was Quintall, Avelyn knew at once, and the monk felt as if the very ground were about to rush up and swallow him—and he almost hoped that it would. The monastery, the Order, was after him, and there would be no corner of the world far enough away, no shadows dark enough to hide him.

“I had little faith that a thief and murderer would be so honorable as to come to the aid of a friend,” the voice went on.

Avelyn glanced all about nervously, wondering where Nightbird might be, wondering if the ranger was close enough to hear those words, and if he was, how he might now feel about this man he had chosen to help.

“I have her,” the voice teased. “Come to me.”

The reminder of Jill’s predicament bolstered the monk’s failing courage. Perhaps his Abellican brothers would get him, Avelyn decided, but they would not harm Jill. Slipping the graphite all about the fingers of one anxious hand, the monk followed the direction of the voice, soon discerning the dark rim of a cave opening and the shadowy form of a man inside. He went in as the form retreated, to find a fairly substantial cave, this one chamber—and it seemed plausible to Avelyn that the place had more than one chamber—larger than his room at the Howling Sheila.

Quintall stood at the back of the dimly lit cave, leaning easily against the wall, flicking flint against steel until a light caught on the torch he had propped there.

When the light flickered to life, when it fully illuminated the face of the man Avelyn had known all those years, the man who had traveled to Pimaninicuit beside Avelyn and knew the truth of the stones, Avelyn was nearly overcome with grief. All that he had lost—his home, his companions, and most important, his faith—assaulted Avelyn; all the memories of the good times at St.-Mere-Abelle, his instruction with Master Jojonah, the revelations about the sacred stones, the studying of the charts, the revealed mysteries of the magic, came rushing back to him.

And then they were buried beneath the subsequent memories: the death of Thagraine, of the boy who had foolishly gone onto Pimaninicuit, of all the crew of the Windrunner, of Dansally, of Siherton.

“Quintall,” Avelyn muttered.

“No more,” the other monk replied.

“Why have you come?” Avelyn asked, hoping against reason that this man, too, had deserted the Order and was as much a renegade as he.

Quintall’s cackle rocked him. “I am Brother Justice,” the man replied harshly, “sent to retrieve what was stolen.” Quintall snorted. “I hardly recognized you, fat Avelyn. You have lost all, so it seems, and have more than doubled your size. Always you took your physical training lightly!”

Avelyn steeled himself against the insults. It was true, he had taken on more than a few bad habits, drinking too much and eating too much, and the only exercise or martial training he now performed was in the fights he inspired.

“Did you not believe that we would discover your treachery?” Brother Justice went on. “Did you think that you could murder a master of St.-Mere-Abelle and steal such a treasure, and then walk free for the rest of your days?”

“There is more—”

“There is no more!” Quintall shouted. “You fell, my former brother. All that remains for you is the pit of hell. I shall have the stones!”

“And my life,” Avelyn reasoned, making no move.

“And your life,” cold Brother Justice confirmed. “You forfeited that when Master Siherton went over the wall.”

“I forfeited that when I refused to accept the perversion of the Order!” Avelyn shot back, drawing some courage with words of conviction. “As Brother Pellimar—”

“Silence!” Brother Justice ordered. “Your life is forfeit, I assure you, and no explanation is worth the time to utter. I will have the stones, as well, but if you hand them to me without battle and accept the fate you deserve, then I will let the woman go free. On my word.”

Avelyn snorted at that. “Is your word as solid a thing as the word of the masters you serve?” he asked. “Is your gold but an illusion, meant to coax a ship into waters where it might be destroyed?”

Quintall’s expression showed that he neither understood nor cared about what Avelyn was saying, showed Avelyn beyond any doubts that the man was single-minded and would not be swayed. That left the fat monk two choices: to surrender the stones and his life and hope that Quintall was speaking truthfully, or to fight.

He didn’t trust the man, not at all. Quintall would kill him after he got the stones, without doubt; then he would kill Jill, that there would be no witnesses. Avelyn believed that in his heart. He took his hand, and the graphite, out of his pocket, pointing it in Quintall’s direction.

“You would forfeit the life of a friend?” Brother Justice asked and then he laughed again.

“I would spare your own life,” Avelyn replied, “in exchange for the woman.”

The man’s laughter continued, and it gave Avelyn pause. Quintall above all others understood Avelyn’s proficiency with the magic stones. Quintall should have understood that Avelyn could loose a bolt of lightning with that piece of graphite that would fry the man where he stood. And yet Quintall, this man who called himself Brother Justice, this extension of St.-Mere-Abelle’s vicious order, was not afraid.

Avelyn turned his thoughts away from the man, to the chamber Quintall had chosen for this encounter. He felt the emanations, the subtle pulse of magic, and when he looked then into the stone he held, when he realized that the powers of the graphite seemed far, far away, he understood.

“Sunstone,” Quintall confirmed, seeing the expression. “There will be little magic used in this cave, foolish Brother Avelyn.”

Avelyn chewed his lip, looking for an out. Back in St.-Mere-Abelle, he had seen Master Siherton create a magical dead zone while he and several others had tried to discern the power of the giant amethyst crystal. Only the most powerful magics could function within such an area, and even then, their powers were greatly diminished.

Avelyn might be able to effect a lightning stroke within this chamber, but he doubted that it would do much more than anger Quintall even more.

Quintall held out his hand. “The stones,” he said calmly, “for the woman’s life.”

“The woman is no part of this,” Elbryan declared, slipping into the cave to stand beside Avelyn. “I know not of Brother Avelyn’s crimes, but you have offered no charge against the woman.”

Quintall’s expression grew suddenly grave at the sight of the imposing ranger. “Treachery again!” he growled at Avelyn. “I should have expected as much from the likes of Avelyn Desbris.”

“No treachery,” Elbryan insisted, “but justice.”

“What do you know of it?” Brother Justice insisted. “What do you know of this stranger, this mad friar, who has come into your midst, begging aid? Did he tell you that he was a murderer?”

“And is the woman a murderer?” Elbryan asked calmly.

“No,” Avelyn answered when the other monk hesitated.

“A thief?” asked Elbryan.

“No!” Avelyn said determinedly. “She has committed no crimes. As for my own, I will speak of them, openly and honestly; and when all the account is told, let someone other than a monk of St.-Mere-Abelle serve as judge.”

Brother Justice narrowed his eyes and glared at the monk. Of course, he had no intention of allowing any court. He was judge, jury, and executioner, assigned by the Father Abbot. “You were a fool to follow Avelyn to this place,” he said to Elbryan, “for now your life is forfeit, as is Avelyn’s, as is the woman’s.”

“More justice?” Elbryan started to ask, but his question was lost as Brother Justice spun about, pulling aside some hanging vines that blocked the entrance to another chamber. A flick of the monk’s wrist sent a silver item flying and from within the deeper chamber came a gurgled groan.

“Go to her!” Elbryan cried to Avelyn, and the ranger leaped forward to meet the monk, Hawkwing spinning to a ready position.

“Not by surprise this time,” Brother Justice sneered, setting himself in a crouch. He tried to keep near the door, to prevent Avelyn from getting to the woman, but Elbryan’s attack was too fierce, too straightforward. The ranger came rushing in, accepting a punishing blow to the chest but managing to duck his shoulder low against the monk and drive the man back a step. Brother Justice dug in, locking himself in place—until Avelyn came roaring in at Elbryan’s back, the monk’s three-hundred-pound frame blasting the two combatants away.

Elbryan took three quick punches—two to the chest and then one to the face that nearly sent him down—before he managed to break the clench and get away from the dangerous monk.

Facing the man squarely, the ranger wasn’t quite sure what to make of him. Brother Justice turned sidelong and lifted his leading foot, drawing it slowly up his balanced leg, arms lifting as well, as certain snakes might rise before the strike.

It was a dagger, small but nasty, and thrown perfectly to hit the gagged and bound woman right in the throat, just under her jawbone. Her main artery severed, blood was pumping wildly from the wound, already forming a puddle around her slumped form.

“Jill, Jill! Oh, my Jill!” Avelyn wailed, rushing to her. He pulled the dagger free, his hands going to the wound, trying futilely to stem the flow. She had little time left, he knew. Her skin felt cold.

Avelyn pulled out his hematite, then remembered the antimagic shield that Quintall had constructed. He thought to carry Jill from this place, but realized immediately that she would be dead before he ever got her outside.

He clutched his hematite in both hands, putting them to the wound, putting his lips against his hands, praying with all his will, with all his heart. If there was a God above, if these stones were indeed sacred, then the hematite must work!

The monk’s fighting prowess was indeed remarkable, his movements quick and fluid, his frame always in perfect balance. He was too fast for most humans, dizzying them with winding, sweeping feints before the lightning strike killed them.

But Quintall, for all his training, was no faster than Tuntun or Belli’mar Juraviel, or any of the elves that had trained Elbryan, and when he snapped a strike from that snakelike pose, thinking to tear out Elbryan’s throat and move on to finish his business with Avelyn, the monk’s expression showed he was surprised to find his extended fingers hit only air, while Elbryan’s staff gave him a wicked smack on the elbow. With incredible flexibility, both physical and mental, the monk adjusted, rolling his pained arm down across the staff to open a hole in Elbryan’s defenses, then snapping off a quick blow with his other hand, followed by a kick that caught the ranger inside the knee and nearly buckled his leg. Elbryan countered by letting go of his staff with his top hand, rolling it under the blocking arm, then grabbing it and sweeping low for the monk’s supporting leg.

Brother Justice hopped over the swing, but was forced back.

The monk circled, a confident expression mounting.

Two running steps launched Brother Justice into a double kick. Elbryan jammed one end of Hawkwing into the dirt arid swept the staff powerfully across in front of him, left to right, deflecting the blow. He stepped ahead with his left foot then, continuing to turn as Brother Justice landed on his feet and pivoted the other way. Elbryan dragged Hawkwing up and around, slapping a backhand with the staff that connected squarely on the monk’s lower back at the same time Brother Justice let fly an elbow to the back of Elbryan’s head.

The ranger reacted well, diving forward as the elbow connected, leaping and tumbling over his staff as if it were a tree branch. He came back to his feet and turned as Brother Justice spun around, the two men circling once more.

“I give you one more chance to leave,” the monk offered, thawing a smile from his adversary. That smug look by the ranger spurred the proud Quintall into a charge. He skidded to a stop right before Elbryan, throwing a vicious overhead chop.

Up came Hawkwing in a solid horizontal block. Anticipating the following moves, Elbryan snapped his left hand down, taking the power from a right cross, then stepped in closer, putting his right leg inside the monk’s left, defeating an attempted kick. Brother Justice wriggled his left arm about the staff, reaching for Elbryan’s face, but the ranger pulled the staff and the arm out wide, moving even closer to the monk, then drove his forehead hard into the monk’s face.

Brother Justice grabbed hard onto the staff with both hands, as much to support himself as to prevent any attacks. Elbryan let go with his left hand at that same moment and snapped off a series of short, heavy jabs into Brother Justice’s face.

The monk was dazed; Elbryan seized the moment. He grabbed the staff again, hard, and tugged it in close, pushed it away to the end of his reach, then pulled it in again. Brother Justice should have let go, but he was fighting to clear his thoughts. Following the tug, he came rushing in close to Elbryan, and his face met the ranger’s forehead again.

Still dazed, still hanging on, the monk felt the change in his adversary’s angle as Elbryan fell back to the floor, pulling hard, taking the monk right over him. Both his feet planted squarely in Brother Justice’s belly; the ranger heaved him right over, sent him flying, to land heavily at the base of the chamber’s hard wall.

Pure rage drove the monk on, forced the pain away. He rolled and came up fast—but not fast enough. His defenses were not in place when Elbryan grabbed his staff down low with both hands and swept it across mightily, smashing in the side of Brother Justice’s face. The monk went with the blow, turning to a dead run that launched him out the cave’s outer opening, into the daylight.

Elbryan was quick to follow, but by the time he got out, the monk was many strides ahead, in a full run. Hardly thinking of the motion, knowing only that he could not lose this advantage against so deadly an adversary, Elbryan popped the feathered tip onto his weapon and bent it low, quickly setting the bowstring. He ran ahead a dozen strides, seeking an angle to best view the top of the ridge, where the monk was fleeing.

Brother Justice came into view for only a split second, darting between two trees. Elbryan’s arrow caught him in the calf, right below the knee, and with a howl of pain the monk tumbled sidelong, gaining momentum as he rolled along the steep slope.

Elbryan scrambled to get to the spot, saw the monk land heavily atop one rocky outcropping and then tumble right over it, a fifteen-foot plummet to hard stone.

Elbryan groaned sympathetically, running to get in view of the man once more. He spotted the monk from a distance, lying among the boulders, one leg bent back up under him, one arm across his chest, the other out straight, then turned back under, obviously broken. The man, gasping for breath, reached inside the folds of his clothing and produced something that Elbryan could not discern from this distance.

The ranger halted as the monk suddenly glowed, limned in blackish flames. Elbryan’s mouth dropped open as the monk’s features twisted, twisted, as his face blurred and seemed to double, and as that second face stretched grotesquely and pulled free of the man’s corporeal form, his visible spirit ripping out of that flesh and blood coil, down to the object he clutched in his hand.

There came a bright flash and then the monk lay still, low flames licking his lifeless body.

“Nightbird!” came a cry from the cave, and Elbryan, thoroughly shaken, scampered back within.

He was careening, flying fast above the forest, across the lakes, over the lands where the snow had already settled deep—too fast for his senses, too fast for the man to understand. The pain was gone, that much he knew. Then he came upon the mountains, whipping through passes, over peaks, to a plateau he had seen before above a vast encampment between the black arms of a smoking mountain. Then came the dizzying ride through tight tunnels, cutting left, right, down and down again to a stone wall creased by a single crack, through that crack, the stone rushing past him so close that his mind screamed out in terror.

Then he was in the room between the columns before the obsidian throne.

Quintall stood on semitransparent legs, caught halfway between the mortal and spirit worlds. He stood on the legs of a wraith facing the dactyl demon.

It was the end, the end of hope, of any pretense of godliness. It was the truth, the dark-shining truth, the reality of what he had become, the only honest end of the road upon which his Abellican masters had set him. It was the dactyl demon, Bestesbulzibar—he knew its name!—in all its horrible beauty, in all its magnificence.

Quintall, Brother Justice, fell to his wraith knees before the dactyl, bowed his head, and spoke.

“Master.”

Elbryan took the torch with him as he pushed aside the vines and entered the inner chamber. Avelyn squatted on the floor, cradling the woman. Her wound was closed and she was very much alive, though thoroughly exhausted, as was Avelyn, who had gone into the hematite, who had, by sheer willpower and faith, fought past the sunstone barrier, fought his way into the healing magic.

The monk asked about Quintall, but Elbryan didn’t hear him. Avelyn shifted on the floor and tried to rise, nearly toppling for the effort, but Elbryan didn’t notice. All that the ranger saw was the woman, all that he heard was her breathing. His eyes roamed over her—the thick mop of blond hair, the blue eyes, shining in the dim light, despite her weary condition, and her lips, those thick and wonderful lips, those so soft lips.

He could hardly breathe, could hardly keep the strength to stand, all his thoughts, all his energy, tied up in a single word, a name he had not spoken for so very long.

“Pony.”

CHAPTER 35

Escape?

Pony.

The name hit the young woman like a thunderbolt, spoken with such familiar inflection. She watched, mesmerized, as the strong young man eased toward her, his green eyes growing misty.

“Pony,” Elbryan said again, and he was stating the name, not asking. “My Pony, I thought . . .”

He slipped down to his knees before her, closed his eyes, and tried hard to steady his breathing. When, after a long while, he opened his eyes and looked again on this image from his past, he found that her expression was more confusion than anything else.

“Do you not remember me?” Elbryan asked, and the question alone, the need to ask it, seemed to pain him greatly.

The woman didn’t know how to respond. She did remember the man—he was there, prodding somewhere in the back of her mind, screaming at her to let him out. The way he said the name, her name—her nickname, she suddenly knew, for her name was not Pony, nor Jill, but Jilseponie!—was so familiar; surely she had heard this man call her Pony before in just that way.

“Give her time, I beg, Elbryan,” Brother Avelyn remarked.

That was it. Elbryan. The name hit Pony as hard as Brother Justice ever could, jarred her, sent her thoughts spinning back across the span of years.

“When you ran from me on the slope, running into burning Dundalis, I thought you lost to me forever,” the ranger went on, spurred by the sudden sparkle of recognition that came to the woman’s blue eyes. “My Pony. How I searched! I found your mother and father, my own, our friends. Carley dan Aubrey died in my own arms. And I would have died, too, trapped by a fomorian giant and a band of goblins, had it not been for—” He stopped, realizing that he was going too fast for the poor young woman, realizing that he had overwhelmed her.

But it was indeed his Pony; Elbryan knew that beyond any doubt. He moved closer to her then, put his face barely inches from hers.

“Elbryan,” she said softly, lifting a weary arm to stroke the ranger’s face. All those scattered images in her head spun and dropped together, like a vast puzzle, all the pieces magically falling together. She remembered him as if she had never forgotten him, remembered their talks and walks, remembered their friendship, and more than that. In her mind, she saw, him moving closer to her, to kiss her.

But then he was Connor, poor Connor, and Pony was suffocating, reaching for the hearth, grabbing a glowing ember.

When she shook the image away, she found that Elbryan had backed away from her and was looking to Brother Avelyn for answers.

“We have much to discuss,” the monk said.

Elbryan nodded and looked back at her, as beautiful now—more beautiful!—than he remembered her.

“Brother Quintall?” Avelyn asked.

Elbryan looked at him curiously.

“Brother Justice?” Avelyn clarified. “The hunter from my own Order, sent to kill me and to kill my friends, do not doubt.”

“He is dead,” Elbryan replied evenly.

“Take me to him.”

Elbryan nodded to Avelyn. “Why did he come after you?” the ranger asked, the question that Avelyn knew he would be forced to answer truthfully. He looked from Elbryan to Pony, then back to the ranger.

“Not all of his claims were untrue, I fear,” the monk admitted. “I will explain all when we are far from this place, and then I will accept your judgment,” Avelyn offered, squaring his shoulders. “Judgment from both of you. You decide if Brother Quintall’s mission was truly one that deserved the name of Justice, if Brother Avelyn, the mad friar, is truly an outlaw.”

“I am no judge,” the ranger remarked.

“Then I am a doomed thing,” Avelyn replied. “For the only ones who presume to judge me have made their decision, and it is based on greed and fear and in no way on justice.”

Elbryan stared long and hard at Avelyn. Finally he nodded, and he helped both Avelyn and Pony to their feet, then led them out of the cave and to the spot where Brother Justice had fallen.

The monk’s body was hardly recognizable, a charred, smoldering thing.

“How did this happen?” Elbryan asked, inspecting the corpse but finding no indication of what had caused it to burst into flame.

“Here is your answer,” Avelyn explained, indicating the side of the corpse, where one hand was nearly burned to ashes. On the ground beside the body lay the ruined broach, its hematite core melted and misshapen, an elongated black egg. Scattered around it were the small quartz crystals, blackened, some stuck in the remains of the golden setting.

Avelyn scrutinized the broach carefully. “Its power is no more,” he announced after a few moments. “Somehow the magic of the hematite and the crystals erupted when Quintall fell.” Avelyn paused and considered his own words. Had there been some contingency placed on the magic? he wondered. Avelyn could feel the magical reverberations in the area and knew that some strong energy had been released. Perhaps the stones served as a warning device to the masters back in St.-Mere-Abelle, a signal that Quintall was dead, that Quintall had failed. Or was the magic even stronger than that? Given the powers of hematite, might this have been some transport for Quintall’s soul?

Avelyn, who had spirit-walked, who had once possessed the body of another, shuddered at the possibilities.

Elbryan continued to prod at the corpse, searching for clues. What he found instead were two stones intact: a sunstone—which did not surprise Avelyn in the least—and a carbuncle.

“That is how he trailed me across the country,” Avelyn remarked, noting the carbuncle. “It is a stone used to detect magic.”

“And you have magic about you,” Elbryan reasoned.

“A great cache,” Avelyn admitted. “Perhaps the greatest individual cache in all the world.”

“Stolen from St.-Mere-Abelle,” said the ranger.

“Taken from those who did not deserve it, who abused it and brought only misery from the God-given stones,” Avelyn said firmly. “Find us a camp, my friend. I will tell you my tale, in all detail, in all truth. You decide which of us, myself or Quintall, deserves the title he carried.”

When they arrived at Elbryan’s camp, when the ranger and Pony settled beside a fire, Avelyn did as promised. He told his tale, all of it, from the journey to Pimaninicuit to the sinking of the Windrunner and the murder of Dansally, to his escape from St.-Mere-Abelle and the death of Master Siherton. It was the first time Avelyn had told his story, though he had hinted at many parts of it to Jill over the course of their travels. It was the first time the monk was able to purge his soul openly, to admit his crimes, if they were crimes. When he finished, he seemed a miserable wretch indeed; his huge form had wilted upon the hard ground, his eyes teary.

Pony went to him, loving him all the more, feeling a true kinship with the man, feeling a great deal of pity, as well. She was sorry that Avelyn had been forced to act as thief and killer, sorry that this gentle man—and despite the barroom brawls, Pony knew Avelyn to be a gentle man—had been put into such an uncompromising position.

Both of them looked at Elbryan after some time, fearing the ranger’s judgment. They saw only sympathy on his handsome face.

“I do not envy that which you were forced to do,” the ranger said firmly. “Nor do I consider your actions criminal. You acted in self-defense, always justifiable. You stole the stones because you rightly judged that they were being abused.”

Avelyn nodded, so glad to hear those words. “Then I must be on my way,” he announced unexpectedly. “Jill—Pony, has found her way home, it would seem.” He put a hand to the woman’s face, and his own brightened suddenly. “Ho, ho, what!

“She needs me no more,” Avelyn finished.

“But does Brother Avelyn need her?” Elbryan asked.

The monk shrugged. “St.-Mere-Abelle will not give up the search, thus I must keep on the move. I would not bring danger to my friends, now that I know of it.”

Elbryan looked hard into Pony’s eyes, then the both of them burst into a fit of laughter, as if the whole notion were perfectly ridiculous.

“You stay,” Elbryan remarked, demanded. “Pony is home, ‘tis true, and her home is Avelyn’s, unless I miss my guess.”

“Her home is Avelyn’s,” she said firmly.

A light snow had begun to fall all across the forest, but it seemed to shy from the ranger’s camp, from the heat of the ranger’s fire, from the warmth of Brother Avelyn’s newfound home.

PART FOUR

THE
RANGER

How I desire to go to her, to be with her, that we might know again the peace that was in our lives before that terrible day. How I want to hold Pony, to kiss her, to tell her all my feelings, all my secrets, my pain, my hopes. To see Pony now is to see what was and to wonder what might have been had the goblins not come to Dundalis. To see Pony now is to ponder what other road might have been before me—might I have farmed the land and hunted, as Olwan my father did? Would Pony and I be wed, perhaps with children?

How would the world look to Elbryan had he not spent those years in Andur’Blough Inninness?

But that is the problem, Uncle Mather. 1 cannot know, can only guess, and I fear that any guess I make will be tainted by the observations of my current life. Perhaps my life would have been better if God had presented me a different path, one more like Olwan’s. I wish all those folk of Dundalis—my mother and father, Pony’s parents, and all the others—had been spared their grim fate. I wish with all my heart that the goblins had not come to Dundalis!

But where would that leave me? At peace, I suppose, and probably with Pony, and that is a fate about which no man could complain.

Yet I refuse to dismiss or diminish my years with the Touel’alfar; those elven friends helped to shape the man Elbryan. Those elven friends created Nightbird, this ranger, hopefully for the betterment of the world and surely for the betterment of me. Looking through the perspective of their shining eyes, I have gained a newer and brighter appreciation of the world about me, one I would never have known had the goblins not come to Dundalis, had the elves not rescued me and taken me to their secret valley. Through that tragedy, I, Elbryan, have come to know and love life all the more. Through that tragedy, I have become the man I am, the man who can see the world through the vision of an elf as well as the vision of a human.

That is my guilt, Uncle Mather, for why should I have been chosen, and not another of Dundalis—not Olwan or Shane McMichael, not Pony or Carley dan Aubrey. That is my guilt, and seeing Pony alive, so beautiful, so wonderful, only heightens my pain, reminds me of those who died, tempts me to ask what might have been, and makes me wonder if I would indeed prefer that lost course.

It is only worse for poor Pony. The sight of me, of Dundalis, has brought back to her memories long buried. I have seen her little in the few days since Brother Avelyn and I rescued her from Quintall. She is avoiding me, I know, and I do not begrudge her that. She needs the time; she has seen again so much of her lost past in so short a time.

Everyone in Dundalis died except the two of us. And we have continued from that moment of tragedy, have grown strong and true, have found lives pleasing, and, now that we are together again, the potential seems all the greater. Yet, in our pleasures . . .

That is the guilt, Uncle Mather, our guilt. I cannot rescue Pony from the pain of her memories, as she cannot rescue me from mine. I only hope that she comes to accept our fate and that she desires to forge ahead in the best manner that we may.

I knew it from the moment I saw her in that cave. I love her, Uncle Mather, as I loved her that fateful day on the ridge above our home. I love her, and all the world will be sweeter indeed if I may hold her in my arms and feel her soft breath against my neck.

—ELBRYAN WYNDON

CHAPTER 36

Confrontation

“They think me madder still!” Brother Avelyn roared happily.

“Ho, ho, what!”

Elbryan looked at Bradwarden, and the centaur only shrugged, not about to disagree with the volatile friar’s estimation of himself

“Cavorting with the likes of you, after all,” Avelyn went on. “And, oh, would they talk if they knew that I was dining with a centaur!”

“They would talk respectfully if they knew Bradwarden as I know him,” Elbryan put in, “else, I fear the centaur would trample them.”

Bradwarden swallowed a huge chunk of mutton and gave a great belch.

“Ho, ho, what!” Avelyn howled, charmed by it all. The monk was feeling better now, feeling more at home than he had since his earliest days in St.-Mere-Abelle, since that innocent time before he had learned the truth of the Abellican Order. In Elbryan, Avelyn had found a man he could honestly respect, a stoic individual, wary of the very real dangers of the world, ready to fight against evil and injustice. He had told his tale in full to the ranger, and the ranger had judged him not according to the penned laws but by the true ideal of justice.

Now Avelyn spent his nights in Dundalis or in Weedy Meadow or End-o’-the-World, and his days in the forest with Elbryan and Pony—and sometimes with the ranger’s more unusual friends, such as Bradwarden and that magnificent horse Symphony. There was something right about it all to Avelyn, some sense of godliness here that he had not felt in many years. His only lament was that Pony seemed truly shaken by her return to this area. She spent little time with any of them, preferring to walk alone, mostly near Dundalis. She was confronting her past, the monk knew, and he was glad of that, though he wished he could be of more help to the young woman.

Bradwarden took up his pipes then, following the meal with a mournful, soulful tune that conjured in Avelyn images of the rolling hills, the wheatfields, and grapevines of Youmaneff. He thought of his mother and father, hoped that his father was still well. Of course, Jayson Desbris would not know it, but he could rest well when thinking of his youngest son now.

On a hillock not so far away, Pony, too, heard the centaur’s haunting music. Her thoughts rolled back to the carefree days of her childhood, of her times with Elbryan—Elbryan! All those terrible images of that fateful day in Dundalis remained with her, but somehow they were easier to deal with. She could look at the tragedy rationally, and now, with Elbryan beside her, she was beginning to come to terms with her fate.

Pony came to know that it was not simple terror and grief that had forced her to bury those awful images, but guilt. She had lived, but everyone else, so she thought, had perished. Why her?

Seeing another from her village, seeing dear Elbryan again, had allowed Pony to remove some of that guilt. She knew the truth now, all of it, and she was strong enough to accept that truth—and on those occasions when she found she was not strong enough, she knew Elbryan would be there for her, as she would be there for him. For the first time in many years, Pony was not alone.

“You are not going into town this night?” Elbryan asked Avelyn, the monk tarrying near to the fire.

“Jill—Pony went into Dundalis,” Avelyn clarified, “but I believe I will spend this night in the forest.”

“Cold wind and a hard ground,” Elbryan warned, and indeed, winter was fast approaching.

“Ho, ho, what!” Avelyn laughed. “You would not guess the hardships I have endured, my friend. This round body does not tell of them.”

Elbryan smiled and considered the monk, understanding there was indeed a hardened frame beneath the soft exterior.

“No, I will stay this night,” Avelyn went on. “I feel it is time for me to begin repaying you the debt I owe.”

“Debt?” Elbryan asked incredulously.

“I owe you my life, as does Pony.”

“I followed the only course open to me,” Elbryan replied.

“And glad I am that you did!” Avelyn snorted. “Ho, ho, what!”

Elbryan gave a smile and shook his head, entertained, as usual by the complex man. “So you shall repay me with your company,” the ranger reasoned.

“Oh, more than that,” the monk replied. “And I fear that if I offer too much of my company, then I shall owe you all the more!”

Again came the laughter, but it died away quickly, Avelyn’s face growing suddenly serious. “Tell me of your horse,” he bade the ranger.

“I have no horse.”

“Symphony?”

“Symphony is not mine,” Elbryan explained. “Symphony is free and belongs to no man.”

“All the better then!” said Avelyn. He fumbled about his robes, then with his pouch.

Elbryan caught a glimpse within that pouch as Avelyn searched for a certain stone, the ranger’s jaw dropping low at the myriad sparkles, shimmering brightly, magnificently, even in the light of the low fire. No wonder, then, that the Abellican Church had come after Brother Avelyn!

Finally the monk found the stone he was looking for and held it up before him: a turquoise.

“Is Symphony about?” the monk asked.

Elbryan nodded slowly, cautiously. “What magic do you intend for Symphony?” he wanted to know.

Avelyn snorted. “Nothing the horse will not desire,” he assured the ranger.

They went off together into the night, finding Symphony in a moonlit field, grazing calmly. Avelyn bade Elbryan to wait at field’s edge, then the monk walked slowly toward the horse, holding forth the stone and chanting quietly.

Elbryan held his breath, not certain what the powerful Symphony might do. The stallion had accepted the ranger, but Elbryan knew that to be an unusual thing for proud and wild Symphony. If the stallion now bolted forward suddenly, trampling the monk into the earth, Elbryan would not be surprised.

But Symphony did no such thing. The horse nickered quietly as Avelyn came right up to him. The monk continued to chant—it seemed to Elbryan as if he were conversing with the horse—and whatever he was saying, Symphony was listening! After a long while, Avelyn motioned for the ranger to join him.

The monk was still whispering softly when Elbryan moved up beside him. Symphony had gone perfectly still, his head raised high, his magnificent, muscled chest presented openly to the two men.

Avelyn handed the turquoise to Elbryan. “Finish,” he instructed.

Elbryan took the stone, having no idea what he should do with it. Before he could begin to question the monk, he felt an urge, a calling. The ranger looked up into Symphony’s dark eyes, understanding suddenly that it was the stallion calling to him! Elbryan blinked in disbelief, then looked back at the turquoise and realized that its glow was not reflected moonlight but its own inner light, a radiating magic; only then did Elbryan realize how warm the stone had grown.

“Touch it to the horse’s breast,” the monk instructed.

Elbryan moved his hand slowly toward the stallion. Symphony closed his eyes, seeming as if in a deep trance. The ranger put the stone right against the horse’s breast, right in the “V” where the muscles of the powerful shoulders came together. He held it there for a long time, while Avelyn took up a louder, more insistent chant that sounded as a song.

Elbryan was hardly conscious of the stone’s action, and Symphony seemed perfectly at ease, as the turquoise burrowed into the horse’s flesh, as the stone set itself perfectly upon Symphony’s breast.

The ranger retracted his hand suddenly, his expression horrified as he regarded the stone, which seemed now a natural part of the horse. Avelyn stopped his chanting and put a comforting hand on Elbryan’s shoulder; Symphony opened his dark eyes and seemed perfectly calm, pained not at all.

“What have I done?” Elbryan asked. “What have you done?”

Avelyn shrugged. “Not exactly sure,” he admitted. “But the stone’s magic was for animals, of that I am certain.”

“To heal?” Elbryan asked. “To strengthen?”

“Perhaps both,” the monk replied. Avelyn’s face crinkled as he tried to sort out a feasible explanation. “You see, I do not always know what magic the stones will provide,” he began. “They call to me; they tell me what to do.”

“Then you have no way of knowing what we just did to Symphony,” Elbryan reasoned, his tone showing clearly that he was not pleased. Symphony was no toy for experiments, after all! “Beneficial or baneful?”

“Beneficial,” Avelyn said with all confidence and without hesitation. “Ho, ho, what! I told you that I meant to repay a debt.”

“But you do not even know what you did!” Elbryan protested.

“But I know the nature of what the stone did,” Avelyn explained. “Turquoise is the stone of animals, a true blessing of beasts. I suspect that your bond with Symphony has been heightened, that you and the stallion are more deeply and profoundly joined now.”

“Master and beast?” Elbryan demanded, clearly not happy with the prospect.

“Friend and friend,” Avelyn corrected. “Symphony cannot be owned, so you said, and I would not presume to break this most wonderful stallion’s spirit! Ho, ho, what! Never that! Trust, my friend, hold faith in the stones, in the gifts of God. You will soon learn the truth of this magic that Symphony now holds, and you will be pleased, as will Symphony, do not doubt.”

As if in answer, Symphony reared suddenly and whinnied, then came back down and thundered about the pair in a tight circle, hooves rending the turf. The stallion showed no sign of pain or even agitation other than a sudden elation.

Elbryan felt that emotion very clearly. It was as if he could read Symphony’s mind, and not just by the visible movements of the stallion’s body.

He read the stallion’s thoughts!

Elbryan looked at Avelyn, the monk smiling widely. “Do you ‘hear’ them?” the ranger asked, for lack of a better word. “Do you know what the stallion is feeling?”

“I was but the mediator,” Avelyn explained, “the facilitator, ho, ho, what! I brought forth the stone’s magic, but you are the one who used it, my friend. You and Symphony, and now you two are joined more closely. But I do indeed know the stallion’s thoughts,” the monk finished with a mischievous smile. “I see them clearly on your face!”

Symphony stopped abruptly and reared again, calling into the night. Then the horse thundered away out of the field, out of sight

But Elbryan knew where the horse was; if he concentrated, the ranger could visualize the very ground before Symphony’s pounding hooves. He did so then, and saw and felt the rush of the wind and the night as the horse raced through the darkened forest. And it went deeper than that; the ranger came to perceive the world about Symphony through the eyes of the magnificent horse. Only then did Elbryan truly appreciate the intelligence of the animal, filtered through a different perspective, perhaps, but no less intense than his own. The horse knew things simply, without the interference of reason that was the domain of men, elves, and the higher races. What was, in the horse’s eyes, simply was with no interpretation, an efficient and perfect way of perception that sorted through emotion, that lived in the present without concern for the future or interference from the past.

Perfect, simple, beautiful.

After a long while, Elbryan opened his eyes and looked at Avelyn. He nodded his appreciation, for he understood already that this gift Avelyn had given to him and to Symphony was as profound and precious as the bow Joycenevial had crafted for him.

Elbryan put his hand on Avelyn’s shoulder and nodded again, for he could find no words to properly thank the man.

Avelyn went into Dundalis the next morning, passing Pony on the trail as she made her way back to the ranger’s camp. The monk started to ask the woman if she wanted him to accompany her, but, in studying the expression on Pony’s face, Avelyn thought the better of it and continued on his way. Soon after, he was whistling gaily, for upon some closer examination, Avelyn had indeed come to understand the expression on the young woman’s face.

Pony found Elbryan burying the embers of his fire. She came into the camp quietly and moved right across the way from him without a word.

Elbryan stood tall, looking at her. They were alone, completely alone, for the first time, and so many questions came to each of them that they remained silent, just started circling each other, as combatants might, as a stalking panther might when confronted with another of its own kind.

Pony’s eyes reflected an intensity Elbryan had never before encountered, a hunger, perhaps, or a rage—some inner passion that kept her from blinking, that kept her chewing on the corner of her bottom lip as she paced about him, her gaze locked on his.

The ranger soon fell into a similar trance, his focus becoming squarely, singularly, Pony. There was only her and nothing else, only those burning blue eyes, those tender lips.

Circling, they moved slightly, but ever closer with each rotation.

A harsh noise from somewhere in the forest startled the pair and stole the moment. Neither recognized it, and neither wanted to search it out.

“Come,” Elbryan bade Pony, taking her hand and leading her down a snow-covered path. They moved out from under the canopy of the forest onto a clearing, and Elbryan smiled wide, for there, across the field, stood Symphony. The ranger had known that the stallion would be there, had even telepathically called out to Symphony to wait for him.

Spotting him, the great stallion reared and snorted, its breath coming out as a great cone of steam.

“Come,” Elbryan said again, leading Pony quickly across the field. Now that Symphony was with them, the ranger knew his destination, knew the only place that would suit this first private meeting with Pony. He became tentative when he neared the magnificent horse. Would Symphony accept two riders?

“Easy, friend,” the ranger said softly, stroking the horse’s muzzle and muscled neck. He looked hard at the horse, sharing his thoughts, hearing the answer, then looked at Pony and nodded.

“He is beautiful,” she said. She thought her words lame, somehow hollow in the face of such magnificence as Symphony, but she had no other words to offer to the stallion. Elbryan took her hand and helped her up tentatively onto the powerful animal’s back.

Symphony snorted again and jostled about, but gradually came to accept the woman. Then came the real test as Elbryan went up on the stallion in front of Pony.

The horse settled easily, ready to run.

And run Symphony did! Fast as the wind, flying along the trails, weaving through the trees in a dizzying blur that had Pony screaming with terror and delight, and holding so tightly to Elbryan’s waist that every time the horse came down hard the ranger’s breath was blasted from his body.

Soon they came to the diamond-shaped grove, the spruce and pines blanketed by snow but the ground about the grove blown bare by the wind. Symphony pulled to a stop and the pair slid down.

Pony went right up to the horse’s face and stared hard into one dark eye. Her breathing would not steady; there was something too primordial, too untamed and uncontrollable, about this beast, something fearfully strong. And yet she had come through the ride unscathed, breathless with joy and excitement.

She had come through the ride!

She turned to Elbryan, who was walking to the glade, and followed him. He disappeared through the thick branches; Pony paused when she got to that spot, considering the implications, considering her own feelings.

The young woman shook her head defiantly, then looked back at the stallion, who reared and whinnied, as if to prod her on. Untamed, uncontrollable, fearfully strong, he embodied the feelings that bubbled at the edges of Pony’s thoughts, threatening to overwhelm her.

She pushed through the thick branches into a small clearing, where Elbryan crouched, the first flickers of a fire already starting before him. Pony watched him as he worked, blowing softly, turning sticks.

Untamed, uncontrollable, fearfully strong. The thoughts stayed with her, repeated in her head like a warning, like a temptation. She clenched her fists at her sides, chewed the corner of her bottom lip again, and stared hard at this man, no more the boy she had known and yet so much that boy with whom she had shared her youth.

She feared those few memories she had not yet uncovered, and yet, looking at Elbryan, she knew that she would soon face them.

She walked over to him and he rose, the fire burning. Face-to-face they stood for many seconds, for minutes, staring in silence at each other.

Then he moved for her, his lips drawn to hers, and she gave a slight gasp, expecting black wings to rise up all around her, expecting a scream to reverberate within her mind. But then he was there, against her, his lips brushing gently over hers, softly, softly, and all she felt was him, and all she heard was his soft breathing and his slight moan.

The kiss became more urgent, and gradually Pony’s fears melted away, swept up in the sudden torrent of passion that overcame her. He kissed her hard, and she kissed him back, tongues entwined, lips pressing hard.

And then they were apart, Elbryan staring at her, locking her deep in his gaze. His hand came up and unlaced her cloak, and she let the garment drop without protest, cool air on her skin. Then he reached for the buttons of her shirt, and on and on until the last layer of her clothing fell away. And she was not ashamed, not embarrassed, and no black wings of horrors past swept up about her.

Elbryan pulled off his own cloak and shirt and stood bare to the waist before her. They moved closer, the hairs of his chest just brushing her breasts, little tingles shared. With his prompting, she lifted her arms high above her head and he locked his fingers about hers.

Then he broke the hold and began to run his hands down her arms, slowly and, oh, so gently, the tips of his fingernails just grazing her soft skin. Down come his hands, past her elbows, across her arms, and then around to the back, to her shoulder blades and to the base of her neck, so softly and gently, fingertips just lightly brushing.

She felt the electric pull of those fingers, the tingle that made her want to pull them in closer—and yet, she knew that if they were pulled in closer, their teasing tingle would be no more. Her head went back, mouth opened as she basked in his stroke, as his hands went down her back, so gently, to the top of her buttocks and then brushing about, to her hips and past her hips. Again with his prompting, Pony turned and melted back into his strong embrace. He lifted one hand to push her hair aside, and gently kissed the nape of her neck, the soft kiss turning slowly more urgent, a harder kiss, a gentle bite, and when she cooed quietly, a harder bite still.

“Do you feel me?” he whispered into her ear.

“Yes.”

“Are you alive?”

“So alive.”

“Do you want me to make love to you?”

Pony paused, searching for the threat of terrible memories. She recalled her wedding night, glanced down at the glowing fire as if it were some enemy or some forewarning. But this was different, the young woman knew, different from Connor. Stronger.

Untamed, uncontrollable, fearfully strong, her mind recited. And right, she silently added. So very right.

“Yes,” she answered quietly.

They sank down to the ground together, onto the still-warm cloak, and there they were, caught in the present and encircled by their past. For Elbryan, it was the culmination of his youth, where every waking thought had led him to this point with this woman, his soulmate, his Pony. This moment, so many years in the waiting, was the marker of the end of that relationship with the girl, the beginning of the new and deeper relationship with the woman. Now he was a man, and Pony a woman, and all the love that had brought them to this moment came crashing together with their bodies. He was happy to the point of giddiness, and yet he was vulnerable suddenly, so vulnerable, for if anything happened to Pony, if he lost her now as he had thought he had lost her before, then a rift would be torn in his heart that would never mend, then his life ever after would be without meaning.

For Pony, that moment in the grove was the denial of blackness, a dark barrier torn down and thrown away, the harsh memories overwhelmed by the gentleness, the love, and the warm memories of her youth with Elbryan: the time when he had pulled her hair and she had laid him out flat; the times when his friends had teased him, but he’d stood up to them, not denying his feelings for the girl; their long talks and walks on the northern slope; that moment on the slope when they shared in the vision of the Halo; that moment on the ridge when they first kissed—yes, that moment of the kiss!—and this time, it did not end in blackness and screams, but went on and on, kissing and touching, feeling each other wholly. They had shared lives and were bonded by common memories, by love lost and love found, and though they hadn’t been together in years, they each knew everything about the other, the truth of the moment.

They lay together for a long time afterward, nestled in their cloaks, saying nothing, staring at the fire. Elbryan got up once to add wood to the fire, and Pony laughed at him as he hopped about, naked, his bare feet stumbling on the cold ground. She pulled the blanket tight about her when he returned, not letting him in.

But her smile gave away her true feelings, the warmth of it egging Elbryan on until he tackled her and fought with her, and then he was under the blanket again, their bodies pressed together, and for Pony, all the world was spinning once more.

Untamed, uncontrollable, fearfully strong.

Later, he was above her, looking down at her in the light of the low fire.

“My Pony,” he whispered. “How empty was my life, so empty that I had not the heart even to recognize the hole in it. Only now, when you have returned to me, do I understand how empty it had been, how meaningless.”

“Never that.”

He nodded, denying her words. “My Pony,” he said again. “The colors of the world are returned to me.”

Then he closed his eyes and kissed her.

The night deepened about them, the wind moaned through the trees and those few birds that braved the northern winter whistled. Somewhere in the distance a wolf howled, and another took up the song, and for Elbryan, the music was sweeter now than ever before, than even in those years he had spent in the enchanted elven forest.

He fell into a most contented sleep, but Pony did not. She lay awake all the night, Elbryan close to her, Elbryan one with her. She thought of Connor and her wedding night, of the black memories that had swallowed her. Unconsciously, she rubbed the palm of her hand, burned once so long ago by glowing embers.

Now, for the first time, Pony saw those memories clearly, heard the screams of Dundalis, saw the fires and the carnage, saw Olwan die in the grasp of a giant, and in her mind, she crawled again under the burning house, into the darkness.

Only this time, they were just memories and not threatening black demons. This time, with Elbryan beside her, with Elbryan a part of her strength, she could face them and accept them.

Tears streamed down her cheeks, but they were honest tears for the loss of Dundalis; when they were gone, when the moment of grief at long last was past, Pony hugged sleeping Elbryan close and smiled, truly free for the first time since that moment on the ridge, since the moment of her first kiss.

CHAPTER 37

Catch of the Day

“Damn me,” the skinny, nervous man whimpered, skittering away from the noose trap and from the ugly humanoid creature hanging from it. “Damn me, oh, damn me! Cric! Cric!”

He realized soon enough that his screaming would only bring in more of these creatures, if any were about, so he slapped a hand over his own mouth and tumbled down to the field, his free hand moving to one of the many daggers on his broad shoulder belts. He found little cover, however, for though the grass was tall, it was sparse, with only a few blades sticking up through the blanket of light snow.

A few moments later, Chipmunk breathed a little easier as a bald, lean man rushed into view, his sword at the ready. “Chipmunk?” Cric called softly. “Chipmunk, are ye here?”

Chipmunk scrambled to his feet and ran for his friend, tripping and falling several times on the slippery ground.

“What do ye know?” Cric asked him repeatedly as he stumbled to approach. Finally, Chipmunk caught up to his friend, but he was too excited to explain in words. He hopped up and down, pointing back across the field to a small copse of trees.

“Our trap?” the bald man asked calmly.

Chipmunk nodded so rapidly that he bit his tongue.

“What’d we catch something?”

Again the wild nod.

“Something unusual?”

Chipmunk was in no mood for any further questions. He grabbed Cric by the arm and shoved him ahead in the direction of the copse. Cric straightened and, seeing that Chipmunk would not be following, just shook his head and went alone to the trap.

A minute later, there came a howl from the trees and Cric ran from the spot nearly as quickly as had Chipmunk.

“It’s a g-goblin!” the tall man sputtered. “A damned goblin!”

“We got to get Paulson,” reasoned Chipmunk, to which Cric only nodded and ran off, the skinny man in close pursuit.

They found barrel-chested Paulson, their leader, sitting, relaxing against the sunny side of a wide elm, his ragged boots standing off to the side, his dirty toes wriggling near a small fire. The pair slowed as they approached, knowing that to disturb Paulson usually meant a slap on the head.

Cric motioned for Chipmunk to approach the man, but Chipmunk only motioned back.

“State yer business,” Paulson demanded under half-closed eyelids. “And yer business better be worth stating!”

“We caught something,” Cric remarked.

Paulson opened his eyes and rubbed a hand across a face that was more scar than beard. “Good pelt?” he asked.

“No pelt,” said Chipmunk.

“No fur,” added Cric. “Just skin.”

“What?” Paulson sat up straight and reached for his boots. “Don’t ye tell me ye hanged a man now!”

“Not a man,” said Chipmunk.

“It’s a damned goblin!” spouted Cric.

Paulson’s face went suddenly grave. “A goblin?” he echoed quietly.

Both men nodded eagerly.

“Just one?”

Again the nods.

“Ye damned fools,” scolded Paulson. “Don’t ye know there’s no such thing as ‘just one’ goblin?”

“We should go home,” said Chipmunk.

Paulson looked all around, then shook his head. Cric and Chipmunk were fairly new to the area, having come north a little more than three years before, but Paulson had lived on the border of the Wilderlands for most of his life, had been living just outside Weedy Meadow when the goblin raid had flattened Dundalis. “We got to find out how many,” he replied, “and find out where they’re heading.”

“Aw, who’s to care for the folk o’ Dundalis?” asked a frightened Cric. “They never cared any for us.”

“Yeah,” added Chipmunk.

“It’s more than for them,” said Paulson. “For ourselves. If goblins’re coming hard, then we’d be wise to go south for a bit.”

“Can’t we just go south then, anyway?” asked Cric.

“Shut yer mouth and keep yer sword ready,” Paulson ordered. “Goblins ain’t so tough—it’s their numbers ye got to fear. And their friends,” he added grimly, “for goblins and giants get on well.”

The other two were trembling.

“But all we got to do is see them afore they see us,” the burly man went on. “Might be that there’s a bounty on goblin ears.”

That seemed to catch the pair’s attention.

The three went back to the trap first, Paulson unceremoniously cutting the goblin down, then slicing off its ears and putting them in a pouch, pausing only to note that the creature was surprisingly well armed for one of its kind and that it wore an insignia on its leather jerkin, a black emblem of a batlike creature on a light gray background. Paulson didn’t think too much of it, figuring that the jerkin was stolen anyway.

“Not been here more than a few hours,” Paulson announced, after a quick inspection of the body. “If this one traveled with friends, then they’re likely still about.” The creature’s tracks through the copse were not hard to follow, but any marks it had made on the open field beyond had been erased by the wind. Still, just by the direction from which it had entered the copse, the trackers could make a reasonable guess about where it had come from, and so they set off quickly across the field and into the forest.

Chipmunk found the first goblin sign—three sets of tracks with one branching back the way the three men had come, the other two moving off down a different fork in the trail.

“Well, now we’re outnumbering them,” Paulson said wickedly, the big man never fearful of a fight.

Less than a mile on, they spotted the goblin pair, resting amid a tumble of rocks on a forested hillside. Paulson drew out his large sword and motioned for Cric to go in at his side, while Chipmunk was to go to the higher ground around to the right, getting an angle for his dagger throws.

“Hard and fast?” Cric whispered.

Paulson considered the words, then shook his head. He held Cric back, hiding behind some scrub, while agile Chipmunk worked his way into position. Then Paulson started out, slowly, pacing evenly and calmly toward the goblin pair. He and Cric were within a dozen strides before the goblins spotted them, and then how the creatures howled!

They jumped to their feet, one producing a long, iron-tipped spear, the other a well-fashioned short sword. Paulson was surprised that these two, like their dead comrade, were so well armed and also that their jerkins so closely resembled the one on the dead goblin, even down to the emblem. The large man’s knowledge of goblins simply didn’t reconcile with this sight before him.

Nor did the goblins act in any manner that Paulson would have expected. He and Cric came on fast, but only one goblin, the spear wielder, jumped out to meet them, blocking the way, covering its companion’s sudden retreat.

Both swordsmen came in last; the goblin swished the spear back and forth, the weapon’s sharp tip scratching Cric’s arm and holding him at bay. Paulson stepped inside the range and caught the spear by the shaft and rushed up its length, quickly and efficiently embedding his sword deep in the creature’s chest.

“Two more ears!” Cric laughed, but Paulson wasn’t thinking along those lines just then.

“Get him, Chipmunk!” he called.

The fleeing goblin angled up the hill, and Chipmunk moved to intercept, sliding to his knees and sending a pair of daggers spinning at the goblin. The creature managed to dodge one, but the other caught it on the hip and hung there.

The goblin squealed but hardly slowed, even when Chipmunk’s next blade stuck deep into its shoulder.

Then the goblin was out of throwing range, and Chipmunk fell in with Paulson and Cric, taking up the chase. Tall Cric was by far the fastest of the three and he forged ahead, gaining steadily on the goblin as it scrambled down the back side of the hill, then over the wooded floor of the next valley. The creature went up over a rise, Cric in close pursuit, and Paulson howled out for his companion to “take the damned thing down!”

Cric went up to the top of the hill, eager, sword ready, and then, to the surprise of his two friends, he skidded to a stop.

When Paulson and Chipmunk caught up to him, they understood his hesitance, for there, in a wide valley below the ridge, loomed the largest army that any of the three had ever seen—and both Cric and Paulson had spent a few years in the Kingsmen. All the valley was filled with tents and campfires; a thousand, thousand forms milled about down below, most seeming about goblin sized, some even smaller, but with a fair number of fomorian giants among them. Even more surprising to the three men were the war engines, a dozen at least, great catapults and spear-throwing ballistae, and huge corkscrew devices, obviously for burrowing through fortified walls.

“How far south were you planning to move?” Cric asked Paulson.

To the barrel-chested man at that moment, Behren seemed a distinct possibility.

“I’m knowing that ye’re up to something no good!” the centaur roared. “An assumption I’m sure to make every time I glance upon yer ugly faces!” Bradwarden had heard the stirring in the small ramshackle hut and, upon investigation, had found the three trappers packing their gear, stripping everything from the shack walls.

The three men glanced nervously at one another. Even huge Paulson seemed a small thing indeed when standing before the eight-hundred-pound centaur—and the creature’s demeanor at that moment made him even more imposing.

“Well?” boomed Bradwarden. “Have ye an explanation?”

“We’re leaving, that’s all,” said Chipmunk.

“Leaving?”

“Going south,” Cric added, ready to concoct an appropriate lie, but when Paulson glared at him, the tall, bald man went silent.

“What did ye do, then?” demanded Bradwarden. “I know ye—ye’d not be leaving if ye hadn’t angered someone.” The centaur backed off a bit, then smiled, thinking he had it figured out. “Ye got Nightbird on yer trail,” he reasoned.

“We ain’t seen the ranger in weeks,” Paulson protested.

“But ye’ve seen his friends,” said Bradwarden. “Might be that ye’ve killed one o’ his friends.”

“No such thing!” growled Paulson.

“Goblins ain’t no friend o’ the Nightbird!” added Chipmunk before he could properly think his words through. Cric pushed the skinny man hard, and Paulson’s glare promised Chipmunk that he meant to do him even more harm for his slip.

Bradwarden backed off a step, eyeing the three curiously. “Goblins?”

“Did I say goblins?” Chipmunk asked innocently, trying to backtrack.

“Ye did!” Bradwarden roared, ending any forthcoming lies from the man and his two companions. “Ye said goblins, and if there be goblins about, and ye know o’ them, then tell yer tale in full, or be sure that I’ll trample ye down to the dirt!”

“Goblins,” Paulson said grimly. “Thousands of goblins. We seen them, and want no part o’ them.” He went on to recount the tale in full, and ended by dropping four goblin ears to the ground before Bradwarden.

Paulson then asked the centaur to be gone so that he and his friends might finish their packing and be on their way, but Bradwarden wouldn’t let them get away that easily. They would go with him, the centaur decided, to find Elbryan and Pony and tell their tale once again. The three trappers weren’t keen on the idea of wasting a single moment, but neither were they ready to battle the fierce centaur.

They found the pair and Brother Avelyn at Elbryan’s camp just north of Dundalis, nestled within the shelter of a grove of closely growing spruce trees.

Bradwarden called out long before his group approached—Elbryan could set a trap as well as any elf, and the ranger was always on his guard. The ranger invited the centaur in, of course, but was surprised indeed to find his half-horse friend in the company of such rogues.

“I believe that Mr. Paulson there has a tale ye’ll be wanting to hear,” Bradwarden explained.

Paulson laid it out simply and to the point, and his words hit especially hard on Pony and on Elbryan. For Pony, the possibility of an approaching goblin army sent her mind careening back to the day of the tragedy, threatening to overwhelm her with feelings she had only recently reconciled.

For Elbryan, though, the trapper’s tale was more complicated. While he, too, carried those terrible memories within him, he also had his sense of duty. How many times had the ranger told himself that he would not allow such a tragedy to befall Dundalis again? And here, before him, loomed the threat, the same threat. For Pony, it took great strength to master her fears, to keep her wits about her; for Elbryan, it was simply a matter of duty and pride.

The ranger took a stick from the edge of the low fire and drew a rough map of the area on the ground. “Show me the exact location,” he ordered Paulson, and the man readily complied, understanding that if Elbryan wasn’t satisfied, the ranger would probably force him to go along, the better to investigate.

Elbryan paced about the campfire, looking down often at the map.

“They must be told,” Pony said.

Elbryan nodded.

“On the word of these three?” Bradwarden asked incredulously.

The ranger looked from Paulson to the centaur, then nodded again. “It is never too soon to issue a warning,” he said.

Paulson appeared vindicated, but Elbryan wasn’t ready to concede that the man’s words were true. “I will go north,” the ranger said, “to this place described.”

“I’ll not go with ye,” Paulson protested.

Elbryan shook his head. “I will fly fast, too fast for you.” He looked at Bradwarden, and the centaur nodded, understanding the plea and more than ready to go along with his ranger friend.

“You,” Elbryan said to Paulson, “and your friends will go to End-o-the-World, bearing word of warning.”

Paulson held out his hand to quiet Cric and Chipmunk, their protests and fears bubbling up in the form of unintelligible whimpers. “And then?” Paulson wanted to know.

“Where your heart takes you,” Elbryan replied. “You owe me nothing, I say, beyond this one favor.”

“We’re owing ye even that?” Paulson asked skeptically.

Elbryan’s grim nod was all the reply that the man was going to get, a poignant reminder of that day in the trappers’ shack when the ranger had shown mercy.

“End-o’-the-World,” Paulson agreed angrily. “And we’ll tell the fools, but I’m not thinking that they’ll be listening.”

Elbryan nodded and looked at Pony. “Weedy Meadow,” he instructed. “You and Avelyn.”

“And what of Dundalis?” the woman asked.

“Bradwarden and I will return to Dundalis with word of the goblins,” the ranger explained. “But first, we will return here.” The ranger pointed down at the map with his stick, to a spot on the map northwest of Dundalis, a point nearly equidistant from Dundalis and Weedy Meadow, and not much further from End-o’-the-World.

“The grove?” Pony asked.

Elbryan nodded. “A diamond-shaped grove of fir trees,” he explained to the trappers.

“I’m knowing the spot,” said Paulson, “and not much caring for it.”

Elbryan wasn’t surprised by that response—likely the same elven magic that drew the ranger to the grove made a rogue like Paulson feel uncomfortable around it. “One week, then,” the ranger explained. He looked to Paulson. “If you go straight to the south from End-o’-the-World, be certain that the folk of the town know where I can be found.”

Paulson waved him away, the man seeming quite displeased by it all.

Elbryan motioned to Bradwarden. “Symphony is about,” the ranger said confidently.

Before the next dawn, the ranger and the centaur were racing to the north, Bradwarden working hard to keep up with magnificent Symphony.

Avelyn and Pony, walking side by side, set a more gradual pace, for they figured that they could arrive in Weedy Meadow before the nightfall.

The road was a bit longer for Paulson, Cric, and Chipmunk, but though the latter two pressed Paulson hard for desertion, telling him every step of the way that they should abandon End-o’-the-World and go straight on to the south—all the way to Palmaris, perhaps—the big man, duty-bound for the first time in years, would hear nothing of it. He had given his word to the ranger that he would go and warn the folk of End-o’-the-World, and so he would.

Pony and Avelyn had underestimated the distance and camped outside Weedy Meadow that night, the monk reasoning that it would be better for them to go into town with such grim warnings during the brightness of day. They rested easily in the quiet forest, having learned much of camp building from Elbryan over the last few days, and Pony was soon asleep.

She awakened to the screams of Avelyn, the fat man in the throes of a nightmare, rolling about on the ground. Finally Pony managed to stir him from his slumber, and the look upon his face as he stared at her was one of madness, one that sent chills up and down Pony’s spine.

Avelyn lifted his hand and opened it, revealing several small stones, the burned smoky quartz that he had taken from the corpse of Brother Quintall.

“I felt that they had magic left in them,” the fat monk explained. “Distance sight is their trademark.”

“You looked for the goblins,” Pony reasoned.

“And I saw them, my girl,” said Avelyn, “a vast host. Paulson did not exaggerate!”

Pony breathed hard and nodded.

“But that was not all!” Avelyn said to her, grabbing and shaking her. “I was compelled beyond the army. Compelled, I say, pulled by the magic of the stones, by a distant power that lone ago attuned itself to these special stones.”

Pony looked at him curiously, not really understanding.

“Something terrible is awake in Corona, my girl!” Avelyn spouted. “The dactyl walks Corona!”

The words were nothing new to Pony; Avelyn had been making such claims for a very long time. Indeed, he had spouted similar words in the common room in Tinson on the night Pony had first met him. This time, though, there was something more to the claim, something personal. Always Avelyn had been firm in his belief, but now his expression showed him to be far beyond simple belief. At that moment, in the light of a dying fire, Pony had no doubt that Avelyn’s knowledge of the awakened dactyl was now something more than the suspicions aroused by ancient texts. It was something entirely personal.

“So there ye have it,” Bradwarden said quietly, ominously, he and Elbryan looking out over a vast field of dark tents. “Them three wasn’t lying.”

“Or even exaggerating,” Elbryan added in subdued tones. When first he had crested this ridge, looking down upon the massive army setting its camp, the ranger’s heart had dropped. How could the folk of Dundalis, Weedy Meadow, and End-o’-the-World resist such an army, even if all of them stood together behind fortified walls?

They could not, of course.

And it was quite obvious that this force was moving southward. The army was many miles below the spot where Paulson, Cric, and Chipmunk had indicated they had seen it, and the swath the goblins and giants had cut in the forest on the northern side of the encampment was visible even from this southern ridge.

“We’ll find us a hole to hide in,” Bradwarden said calmly. “Goblins been through afore, and’ll be through again. I’ve waited them out afore, and I’ll wait them out again!”

“We need to know more of their intentions,” Elbryan said suddenly, drawing a curious stare from the centaur.

“Not so hard to figure out what a goblin means to do,” Bradwarden replied dryly.

Elbryan was shaking his head before the centaur ever finished. “This is different,” he explained. “Goblins and giants should not be together in so large a group. And working in concert,” he added, sweeping his arm across the panorama of the encampment, indicating the disciplined manner in which the creatures were organizing their camp. “And what of those?” he went on, pointing to a dozen huge war engines circled on the far end of the camp.

“They’re a bit hungrier this time, is all,” replied Bradwarden. “So they’ll kill a few more than usual, maybe sack two towns instead of one. It’s an old tale, me friend, repeated again and again, though always do ye human folk seem surprised when it falls on yer heads.”

Elbryan didn’t believe it, not this time, not in looking at that military camp. He glanced to the west, taking note that the sun was touching the horizon. “I have to go in,” he remarked.

“Do ye now?” the centaur asked sarcastically.

Elbryan slipped down from Symphony and handed his reins to Bradwarden. “Scout the area,” he said. “See if any branches of the army have moved past our location. I will return at the setting of Sheila to this spot or to the back of the next ridge if the goblins have claimed this area as their own.”

Bradwarden knew that it was futile to argue with the stubborn ranger.

Elbryan made his way from tree to tree, to bush and to the back of hills, moving ever closer to the great army. Soon, goblin scouts were about him, walking through the trees, talking in their whining voices, complaining about this or that, about the fit of their uniforms or some particularly nasty commander who talked more with his whip than his voice. Elbryan couldn’t make out every word; the goblins were using the language spoken by the common folk of Corona, but the creatures’ accents were so thick, their slang so heavy, that the ranger could only get a general impression of their conversation.

That impression did little to calm Elbryan’s fears. The goblins were speaking of being a part of an army, that much was certain.

Elbryan got his next surprise an hour later. The ranger was up in a tree, lying low across a thick branch barely ten feet from the ground when a group of soldiers walked into the clearing below the tree. Three were goblins, but the fourth, holding the torch, was a creature the ranger had never before seen, a dwarf, barrel-chested but spindly limbed, wearing a red cap.

A cap red with blood, Elbryan knew, for though he had never seen a powrie before, he remembered well the childhood tales of the wicked dwarves.

The four decided to rest right at the base of the wide-spreading tree. Fortunately for Elbryan, none of the creatures bothered to look up into the tangle of branches.

The ranger wasn’t sure how to proceed. He felt that he should steal that bloody cap, as further proof for the townsfolk that danger was sweeping their way. Reports of goblins would do little more than stir up some interest and maybe incite a few patrols, Elbryan knew, a response he remembered from his own days as a villager. But a bloody cap tossed in their midst, proof that powries were in the region, might scare more than a few folk from their homes, might send them running down the road to the south.

How to get the cap, though?

Stealthy thievery seemed the order of the day. The four were down and resting; perhaps they would drift off to sleep. One of the goblins brought out a bulging waterskin, and as soon as the creature poured some of the foaming liquid into a mug, Elbryan knew that it held some potent drink indeed.

Elbryan’s blood began to boil with rage as the goblins talked of flattening the towns and killing all the men, as they described in detail the pleasures that might be had before they killed the women.

The young man found his breath hard to draw; the brutish talk brought him back to that awful day in his youth, made him see again the carnage in Dundalis, made him hear again the screams of his family and his friends.

All thoughts of stealthy thievery flew from the fierce ranger’s mind.

A few minutes later, one of the goblins went off a short distance into the brush to relieve itself. Elbryan could still see the creature, a darker spot in the brush, its back to him swaying back and forth as it watered a bush.

The ranger shifted slowly to a sitting position. He lifted an arrow to Hawkwing’s string and gently pulled back. He glanced down at the other three, growing louder and more boisterous as they drank deeply. The dwarf was telling some rowdy story, the two goblins laughing riotously at every grotesque detail.

Elbryan measured the words, waiting a moment longer, sensing that the dwarf was at some high point.

Hawkwing’s bowstring hummed, the arrow flying true, diving into the back of the peeing goblin’s head. The creature gave a slight moan and tumbled headlong into the brush.

The dwarf stopped abruptly and hopped to its feet, staring out into the night.

The goblins were still laughing, though, one of them making some crude remark that its companion probably passed out on top of its own urine.

The dwarf wasn’t so sure and waved the pair to silence, then motioned for them to move out a bit.

Up on the branch, the ranger fitted two arrows to his bow, one above the other and drew back the string. The two goblins paced out in front of the dwarf, side by side, calling softly to their missing companion, though neither seemed overconcerned.

Elbryan shifted his bow to horizontal, took careful aim, and let fly. The arrows whipped out, not quite parallel, their angle separating them as they flew. They were two feet apart as each burrowed into its respective goblin, dropping the creatures where they stood. One made not a sound, the other, hit below a lung, let out an agonized howl.

Elbryan leaped from the branch, letting fly another arrow in midair, this one silencing the wounded goblin forever. The ranger hit the ground in a roll, flicked the feathered tip and string from Hawkwing, and came to his feet, staff at the ready.

The dwarf was ready, too, a two-headed flail spinning in its hands. It came on in a wild rush, showing no sign of fear.

Elbryan leaped back, easily avoiding the short reach of the flail, then stepped ahead and poked hard with the tip of his staff, smacking the dwarf right in the face.

The stout creature hardly slowed, rushing ahead, whipping its flail back and forth.

Elbryan dodged and darted out to the side and, when the dwarf turned to chase, swinging its weapon with extended arms, Elbryan presented his staff vertically, both balls of the flail wrapping about it.

The ranger pulled hard, expecting to take the weapon from the dwarf’s hand, but the powrie was stronger than Elbryan believed, and only pulled back even harder. Always ready to improvise, Elbryan eased his muscles and ran straight ahead into the dwarf, turning his staff to smash its tip into the dwarf’s face once more.

Elbryan tugged again and the chained balls slipped off the staff’s end, freeing both weapons. The ranger had the advantage though, and he batted Hawkwing back and forth, clubbing the dwarf twice on either side of its hard head.

The powrie retreated a step and shook its head fiercely, then, to Elbryan’s disbelief, came charging right back in. Its swing was awkward, the flail coming in from a wide angle, and Elbryan thrust his staff out that way in one hand, enwrapping the balls once more. The ranger stepped straight ahead, cupped his fingers, flattened his palm, and slammed the powrie with a series of short heavy blows, each one snapping the dwarf’s head back.

His attacks showing little effect, the ranger spun to the side, grabbed up his staff in both hands, and tugged hard, pulling the flail free of the powrie’s grasp and launching it across the clearing. Sensing that the furious dwarf would be charging again, Elbryan came all the way around and jabbed Hawkwing hard into the creature’s throat, stopping it in its tracks.

The ranger spun again and smashed the staff down diagonally across the powrie’s jaw, cracking bone, but the dwarf only growled and pursued. Elbryan simply could not believe the punishment this creature had accepted!

The powrie dipped its broad shoulder, trying to tackle the ranger. Elbryan set his feet and launched a vicious uppercut jab with the staff, using the powrie’s momentum against it.

But still the dwarf came on, locking its thin arms about Elbryan’s waist and squeezing him tight, driving him back toward the trunk of the huge tree.

The ranger dropped Hawkwing, reached behind him to his pack, and tore free his hatchet. With a growl, he chopped it down hard on the back of the powrie’s neck.

Still the dwarf drove him backward.

Elbryan hit the creature again and again, then nearly lost his weapon when he collided with the tree, the powrie’s legs driving on, as if the dwarf meant to push him right through the bark.

And given the unearthly strength of the dwarf, Elbryan wondered if the creature might actually do so!

Now the ranger’s arm pumped frantically, and finally after perhaps the tenth blow, the powrie’s grasp at last loosened.

Elbryan timed his maneuver, hit the dwarf once more, then spun out to the side, and the overbalanced, semiconscious powrie ran headlong into the tree, hugging it now, holding onto it dearly, for if the dwarf let go, it knew it would fall to the ground.

Elbryan walked up behind the creature and bashed his hatchet with all his strength into the back of the dwarf’s neck, splintering bone. The powrie whimpered, but held on.

Elbryan, horrified, hit it again, and the dwarf slumped to its knees, finally dead, but still hugging the tree.

Elbryan looked at his weapons, so ineffective against the sturdy powrie. “I need a sword,” the ranger lamented. He took the dwarf’s cap and gathered up Hawkwing, quickly replacing the feathered tip and stringing the weapon. As he started out of the clearing, he heard a gasp, and turned and fitted an arrow so fluidly and quickly that the newest goblin that had stumbled upon the scene hardly moved before an arrow took it through the throat, sending it stumbling backward into another tree.

Elbryan’s next shot pierced its heart and drove deep into the tree behind it, and the goblin slumped, quite dead, but standing, pegged to the tree.

The ranger ran off, arriving at the appointed spot as the moon settled behind the western horizon. Bradwarden and Symphony were waiting for him, the centaur bearing ill news. A section of the army had indeed broken off from this main group, so the tracks had shown, heading south and west.

“End-o’-the-World,” Elbryan reasoned.

“They’re near to the place already,” said Bradwarden, “if not sleeping in the village itself.”

Elbryan hopped up on Symphony. There would be no sleep for him this night, he knew, nor the next.

CHAPTER 38

Mercy Repaid

“Remain here,” Elbryan bade Bradwarden when the pair reached the diamond-shaped grove, “or in the region, at least. See what the news is from Weedy Meadow and prepare the folk of Dundalis for the decision that will soon be before them.”

“The humans aren’t much for talking to the likes of a centaur,” Bradwarden reminded the ranger. “But I’ll see what I can see and set me animal friends about to the north and west, looking for goblin sign. Ye’re for End-o’-the-World, then?”

Elbryan nodded. “I pray that I arrive in time, or that the three trappers got word to the folk.”

“Pray for the second, for hoping for the first, I fear, will be a waste o’ yer time,” Bradwarden replied. “And for the trappers, pray instead that the folk’re smart enough to heed their words.”

Elbryan nodded grimly and tugged his reins, swinging Symphony about. The stallion was already lathered from the long run south, but Symphony had more heart than any other horse and understood his rider’s urgency. Off the stallion pounded through the predawn forest, running on all through the next day. From one high hillock, Elbryan noted hopefully that no smoke appeared in the west, that End-o’-the-World apparently was not burning.

Elbryan first noticed the ghostly figures moving through the mist as twilight descended. The ranger still had a dozen miles before him to get to End-o’-the-World, and so shapes moving through the forest, moving eastward, did not bode well. He brought Symphony up behind a thick tangle of white birch and strung Hawkwing, ready to fight all the way to the westernmost village if need be.

Somewhere not far ahead and to the side, a small shadow glided through the trees, a slender form not much higher than Elbryan’s waist. The ranger put up his bow and drew back, finding the mark. He saw the form stumble out of some brush and stagger along the trail. It was the right size for a goblin—a small one—but the way it moved did not seem right to the perceptive ranger. This was not a lead soldier in an army’s march, but one exhausted, in desperate flight. The ranger waited a few moments longer as the figure neared, as it came out into a clearing under the moonlight.

A young boy, no more than ten years.

Elbryan prodded Symphony into a short gallop, too quickly for the frightened youngster to scramble away. The ranger bent low to the side and caught the fleeing boy under the arm, easily hoisting him up into the saddle, trying to quiet his cries.

A movement from the other side caught the ranger’s attention. He pushed down hard to secure the squirming youngster and swung about, Hawkwing in his free hand, ready to fend off an attack.

The would-be attacker skidded to an abrupt stop, recognizing the man.

“Paulson,” Elbryan breathed.

“And to yerself, Nightbird,” the large man replied. “Be easy on the boy. He’s been through the fighting.”

Elbryan looked down to his diminutive captive. “End-o’-the-World?” he asked.

Paulson nodded grimly.

Other people walked into the small clearing then, dirty, many with wounds, and all with that hollow, shocked expression showing that they had just come through hell.

“Goblins and giants hit the place two days after we arrived,” Paulson explained.

“And dwarves,” added Cric, coming into the clearing beside Chipmunk. “Nasty folk!”

“Powries,” remarked Elbryan, holding up the cap he had procured.

“We got some o’ the folk on the road south before the fight,” Paulson went on, “some smart enough to hear our words o’ doom. But most stayed. Stubborn.”

Elbryan nodded, thinking of his own village. Few in Dundalis would have left even if they knew a goblin force was coming to avenge the goblin that had been killed by the hunting party. They would have stayed and fought and died, because Dundalis was their home and, in truth, they had nowhere else to go.

“They came in hard, Nightbird,” Paulson went on, shaking his head, “and in numbers I’d not’ve believed possible had I not seen the army in the north for meself. We got out, me and Cric and Chipmunk, and we took about a score of folk with us, running blind through the woods these few days, thinking that we’ve got goblins on our heels all the way.”

Elbryan closed his eyes, sympathetic to the tale, understanding completely the plight of these people, the horrible emptiness that some of them now felt, the complete hopelessness.

“There is a sheltered meadow two hundred yards from this spot,” Elbryan told Paulson, the ranger pointing back the way he had come. “Take your band there and huddle together to fend off the cold. I will scout out the lands west and return quickly, that we might make our choice.”

Paulson gave a quick nod. “We could be using some rest,” he admitted.

Elbryan let the boy down to Paulson’s waiting grasp, and the ranger was touched by how gently the bearish man handled the youngster. He sat for a while atop Symphony, regarding the refugees, wondering what he might do for these people.

Then he set off, riding hard through the moonlit woods. He was out an hour and more before he decided that there were no goblins in the area, no dwarves, and certainly no giants. Elbryan thought that a curious thing; why hadn’t the wretched humanoids pursued the fleeing humans? And why, he wondered, had the western sky been clear of smoke? Surely the goblins would have burned End-o’-the-World, as they had burned Dundalis years before.

Back at the sheltered meadow, Elbryan gave his permission for the refugees to start a couple of low fires. It was risky setting a light in the dark forest, but these folk sorely needed the warmth.

Elbryan slipped down from Symphony at the side of the meadow, bade the horse to stay in the area and listen close for his call, then he went into the small encampment and found a place about the fire with the three trappers.

“I would have thought that you three would take the south road with those who were wise enough to flee,” Elbryan remarked after a short, uncomfortable silence. The ranger noted then the way Cric looked hard at Paulson, the way Paulson kept his own gaze low to the fire.

“Wasn’t time,” the big man replied unconvincingly.

Elbryan paused for a long while, studying Paulson, trying to find some clue to this uncharacteristically chivalrous action. Finally, Paulson looked up, locking stares with the ranger.

“So we’re with ye, then,” the big man growled. “But don’t ye think for a moment that we three give a beaver’s damn for Honce-the-Bear or any town between here and Ursal!”

“Then why?” Elbryan asked simply.

Paulson looked down at the fire. He stood up and kicked a stick that had fallen from the flames, then walked off.

Elbryan looked at the man’s companions. Cric motioned across the way to the boy Elbryan had captured.

“Paulson had a boy once,” Cric explained, “about the same years as that one. Fell from a tree and breaked his neck.”

“That one there lost his folk, by me own guess,” Chipmunk added.

“You could have gotten away,” said Elbryan, “to the south.”

Cric started to respond, eagerly and angrily, it seemed to Elbryan, but the tall man went silent as Paulson stormed back over to the fire.

“And I’m not liking smelly goblins!” the large man snarled. “I mean to get me enough goblin ears so that a single gold piece bounty’ll put me in a big house with a dozen serving wenches on a hundred acres o’ land!”

Elbryan nodded and smiled, trying to calm the brute, but Paulson only kicked the dirt again and stormed away. It was more than any bounty, the ranger knew. And, given the fact that Cric and Chipmunk had remained, it was more than the tale of a child lost. These three, for all their faults and all their vocal protests, carried some degree of humanity within them. Whatever complaints Cric and Chipmunk might offer, they had remained in the area because of the refugees, out of simple compassion.

In the end, Elbryan hardly cared what reason Paulson or the others gave for staying. Given the increasingly desperate situation about him, Elbryan was only glad to have these trappers, fierce fighters who knew the area as well as—or even better than—he, on his side.

The next day, Elbryan set the refugees on their way—for Dundalis, if possible, though he gave Paulson several alternate choices, caves and sheltered vales. Then the ranger set off, riding hard for End-o’-the-World, looking for answers or hints of what might yet come, and hoping to find more refugees.

The forest was perfectly quiet as he neared the town. Still, he saw no smoke blackening the sky. He left Symphony in the forest and moved tree to tree, crossing past goblin sentries undetected, at last finding a good vantage point on the edge of the village.

Goblins, dwarves, and giants swarmed in the place, moving as if this were their home. Elbryan saw the bodies, dozens of dead, human and humanoid, thrown in a ditch on the western edge of town, but this was not as the sack of Dundalis had been. The buildings showed very little damage; none had been burned. Did the humanoid army mean to settle here? Or, as the ranger thought much more likely, did they mean to use End-o’-the-World as a base camp, a supply depot?

Elbryan didn’t like the prospects. From End-o’-the-World, this force could swing south and then east, cutting off the roads for any people fleeing Weedy Meadow or Dundalis, the next obvious targets. And if the humanoids didn’t sack the town, that indicated they meant to continue on.

Elbryan recalled the image of the vast encampment. The humanoids could indeed advance, and the ranger had to wonder if all the men of Honce-the-Bear could even slow them.

He could do nothing here, so he thought, and he turned to leave, picking the course that would get him back through the forest to Symphony.

Then the ranger heard the cry, a child’s cry, from a house nearby.

Elbryan squatted low and considered his options. He could hardly leave such a desperate wail, but if he was caught here, then the information he possessed might never reach Weedy Meadow or Dundalis. There was more at stake here than his own life.

But the cry sounded again, seconded by another whimper, that of a woman.

Elbryan dashed across the clearing between two houses, held still long enough to survey the area, then ran on to the house in question.

“A meal for a dog!” he heard inside, a harsh voice, like that of the powrie he had killed. “You get me some proper food or I’ll eat the arm from your ugly son!”

The woman cried out again, followed closely by the sound of a sharp slap, then of a body falling hard to the floor. Elbryan moved along the side of the house, finally spotting a small window.

The powrie advanced on the sobbing woman, its hand raised to deliver another heavy blow. It stopped, though, a couple of feet from its intended victim, looking down at the woman curiously.

And she looked at the dwarf, not understanding—until the powrie toppled forward, an arrow deep in its back. The woman looked past it, her eyes wide, to the window, where stood the ranger, motioning to her and to her son to be quick.

The three got from house to house, then across the short clearing to the woods. As they entered the shelter of the trees, they heard a scream from the town.

Elbryan looked back upon End-o’-the-World to see another powrie come running out of the house, shouting that there was an archer about.

“Run!” Elbryan whispered urgently to his companions. They scrambled through the woods desperately, hearing horns from the town. Elbryan realized that the goblin sentries would soon be all about them, swarming about the forest.

He saw the shapes of two such goblins paralleling the movements of his group. Up came Hawkwing, and two shots later, the immediate threat was ended.

But there were more, many more, and the pursuit from the town was organized and systematic, calls from sentries gradually narrowing the possible area.

The three came upon Symphony, the big stallion pawing the ground and snorting warnings. Elbryan hoisted the woman onto Symphony’s back, into the saddle, then placed the boy behind her.

“Tell the centaur what you have seen in End-o’-the-World,” he instructed the woman, who only shook her head as if she didn’t understand. “Tell Bradwarden—remember that name!—and all the others that the goblins will likely move south and east to cut off their escape.” The ranger’s tone was adamant, so forceful that the woman finally nodded her consent. “I will join you as soon as I can.”

“Run,” the ranger instructed the horse, “all the way to the grove to Bradwarden!”

“What of you?” the woman asked, grabbing the ranger’s hand. “How will you get away from this place?” Elbryan had no time for answers. He pulled his hand free, and Symphony leaped away, thundering down the trails, slamming down two goblins that foolishly jumped in his path to intercept.

Elbryan watched for a moment, confident that the woman and boy would be safe enough with Symphony carrying them. Then the ranger turned his attention to his own predicament, looked about at the many shapes moving among the shadows of the trees, and listened to the many calls of goblins and dwarves and the fearsome bellows of giants.

CHAPTER 39

The Difference

They were readying to attack Weedy Meadow. Elbryan knew that, could hear it in the shriek of every bird, in the movements of squirrels, agitated by the presence of such numbers, by the thunder of a giant’s step or the rolling war machines, by the croaks of powrie generals, the eager whines of bloodthirsty goblins.

They were readying to attack Weedy Meadow, and Avelyn and Pony had not been able to convince the townsfolk to leave—not many, anyway, though now with the storm cloud that was the goblin army hovering about the village, many of the folk began to recognize their folly.

From a high vantage point some two miles south of the village, Elbryan saw the villagers shoring up walls, scrambling about in preparation. None of it would make any difference, the ranger knew. The only hope for Weedy Meadow’s four score people was to get out of the village and far away. And with the goblins moving in from all sides, the only possibility of that was with the help of the ranger and his friends.

But Elbryan had so few to work with. Besides Pony and Avelyn, who were somewhere down amid that scrambling group, Elbryan had only the three trappers and Bradwarden. The refugees from End-o’-the-World were nowhere near ready for another fight; half of them hadn’t even uttered a word yet. The one advantage on the ranger’s side was his knowledge of the region surrounding Weedy Meadow. The village was nestled in a land of steep hillsides and narrow valleys, where a hundred sneaking people might pass unnoticed only a few dozen yards away. This was a place of natural noises: running streams, cackling birds, and chattering animals. A living forest, with enough pine and spruce to offer cover even now, with winter fast holding the land.

“What’re ye thinking?” Bradwarden asked, moving up quietly beside the ranger.

“We have to get them out.”

“Not so easy a task, I’d be betting,” replied the centaur, “else Avelyn and Pony’d have them far away already.” Bradwarden paused, watching Elbryan’s pained features as the man continued to stare to the north. The centaur understood what the man was feeling, the sense of his own loss those years before and the helplessness now in the face of a repeat of that disaster. Bradwarden had watched Elbryan closely these last two days, since he had evaded the monsters about End-o’-the-World and had crawled out of the forest. Always had the ranger seemed stoic and often stern, but never as grim as now.

“We’ll get Pony and Avelyn, at least,” the centaur offered, “and some others, I’m not doubting. Most won’t go. Ye know that. They’ll be staying with their homes until they see the enemy, then they’ll know their doom. Then, it’ll be too late for them.”

Elbryan cocked an eyebrow. “Will it?” he asked simply.

Bradwarden didn’t quite understand. Even if Elbryan and the trappers, all the refugees from End-o’-the-World, and all the folk of Dundalis went in to bolster the defenses of Weedy Meadow, the village would be flattened within an hour. Elbryan knew that as surely as did the centaur, and yet, the sudden gleam of determination on Elbryan’s face left the centaur believing that the man had some plan.

“There,” Elbryan said, pointing to a position just east of the village, to a pair of two-thousand-foot-tall mountains, their steep sides white with snow, crossed by the dark lines of many leafless trees.

“The valley between those hills is full of boulders and pine groves,” the ranger explained. “Cover enough, if we move the folk quickly.” Elbryan looked down and patted Symphony’s muscled neck, knowing full well that the horse not only understood the plan but would help facilitate it.

“Ye’d choose the low ground for yer escape?” the centaur asked incredulously.

“Too many trees,” Elbryan answered without hesitation as the puzzle sorted out before him. “They will get no clear shots or spear throws from above.”

“They’ll come down like a mass o’ swooping hawks,” Bradwarden protested.

Elbryan smiled wickedly as he considered those steep hillsides, all of varied angles and deep with virgin snow. He thought of Avelyn and the magic stones and some of the properties the monk had explained to him. He thought of Paulson, Cric, and Chipmunk, and their undeniable skills. “Will they?” he said calmly, his tone so even and assured that the centaur sucked in his breath and argued no more.

“How did you get in here?” Pony asked breathlessly, grabbing Elbryan in a hug as soon as she spotted him entering the common room at Weedy Meadow. “We know the goblins are all about.”

“Thicker than you believe,” Elbryan agreed, returning the hug tenfold. It felt so good to him, so warm and fulfilling, that a very large part of the stoic ranger wanted to whisk Pony away into the night, to run far away from this place and its troubles and just live peacefully and lovingly.

He could not do that, could not forsake his duty and the destiny that he had been shown by the Touel’alfar. For every thought of running away with Pony, the ranger held five memories of the tragedy that had befallen his own family and community.

Avelyn bounded over to the pair a moment later, the boisterous monk seeming not so animated now. “Ah, but they wouldn’t go,” he wailed at Elbryan. “They would not listen to our words, and even now, with darkness looming in the forest, many insist that they will stay and fight.”

“Any who choose to stay and fight will surely die,” Elbryan said, loud enough for several nearby townsfolk to hear. A pair of grizzly men at a table near the common room entrance stood up, one kicking the table away as he rose. They glared at Elbryan for a long moment, but finally walked away, moving to the other side of the large hall.

Undaunted, Elbryan moved to the long table that served as the bar, and hopped atop it. “I tell you this only one time,” the ranger proclaimed, and the score of men and half that number of women in the room looked his way, most disdainfully but some too fearful to show any outrage. “I have just crawled through the ranks of our enemy, deep lines of goblins and giants and powrie dwarves.”

“Powries?” one woman echoed.

“Bah, a tale o’ lies,” someone answered from one corner.

“Your only chance will be to get far from this place,” Elbryan said bluntly, tossing the bloodred beret to the floor. “And even now, escape will not be easy. I will take those that I can with me tonight, soon after the moon has set.” The ranger paused and glanced around, locking stares with each of the patrons, letting them see the intensity of his green eyes, the determination on his face. “As for the rest of you, your window through the monstrous force will be small and any hesitation will cost you dearly.”

“Who are you to come in here and give orders?” one man demanded. Agreeing protests rang from every corner of the room.

True to his word, the ranger did not repeat his message. He hopped down from the table, gathered Pony and Avelyn in his wake, and bade them follow him outside, where they might talk in private.

Elbryan didn’t flinch nor did he look back threateningly when a mug shattered against the wall beside the exit, a missile obviously aimed at the back of his head.

Elbryan conferred with Avelyn first, to confirm the potential of the magical stones. Then he talked more to Pony, who better understood the terrain of this region, with its hilly forests and many streams.

“They, too, will come in through that valley,” Pony reasoned as Elbryan laid out the plan before her. “If they are as organized as your description of the assault on End-o’-the-World indicates, they will not leave so open a route behind them. They will come in through that valley, and will take the tops of both hills.”

“Not many will make it through,” the ranger promised. “The goblin line will be thin, and speed and surprise will be our allies. As for those on the hills, three friends are already preparing for them.”

Pony nodded, not doubting the ranger’s words, but still, another part of the plan troubled her deeply. “How can we place so much hope on animals?” she asked.

Elbryan looked to Avelyn. “The turquoise,” he explained. “It has given me insight into Symphony’s thoughts. I can talk to the horse with my mind, and he understands. Of that I am sure.”

Avelyn nodded, not doubting the power of the turquoise. The stone, as if it were something sentient, had called to the monk on that day when he had presented it to Elbryan and Symphony, and Avelyn, who had floated down the face of a cliff, who had walked on water and unleashed tremendous fireballs, who had held the power of a thunderstorm in his puny, mortal hands, would not discount any possibilities of its God-given power.

“We have few options,” Pony admitted.

“No other,” Elbryan replied.

Avelyn saw the look that passed between them and he walked away, at first aimlessly but then turning toward the cabin of the one family—a widow and her three small children—that the three friends had agreed should leave with the ranger this night

Pony and Elbryan spent a long and quiet moment together, ending it wordlessly with a kiss that passed as a promise from Elbryan to the woman that she would not be abandoned, and as a promise from Pony that she and those who would leave would be ready when the moment of opportunity was upon them.

The ranger left Weedy Meadow that night, moving through the winding valley east of the village with the fleeing family. The forest was quiet, but, as Elbryan had suspected, it was not empty.

“Goblins,” he mouthed silently to the woman, and he held up his open hand to indicate their number at five. The ranger had an arrow ready on Hawkwing, but he didn’t want to kill any monsters this night, not in this pass, where any bodies might alert the army to a possible hole in its raiding lines.

So they sat tight and waited, the woman working hard to keep her youngest child, a mere infant, from crying.

The goblins moved close, so close that the five could hear their whining voices, so close that the crack of a stick underfoot sounded loud to the ranger and the family.

Elbryan kept them down, tried to reassure them all by patting the other two children softly, by showing them his weapons and that he was ready should they be discovered.

The ranger, lying up front, said nothing when a goblin boot stepped firmly on the cold ground barely three feet from his head. Elbryan held his breath and clutched his hand axe, playing out in his mind the quickest and surest attack should the goblin make any sudden move to indicate that it had spotted the group.

But then the moment had passed, the goblins, wandering on along their patrol route in the valley, oblivious of the man and his refugees. The goblins’ ignorance saved the creatures’ lives that night, for death was barely an arm’s length away; more important, the goblins’ ignorance also saved Elbryan’s plan.

The sky brightened to a dull gray shortly before the dawn, another lazy snowstorm dropping scattered flakes that floated to and fro during their descent. Elbryan and Bradwarden, on that same hill far to the south of Weedy Meadow, watched for the start of it all, for the first signs of the attack they knew would come this day.

“Ye left her there,” the centaur said unexpectedly.

Elbryan cocked a curious eyebrow.

“The girl,” the centaur explained. “Yer lover.”

“More than a lover,” Elbryan replied.

“And ye left her there,” the centaur went on, “with ten thousand monsters moving her way.”

Elbryan continued to stare curiously at his half-equine friend, not sure whether Bradwarden was congratulating him or criticizing him.

“Ye left the woman ye love in harm’s way.”

The words hit Elbryan strangely, showed him a perspective that he had hardly considered. “It was Pony’s choice to stay, her duty—”

“She could die this day.”

“Do you enjoy torturing me with your words?”

Bradwarden looked the ranger squarely in the face and laughed heartily. “Torturing?” he asked. “I’m admiring ye, boy! Ye love the girl, but ye left her in a town that’s about to be sacked!”

“I trust her,” Elbryan protested, too defensive to understand the centaur’s sincerity, “and trust in her.”

“So I’m seeing,” said Bradwarden. He put a hand on Elbryan’s shoulder and gave the man a sincere, admiring look. “And that’s yer strength. Too many of yer folk would’ve forced the girl by their side, to protect her. Ye’re smart enough to see that Pony needs little protecting.”

Elbryan looked back to the north, to Weedy Meadow.

“She could die this day,” Bradwarden said evenly.

“So could we,” Elbryan countered.

“So could ten thousand goblins.” The centaur laughed.

Elbryan joined in, but the mirth was ended when a streaking line of fire cut across the sky, a ball of flaming pitch, soaring for Weedy Meadow.

“Powrie catapult,” Bradwarden said dryly.

“Time to go,” replied Elbryan. He gave one last look at the distant village, at the small fire that had come up. Pony was in there, in harm’s way.

Elbryan grimaced and let it go. He looked at the centaur, moving steadily ahead of him, and at first he was angry with Bradwarden for bringing up the grim possibilities. Until this time, Elbryan hadn’t even considered the danger to Pony on a personal level, so great was his trust in her. She would lead the people out of Weedy Meadow, he had supposed, and though some of them might be killed, Pony would not.

Bradwarden had made him face the truth of this day, and gradually the ranger’s anger became gratitude. He didn’t trust Pony any less; he could control his desires to rush to her side and protect her. Bradwarden had shown him the truth of his relationship, the true depth of his love and trust for this woman who had come back into his life. Elbryan nodded and smiled as he regarded the centaur, sincerely grateful.

“Ho, ho, what!” the monk bellowed, running to the newest fire, clutching the sheet of serpentine in his plump hand. Using the magical protection, Avelyn walked right into the midst of the blaze, standing with flames licking to his shoulders but smiling widely, to the amazement of those villagers witnessing the sight.

The monk fell deeper into the magic of the stone, calling forth its shielding powers, expanding its area of influence until this particular fire was smothered.

Avelyn came out of his trance, only to find that another blaze was burning, not so far away. “Ho, ho, what!” he bellowed again, pushing aside the would-be village firefighters so that he could use his much more effective method.

Despite the efforts of the mad friar, the rain of powrie fireballs increased, coupled with bouncing boulders that smashed more than one home to kindling. One fireball hit against the village’s east wall, splattering the two men standing nearby with burning pitch. Pony was quick to one, wrapping him in a heavy blanket, and Avelyn got to the other, using the serpentine effectively.

“The gray stone!” Pony cried to the monk, indicating the hematite and the badly burned man on the ground beside her. Avelyn went to him at once and eased his pain, but the monk’s expression turned more grim.

He was beginning to admit that he could not keep up with the barrage, and he knew that even this was but a prelude to worse.

Pony left the man in Avelyn’s caring hands and ran about the frantic villagers, berating them for their folly in staying and reminding them that a way out might soon be open.

She was not surprised that now, with fireballs lighting structures by the minute and boulders crashing down about them, she found more people willing to listen to Elbryan’s plan. Still, despite the flaming evidence, many of the proud and stubborn folk refused to admit that this was more than a simple goblin raid.

“We’ll push them back,” one man argued to her, “chase them into the woods so far, they’ll never find their stinking way out!”

Pony shook her head, trying to argue, but the man had too much support from the five fellows standing shoulder-to-shoulder with him along the wall.

“Goblins!” the man insisted, and he spat at Pony’s feet.

The others started grumbling but went strangely silent an instant later, and Pony looked up at them, then followed their gaze across the short field that stood between the village and the edge of the trees.

A pair of fomorian giants, fifteen feet tall and ten times the weight of a heavy man, paced back and forth in the shadows, eager to rush the wall.

“Damn big goblins,” Pony replied sarcastically. She looked down at the weapons the group carried—shovels and pitchforks mostly, with only a single, rusty old sword among them. Pony had given her own sword to the mother who had left with Elbryan, and now she carried only a slender club and a small axe, weapons that looked puny indeed against the sheer bulk of those two giants.

She left the stubborn group with one final reminder. “The east wall,” she said grimly.

She found Avelyn near that wall, and paused as she approached, seeing a slight bluish glow among the timbers of the one east gate. She looked at the monk curiously.

Avelyn shrugged. “I did not know that the serpentine could enact a lasting barrier,” he said, “nor do I know how long I might maintain it. But be assured that any fires brushing that gate will find no hold.”

Pony put a hand to the monk’s broad shoulder, glad indeed to have Brother Avelyn on her side.

The pair turned abruptly a moment later when a shout from the north wall told them that the attack was on.

Elbryan was running hard to keep up with Bradwarden; Symphony had taken to the woods, disappearing as a shadow might when the sun goes behind dark clouds.

“I cannot slow!” the centaur called, and then he grunted as the ranger grabbed fast to his tail, the man half running, half flying behind the swift creature.

They came to their base camp, where Paulson, Cric, and Chipmunk waited.

“They’re filling the valley,” Paulson explained, “a long line, goblins mostly, and not so deep.”

“Powries on the hills,” Cric piped in.

“But the traps are set?” Elbryan asked.

All three nodded eagerly.

Elbryan closed his eyes and sent his thoughts out to Symphony, and heard the horse’s response clearly. Satisfied, he looked again at his immediate companions. “We must pick our targets carefully,” the ranger explained. “We must thin their line wherever we may, and take out any giants or those monsters that can get out of harm’s way.” The ranger looked back to the east “Let Symphony do the rest,” he explained.

The group started off quietly, Paulson, Cric, and Chipmunk going along the base of the north hill, Elbryan and Bradwarden making their way to the south.

Agile Pony got to the roof quickly and fell flat to her belly, crawling low as spears arched over her, as the monstrous horde came on toward the north gate. She peeked over the edge of the roof, back into the village, and saw that only three of the five at the wall remained alive, and they were fleeing fast.

The two giants banged against the fortified wall for a moment, then simply stepped over it.

Pony held her breath at that dangerous moment, but fortunately the two giants were too concerned with the townsfolk to notice her. They strode past into the village, men and women fleeing before them, screaming, finally admitting their folly in staying.

“Ho, ho, what!” came a familiar cry, and Pony looked past the giants to see Brother Avelyn standing steady before them.

A spear nearly got the distracted woman. She spun about as a goblin’s head appeared above the edge of the roof. Pony’s club sent the monster tumbling away, but she noted that a hundred more were climbing all about the wall, eager for human blood. With a growl, the woman threw her club into the face of the closest one, and it, too, fell back. Then she gave a quick glance to the east, which was still quiet.

“Damn,” the woman muttered and she put her legs under her and ran for the southwestern corner of the roof, leaping far into the air and grabbing the closest giant by the hair. Her momentum brought her right in front of the monster, their faces inches apart, and Pony wasted no time in planting her axe into that gruesome visage.

The giant howled, the woman fell away, landing in a roll, and the second giant turned to her, ready to squash her flat.

“Ho, ho, what!” Avelyn bellowed his signature cry, one he used now to release the mounting energies of the graphite he held.

A forked blast of blue-white lightning erupted from the monk’s hand, one finger of the bolt striking each giant. The one Pony had hit in the face, its hands up to cover the wound, went flying backward, hitting the wall waist high and flipping right over it, crushing a goblin in the process. The other giant, its foot high to stamp Pony, jolted straight and stood trembling, too stunned to react as its intended victim ran off.

Pony rushed to Avelyn. She looked all about desperately. Goblins were crawling over the walls like ants, hundreds and hundreds, their sheer numbers burying any townsfolk who stood to challenge them.

“Fighting in the east!” one man yelled, running to Pony and Avelyn. “Where is your plan?” he added sarcastically, hopelessly.

Pony ran with him back toward the eastern gate, while Avelyn held the rear guard, loosing another lighting bolt that launched a dozen goblins from the rooftop Pony had just abandoned.

A powrie crawled atop the eastern wall directly in front of Pony and the villager, not so far from the gate.

“Where is your plan?” the man demanded again of Pony, his desperate question echoing off the anxious faces of all the villagers gathered near the wall.

The powrie stood tall on the eastern wall, but then kept moving forward, curiously, falling headlong over the structure and landing in the dirt, very still.

A long arrow protruded from its back, an arrow with fletchings familiar to the woman.

“There is my plan,” she replied confidently.

A moment later came the thunder of hoofbeats to the east, many hoofbeats accompanied by the screams of those unfortunate goblins caught in front of the wild horse stampede.

“Avelyn!” Pony yelled.

“Ho, ho, what!” the monk replied, loosing yet another lightning bolt, this time into the ground at the feet of a horde of goblins that were charging straight for him. The jolt sent the entire group of monsters two feet off the ground.

Pony grabbed a pitchfork from one of the men nearby and ran to the eastern gate, bravely throwing it open.

There stood a pair of goblins, stunned that the gate had opened before them. Pony took one in the throat with the pitchfork. The other turned to flee, but was cut down almost immediately, an arrow striking it right between the eyes. Pony looked back and spotted Elbryan sitting on a low branch of a tree on the northern side of the ravine. Below the ranger, Bradwarden ran back and forth, trampling goblins and powries or bashing them down with his heavy cudgel. The centaur tapped one powrie on the head, then scooped up the dazed dwarf and dropped it into a sack.

Pony didn’t have time to consider the move, for the thunder approached, led by powerful Symphony. Goblins and powries scattered or were crushed beneath the charge, a hundred wild horses stampeding along the ravine.

“Avelyn!” Pony cried, and the monk rushed past her; she noted that he was glowing slightly, that same bluish hue as the eastern gate.

Pony held the townsfolk back as Avelyn ran out among the goblins. Most were too confused and frightened to attack, but some did charge.

Avelyn held forth his hand—Pony caught sight of a red sparkle from within his grasp.

A huge ball of fire encircled the monk and consumed all the nearby monsters. A hot wind brushed Pony’s face and blew into the stunned villagers standing beside her.

When the flames dissipated an instant later, Avelyn stood alone and the way was open.

Almost open; a powrie came rushing out from behind a stone, its hair burned away, its face blackened, its club no more than a withered and charred stick. But the dwarf was very much alive, and very angry. It howled and whooped and charged Avelyn, ready to throttle the monk with its bare hands.

In his other hand, Avelyn clutched a third stone, brown and striped with black—tiger’s paw, it was called. Now the monk fell into this stone’s magic, letting go the fire shield of the serpentine. A moment later, Avelyn was screaming in agony, not from the powrie—that enemy hadn’t caught up to him yet—but from the work of his own transforming magic that was bending and breaking the bones in Avelyn’s left arm. Fingers crunched and shortened, fingernails narrowed and slipped back under the knuckles, and then came a great itching as orange and black fur erupted all along the length of the arm.

The powrie got to the monk, but Avelyn had recovered now. He was whole again—except that his left arm was no longer the arm of Brother Avelyn but that of a powerful tiger.

With a mere thought, Avelyn extended his claws and raked them across, taking the face off of the stunned powrie.

Now the way was clear.

From further down the valley, Symphony charged in, followed by his equine minions. The stampede came to a skidding halt, the wild horses accepting riders, villagers. Pony climbed atop Symphony, and Avelyn, standing with Elbryan as the ranger ran in, waited behind to cover the retreat.

Both Pony and Elbryan sucked in their breath at the sight of Avelyn’s arm, but neither spoke of it at that desperate moment.

Then away thundered Symphony and the hundred horses, fifty of Weedy Meadow’s eighty inhabitants holding fast to manes, terrified, and scores of goblins and powries scrambling to the hills, trying to get out of the way.

Down those hills came the powries, outraged by the apparent escape, but Paulson, Cric, and Chipmunk had done their work well. Deadfalls, pit traps, and jaw traps stopped many; in one place a dropping pile of logs triggered a small avalanche of loose snow and rock.

Those monsters that did make it down found Bradwarden and his cudgel waiting for them, the centaur kicking and smashing with abandon. Avelyn’s graphite shot out again, back toward Weedy Meadow’s eastern gate, scattering those goblins coming in close pursuit and opening the way for Elbryan, who insisted that he go back for any stragglers.

The ranger found a giant coming hard his way, stomping across the village, outraged and already hurt by one of the monk’s lightning blasts.

Hawkwing’s bowstring hummed repeatedly, an arrow thudding into the giant’s chest, followed by one to its belly, another to its chest, and then a third nicking off huge ribs, and then a second in the belly.

Each hit slowed the behemoth a bit more, allowed Elbryan yet another devastating shot. Finally, the stubborn monster slumped down.

Several frightened men ran right over its back as it tumbled, a horde of shrieking goblins close on their heels.

Elbryan knelt by the gate, taking careful aim and picking off the closest monsters one by one.

“Avelyn, I need you!” the ranger cried. The situation was even more desperate than Elbryan initially believed, as he discovered when he looked up to see a goblin standing atop the wall, some five feet to the side of the gate, ready to pounce upon him.

But Avelyn couldn’t immediately help, the monk preoccupied with a group of powries coming hard down the south hill, having dodged the trappers’ pitfalls.

Elbryan turned to meet the pounce, but even as the goblin came on, silver flickers caught the ranger’s eye. The monster landed right beside the ranger, but it was dead before it hit the ground, three daggers sticking from the side of its neck and chest. Elbryan glanced back to a smiling Chipmunk, the man running off to engage another confused powrie.

“Avelyn!” Elbryan called again, more insistently. The ranger put up his bow and cut down one more goblin as the group of men ran out the gate and scrambled past him.

Elbryan fell back in a roll; goblins filled the gate and poured out.

Avelyn’s lightning blast laid them low.

Then they were off and running, all of them, Elbryan and the three trappers, Bradwarden and Avelyn, and all the latest refugees of Weedy Meadow, following the tentative trail opened to them by the horse stampede.

They ran all the morning, fighting often, but only quick skirmishes. They followed the obvious trail and were guided along even more cunning ways by Elbryan, the ranger following Symphony’s call.

One stubborn group of thirty powries stayed with them all the way, hooting and hollering, throwing daggers and axes whenever they got close enough, and only crying out with more fervor whenever Elbryan or Bradwarden paused and let fly an arrow, inevitably taking one of the dwarves down.

Avelyn, huffing and puffing, and too weary to attempt another stone use, moaned and complained that the others should leave his fat body behind. Elbryan would hear none of that, of course, and neither would Bradwarden. The powerful centaur was still carrying the sack with the kicking powrie, and somehow managing to put his great bow to use every so often, but he still had enough strength to allow the fat monk up on his back.

The horse trail continued to the east, but Elbryan called for a turn to the south, leading his group, more sliding than running, down a thickly wooded hillside that ended in a half-frozen stream and a field covered with snow beyond that. They splashed across and ran on, the powries coming in furious pursuit now that their prey was in the open.

“Why’d we go this way?” one villager cried out in desperation, seeing the stubborn, untiring dwarves gaining steadily.

The man got his answer as grim-faced Pony, sitting tall atop Symphony; came out of the trees across the way, flanked on each side by a score of angry villagers and their spirited mounts.

Elbryan’s group ran on; the powries skidded to an abrupt halt and tried to turn.

Pony led the thunderous charge and not a dwarf got off that field alive—except for the unfortunate one kicking futilely in Bradwarden’s sack.

The encampment that night, closer to Dundalis than to Weedy Meadow, was filled with a bittersweet atmosphere. More than sixty of the village’s eighty folk had escaped, but that meant that nearly a score had died, and all their homes were lost.

“You sent him away?” Pony asked Elbryan as the ranger approached the campfire she and Avelyn shared.

“I could not tolerate that in the camp,” Elbryan explained.

“How could you tolerate it at all?” Avelyn asked.

“How could I stop it?” Elbryan was quick to reply.

“Good point,” the monk conceded. “Ho, ho, what!”

Elbryan looked at Pony, and each shuddered, thinking of brutal Bradwarden and his planned meal. Elbryan had interrogated the captured powrie, getting no information of any value, and then the centaur had claimed the dwarf as his catch—and as his dinner.

He had promised Elbryan that he would kill the wretched creature quickly, at least.

The ranger had to be satisfied with that; he and the refugees were in no position to take on a prisoner, especially one as fierce and stupidly bold as that powrie.

“We did well,” Avelyn remarked, handing a bowl to Elbryan and motioning to a cauldron not so far away.

The ranger held up his hand, having little appetite this night.

Avelyn only shrugged and went back to his meal.

“You did well,” Elbryan remarked to the man. “Your fireball opened the way for Symphony—and even the help of the horses would not have been possible without the magic of the turquoise. And your lightning bolts saved many lives, my own included.”

“And mine,” Pony added, rubbing the fat monk’s back.

Avelyn looked at her, then at Elbryan, his expression truly content. He even forgot his food for a moment, just sat back and considered the events and the role he and his God-given stones had played.

“For years I have wondered if I chose correctly in taking the stones,” Avelyn explained a moment later. “Always have I been followed by doubts, by fears that my actions were not truly in the spirit of God but only in my own misguided interpretation of that spirit.”

“Today proves you right, then,” Elbryan said quietly.

Avelyn nodded, feeling truly vindicated. A moment later, he caught the look that passed between Elbryan and Pony, and politely excused himself. There were many wounded in the encampment that night, including some who might need further help from Avelyn and his hematite.

“I could not save Weedy Meadow,” Elbryan said to the woman when they were alone.

Pony looked all around, leading Elbryan’s gaze to the men and women, to the children who would have surely died this day had not the ranger and his friends ushered them away.

“I am satisfied,” Elbryan admitted. “The town could not be saved, but so different this is from the day of our own tragedy.”

“We did not have a ranger to look over us,” Pony replied with a grin.

That smile could not hold, though, lost in the bittersweet blend of tragedy present and tragedy past. The two moved closer together, huddled in each other’s arms before the fire, and said not another word, each lost in their memories of their own loss but with the satisfaction that this day, they had been the difference.

CHAPTER 40

Nightbird the Leader

“They are not burning the town,” Elbryan remarked as he, Pony, Bradwarden, and Avelyn looked toward Dundalis.

“Why would they?” the centaur asked. “The place was empty before they ever got there.”

“True enough,” Elbryan replied, for the folk of Dundalis, with sixty-three witnesses from Weedy Meadow and a score from End-o’-the-World telling tales of utter disaster, had not been hard to convince. All of Dundalis’ folk had followed Elbryan into the woods to the camps the ranger and his friends had constructed, hidden deep and far from the trails.

“But neither did they burn Weedy Meadow,” Pony observed, “nor End-o’-the-World before that.”

Elbryan looked grimly at Bradwarden.

“Supply towns,” the centaur said, his tone grave.

“That means they are continuing south,” Avelyn remarked, his voice cracking on the words. “How far?”

“Few villages south of here,” Bradwarden said. “Nothing much all the way to the great river.”

“Palmaris,” Avelyn muttered helplessly.

A long, silent moment passed as the gravity of the situation settled more deeply over the four friends.

“We can do little to stop such an army;” Elbryan declared. “But our duty is threefold: to hurt the monsters in any way that we can, to send word ahead so that the villages and even the great city are not caught unaware, and to care for those who have fallen under our protection.”

“A hundred and sixty,” Bradwarden said. “And I haven’t yet counted them all. Worse, no more than a third o’ them’re able to fight against the likes of a single goblin.”

“We must work with them, then,” Elbryan declared, “usher those who cannot fight to safety and use those who can and will do battle to our best advantage.”

“A huge task, ranger,” Bradwarden remarked.

Elbryan stared at him long and hard.

“I’m with ye,” the centaur grumbled a moment later, “though not for the taste o’ powrie, I tell ye. Tough little bugs!”

“Ho, ho, what!” Avelyn howled.

They went to the task that very day, sorting the refugees into those who would stay and fight with Elbryan, and those who would be sent to safer havens, into caves that Bradwarden knew of some distance to the east of Dundalis or even into the more human-controlled southlands, if a route could be found. When they finished the initial round, Elbryan found that he had more than seven score who would need to be relocated, leaving him just over twenty able-bodied warriors. And they were indeed a ragtag band; the best among them, other than Pony, Bradwarden, and Avelyn, was probably unreliable Paulson or the always-irritating, disagreeable Tol Yuganick.

Pony pointed out that very fact to Elbryan when they sat together that evening. “You should send him south with the refugees,” she noted, indicating the grumbling Tol, who was walking about the encampment, bullying any who crossed his path.

“He is strong and good with a spear,” Elbryan countered.

“And he’ll fight you all the way,” Pony said. “Tol will demand control, and his continuing rage will certainly put him, and any who follow him, into a position from which there will be no escape.”

Elbryan couldn’t really disagree. At least with Paulson, the ranger had some idea that the man was willing to follow directions; Paulson and his two companions, after all, had laid traps on the hillsides east of Weedy Meadow exactly as Elbryan had bade them.

“Send him off with the unfit,” Pony said again, more forcefully. “Let Belster O’Comely deal with the brute, else I fear that you and Tol will cross swords, and it would not do for you to be killing one of our own in front of the others.”

Elbryan thought she was perhaps being a bit overdramatic, but he had to admit that he and Tol had come close to blows several times over the previous few months—and then in situations not nearly as tense as the one that surely lay before them.

“When will you send the band south?” Pony asked, wisely giving Elbryan some breathing room before he was forced into such a difficult decision.

“Paulson, Cric, and Chipmunk are off scouting the area even now,” the ranger replied, “swinging west to confirm the occupation of Weedy Meadow and End-o’-the-World and then south to see what roads lie open. When they return in a few days, we might decide what to do with the refugees.”

Pony nodded, considering the plan. “If they will soon return, then they will not go far to the south, not to the next villages in line, Caer Tinella and Landsdown, and certainly not to Palmaris,” she reasoned. “You must send an emissary soon if the southland is to be properly warned.”

Elbryan sighed deeply, agreeing fully with her observation. He knew the proper course before him, knew the perfect choice, a person possessed of both tact and skills, battle and horsemanship, but it was a decree the ranger did not wish to utter.

Pony did it for him. “Symphony will bear me?” she asked, drawing the ranger’s gaze to her own.

Elbryan paused and looked long and hard at the woman, at his love. They had been reunited for so short a time, how could he bear to part with her again? Despite that turmoil, Elbryan found himself nodding. Symphony would indeed carry Pony; the great stallion had already indicated as much to Elbryan.

“Then I will be away before the dawn,” Pony said firmly.

Elbryan sighed again, and Pony took his face in her hands, turned him to her, and pulled him close, kissing him gently.

“I will go all the way to Palmaris, if I must,” she promised, “and then I will return to your side. Symphony will see me there and back again. No goblin, no powrie, no giant will catch me.”

Elbryan, who had felt the wind, the rush of Symphony’s run, didn’t doubt that for a minute. “And you must return to me,” he whispered, “to fight beside me and to lie beside me in the quiet night, when all the troubles of the day must be put to peace.”

Pony kissed him again, longer and harder this time. All around them, the camp was settling down, save the occasional grumble from ugly Tol, and the pair slipped away sometime later into the forest to a private place.

True to her word, Pony was riding hard to the south as the sun crested the eastern horizon. She had not gone without two meetings, though, one a very private discussion with Elbryan and the other, unexpectedly, with Brother Avelyn, who was waiting for her when she walked out of the camp.

“Symphony is not far,” the monk explained. “I saw him on that ridge just a few minutes ago. Waiting for you, I should guess.”

Pony gave a crooked smile, her wonderment at the continuing intelligence shown by the animal—now seeming to be so much more than an ordinary horse—clearly displayed on her features.

“As I was waiting for you,” Avelyn huffed.

“Symphony would not carry us both,” Pony said dryly.

“What?” asked Avelyn. “Ho, ho, good laugh, that!”

The man’s mirth disappeared almost immediately, and the suddenly grim set of his heavy jowls made Pony believe he was concerned for her safety.

“I will return,” she promised.

Avelyn nodded. “And all the faster,” he explained, holding forth a silver circlet, “with this.”

Pony took the band tentatively, knowing as soon as she saw the gemstone set in the silver in front that this was much more than something ornamental. The gem was unlike anything she had seen before, yellowish-green with a black streak down its middle.

“Cat’s eye,” Avelyn explained. He took the circlet back from her and set it about her forehead.

“With it, you will see clearly in the dark of night,” the monk explained.

Indeed, the mounting light of dawn still a while away seemed suddenly brighter to Pony. Not brighter, exactly, but every object became much more distinct. Pony looked at Avelyn, suddenly very appreciative of the training he had given her with the magical stones but somewhat surprised that she could call forth the magic of this cat’s eye so readily.

“How is it that the stone will work so easily for me?” she asked. “And am I now ready to unleash fireballs and bolts of lightning as you did in the battle in Weedy Meadow?” Pony’s expression grew sly. “Is the power, then, wholly of the stones?” she asked. “And if that is so, then why is Avelyn so blessed?”

“Ho, but that hurt!” the good-natured monk bellowed. “Ho, ho, what! Blessed indeed, say some, but cursed, say I, with such a supportive friend as this!”

“Ho, but that hurt!” Pony echoed, imitating Avelyn’s voice, and they shared a much-needed laugh.

“The power comes from both stone and user,” Avelyn explained in all seriousness, a lesson he had explained to her many times during their weeks on the road. “Some stones, though, such as the turquoise I gave to Elbryan and he to Symphony, can be altered to perform their magic continually, whoever their holder might be. Stones become magical items, so to speak, useful to the layman. I have seen such minor charms, and so have you, I would guess, among the farmers or the minor seers of the lands.”

“And you prepared this one,” Pony reasoned, tapping the cat’s eye.

“For you,” replied Avelyn, “or for myself or perhaps for Elbryan. Ho, ho, what! Wherever it is most needed, I say, and now, that will be with you. Take it and use it to guide Symphony well through the night when our enemies will not be aware.”

A snort from the side caught their attention and they turned to see the magnificent stallion standing again atop the nearby ridge, eager to run, as if he had been eavesdropping on their conversation.

“I doubt Symphony will need much guidance,” Pony said, “day or night.”

“Use it to keep your head from smacking into low branches, then.” Avelyn laughed, drawing a short-lived smile from Pony.

Short-lived, because it was time for the woman to go.

Avelyn turned her around suddenly as soon as she had started away. The monk held his hand out to her, and when she took it, he gave her another stone, a piece of graphite, the stone used to create lightning.

“Perhaps you are ready,” Avelyn said with respect.

Pony clenched the graphite tightly, nodded once, and walked away.

The day was, clear and crisp but bitterly cold, the north wind blowing steadily, and Elbryan had to wonder if winter would ever give up its grip upon the land.

Later that morning, the ranger gathered together the men and a few women who would remain with him as his fighting force. “We cannot defeat the enemy that has come to our homes,” he told them bluntly. “They are too great in number.”

That brought a few grumbles, including a sarcastic, “Inspirational,” from Tol Yuganick.

“But we can hurt them,” Elbryan went on. “And perhaps our efforts here will make the war—”

“War?” Tol demanded.

“You still think this no more than a raiding party?” Elbryan scolded. “Ten thousand goblins have passed through Weedy Meadow since its fall, passed through and continued south.”

Tol snorted and waved his hand dismissively.

“Our efforts here will make the war easier on those in the south,” Elbryan said loudly, to quench the rising dissent, “to help Caer Tinella and Landsdown, and even Palmaris, where we believe this army to be headed.”

“Bah!” Tol snorted. “The words of a fool, I say! The goblin scum have taken Dundalis, so to Dundalis we must go, to drive them far.”

“To die,” Elbryan put in before the big man could gain any momentum. “Only to die.” Elbryan walked over to stand right before Tol, the tension mounting with each step. They were about the same height, but Tol, with his barrel-like torso and ample belly, was heavier.

The man puffed out his chest and glared hard at the ranger.

“I’ll not stop any who wish to follow Tol Yuganick into Dundalis,” the ranger said after a long and tense moment, “or into Weedy Meadow or End-o’-the-World or wherever else you choose as your graveyard. These woods have many places I can camp so you’ll not be able to betray me when the goblins pull off your fingernails or hold you down and smash your privates with hammers.”

Even Tol blanched a bit at that notion.

“No, you’ll not betray me or my cause, but neither will I cry for your pain, neither will I risk those who wisely choose my way, to rescue those who willingly went to such a death.”

It was enough for one day, Elbryan decided, for the first day of putting his soldiers in line, so the ranger slowly walked away from Tol, then off the field to the edge of the forest, where stood an amused Bradwarden.

“Oh, nice touch with the hammer story,” the centaur greeted him.

Elbryan gave a wry smile, but it couldn’t last. He was too concerned with Pony’s opinion of Tol as a troublemaker and with the fact that Pony was probably already many miles away.

“We’ve—ye’ve a long way to go to get them in line,” the centaur remarked.

Elbryan was all too aware of that grim fact.

‘”But I gave ye little credit when ye didn’t kill the three rogues,” Bradwarden offered.

“You said I should have killed them,” the ranger reminded, drawing an embarrassed snort from the centaur.

“So I did! So I did!” Bradwarden replied. “And the three’ve proven themselves worthy o’ yer mercy ten times over!”

“They are valuable allies,” Elbryan added.

“Ye’ll have a tougher time with that one,” Bradwarden remarked, lifting his bearded chin toward Tol Yuganick, who was still standing in the small field, looking none too happy. “He’s not for respecting ye, ranger. Might that ye should take him into the woods and beat him about.”

Elbryan only smiled, but Bradwarden’s suggestion did not seem like such a bad idea.

The mood of all the encampment brightened considerably that night when a dozen stragglers—more refugees from End-o’-the-World and mostly under the age of fifteen—wandered in, seeming dazed and sorely hungry; several had minor wounds, but otherwise all were physically sound. They told their remarkable tale to the group, and then their two leaders, a middle-aged couple, repeated the story in depth to Elbryan and Avelyn.

They had fled the town with the others as the goblin horde descended upon it, heading for the forest. But they had not gotten away cleanly and were forced to separate from the main group. Later that night, they had found themselves cornered in a rocky ravine by powries and a pair of giants, but, as the woman explained it, “The air came alive, like the buzzing of a million bees,” and when the confusion ended, all their would-be murderers lay dead, the victims of many small puncture wounds.

It sounded all too familiar to Elbryan Wyndon.

“Then we were guided,” the man added, “through the woods by night, camping in the day.”

“By whom?” the ranger asked eagerly. “Who was it that led you to this place?”

The man shrugged and pointed to one young boy, sleeping near the fire, a lad of no more than six years. “Shawno said he talked to them,” the man explained. “ ‘Tools,’ he called them.”

“Tools?” echoed Avelyn, mystified.

“Not ‘Tools,’ ” Elbryan explained. “Touel.” The ranger looked hard at the boy. He would have to speak with that one in the morning, after the child had rested and eaten.

CHAPTER 41

Tempest

“Uncle Mather?”

Elbryan waited for a long while in the dimly lit cave, the day outside gray and hinting again of snow. He was not physically uncomfortable, for this place he had been using as Oracle, a hole beneath a wide pine, remained surprisingly dry; and, sheltered from the bite of the north wind, the air was not so cold.

The ranger was anxious, and he wanted to converse with the spirit this late afternoon, to tell his uncle Mather of the responsibilities that had befallen him, of the abrupt change that had come into his life, into the lives of all the folk on the borders of the Wilderlands. He realized then that Pony had been his sounding board, his confidant, and that since she had returned to him, he had not often been to Oracle.

But now Pony was gone, on the road with Symphony.

The ranger prayed that his uncle Mather would respond openly this time, would offer him some solid answers, as Pony had done, but that had never before been the way of the Oracle. This time, Elbryan feared, the answers and the strength were not within him, waiting for him to discover them.

He called again, softly, then again nearly half an hour later, when the cave had grown so dark that the keen-eyed ranger could hardly make out the edges of the mirror, let alone any spirit image within the glass.

Elbryan closed his eyes and recounted the events in his mind. The boy from End-o’-the-World, Shawno, had been of little help, but Elbryan remained convinced that it was indeed the Touel’alfar who had rescued that fleeing group from the monstrous hordes.

But where were the elves, then? Surely Belli’mar Juraviel, if he was in the area, would have made some contact with Elbryan. Surely Tuntun would have to come to him, if for no other reason than to tell him how miserably he had failed in protecting the three towns!

The ranger was startled when he opened his eyes to see the reflection of a small light, a candle, burning softly in the depths of the mirror, its sharp glow dulled by a whitish haze whose source Elbryan could not discern.

No, it was not a reflection, the ranger suddenly realized, but a light within the glass!

A moment later, Elbryan sucked in his breath, for there, at the corner of the glass stood the quiet apparition of, he knew in his heart, his father’s brother.

“Uncle Mather,” he said softly, “glad I am that you heeded my call this troubled day.”

The image stood silently, unblinking.

Where to begin? Elbryan wondered. “The towns have fallen, all three,” he blurted, “but many of the folk escaped, including nearly all those from Weedy Meadow and all of Dundalis.”

The image hardly moved, but Elbryan sensed the spirit was pleased—with Elbryan, if not with the situation.

“And so we are hiding,” the ranger went on, “and it is difficult, for winter remains. Now I must get those who cannot fight to safety in the south; that I know and am already seeking to arrange. And the southland will be warned by Pony, my beloved, returned to me and flying fast across the miles upon Symphony. But as for the rest, Uncle Mather, for those who would remain and fight, my course is unclear.”

The ranger paused and waited, hoping for some response.

“I would choose to use them against the invaders,” Elbryan said at length, when no answer was forthcoming. “I can form them into something devilish, a swift and secret band that strikes our enemy in the night and flies away before the goblins and powries can retaliate.”

Again, the ranger had the feeling that the specter was pleased.

“So much stronger shall we be if my suspicions are correct,” Elbryan went on, “if the Touel’alfar are in the area, ready to lend their silverel bows to our cause. Do you know? Are they somewhere close . . .”

Elbryan’s voice trailed off as the image in the mirror shifted, as though the lens that was the mirror was drawing back from that single shielded candle, widening to include many others, little burning huts of snow, they seemed, set in a familiar field.

“Uncle Mather?” Elbryan asked, but the image of the specter was no more, just the field of candles, flickering under the dulling whiteness, dying, gradually dying, until the mirror, until all the small cave, went absolutely dark.

Elbryan sat there for a long while, considering the course before him. The moon had set when he at last crawled out of the hole, and there, waiting for him, fiddling with some stones, was Brother Avelyn. The monk had set a torch in the nook of a low branch of a nearby tree, its orange light casting twisted shadows across the ground.

“Cold night,” the monk remarked dryly. “A true friend would have come out much earlier.”

“I knew not that you were here waiting,” Elbryan replied, and then he paused and looked hard at the man. “I did not know that you even knew of this place.”

“Shown to me by the stones,” the monk replied, and he held up one of the stones, a coin-sized quartz.

“You sought me out, then.”

“We have much work before us, my friend,” said Avelyn.

Elbryan didn’t disagree.

“This is no simple raid, not even a simple invasion,” said Avelyn.

“A simple invasion?” echoed Elbryan, for surely the words sounded curious when put together. “Can an invasion be simple?”

“If it is without greater purpose,” replied the monk. “Powries have oft come to Honce-the-Bear’s coastline, striking hard and charging inland until their thirst for blood and pillage is sated. Then their ranks break apart from their constant infighting, they go away, and the land heals. It has been that way for all of time, I believe.”

“But this time is different,” reasoned the ranger.

“That is my fear,” said Avelyn.

“Yet it would seem as if this monstrous force of creatures so hateful and so different from one another would be more likely to turn on itself,” Elbryan said.

“So they would,” muttered Avelyn. “So they would, were it not for a guiding hand of the greatest strength.”

Elbryan leaned back against the wide tree, having nothing to offer on that point. He remembered the murmuring of the elves soon before his departure, the whispers of a dactyl demon awakened in the north. “And if you are right?” he asked finally.

Avelyn’s face turned grave. “Then I see my destiny,” the monk remarked. “Then I understand what prophetic, divine being guided my hand when I filled my pouch with the stones of St-Mere-Abelle. Even the choice of which stones to take was made for me, then, by something above—”

“I envy you your faith,” said the ranger. “For myself, I feel that our destiny is our own to choose, our mistakes our own to make, our choices wrought of freedom.”

Avelyn thought for a moment, then nodded. “A different way of looking at the same thing,” he decided. “My choice that day was based on all that had transpired previously in my life, was the culmination of a course that had begun long before I entered the Abellican Order. I feel that I am right with my God, ranger, and if my suspicions as to the nature of the beast are true, then I see my course before me. That is all. I thought I should let it be known to you.”

“Because you are leaving.”

“Not yet,” Avelyn replied quickly, “and know that I am with you, at your command. I will use the stones and all my talents and all my body in whatever course you set. For now.”

Elbryan nodded, satisfied that the monk would be of great help—as he had already been. The ranger didn’t underestimate Avelyn in the least; without the man and his magic, many more would have fallen at Weedy Meadow. And by Elbryan’s measure, Avelyn’s bravery in all that he had done—in taking the stones and fleeing St-Mere-Abelle, in facing Brother Justice, and in aiding against the monsters—was above question.

“Do you believe in visions?” the ranger asked suddenly. “In prophecy?”

Avelyn looked at him hard. “Did I not just say as much?” he returned.

“And how is one to know if a vision is true or a deception?” the ranger asked.

“Ho, ho, what!” Avelyn boomed. “You’ve seen something this night in your hole!”

Elbryan smiled. “But how am I to know its source and its outcome?”

Avelyn laughed all the harder. “The responsibility weighs on you heavily,” the monk replied. “You consider the vision more closely because so many people depend upon you now, because any course you take will draw many others in your wake. Ho, ho, what! Relieve your mind of the burden, then decide, my friend. What would be your course had you seen this vision without the responsibilities that have been placed on your strong shoulders?”

Elbryan paused for a long while, studying this man, thinking Avelyn as wise as any of the elves who had been so instrumental in the making of Elbryan the Nightbird.

Then he knew what he must do. And with only a few hours of darkness left before him, and without Symphony to take him swiftly, he knew that he must make haste.

“Your pardon, my friend,” he said.

“A vision calls?”

Elbryan nodded.

“Would you need my company, then?” Avelyn asked.

Elbryan looked at him again and was glad of the man’s offer. He felt that he might indeed need help this night, but he understood, too, that the vision, whatever it foretold, was for him alone. He walked to Avelyn and patted the huge man on the shoulder. “I need you to help Bradwarden,” he explained, “to keep the people on the right course.”

Avelyn didn’t look over his shoulder to watch the ranger disappear into the night.

The diamond-shaped grove was eerily quiet, with no rustle of wind nor the call of any animal, of any night bird, to stir the still air. Elbryan wished that he had gotten here before moonset, when he could better see the rolling fields of snow surrounding the dark grove. He considered the sack he had retrieved before coming out to this place, bulging with candles, and he wondered if he should first light the area.

It didn’t matter, the ranger decided boldly, and went to work. He moved slowly and carefully about the field, building domes of snow the size of his two cupped hands. Then he carefully hollowed each out and placed a single candle within. When he was finished with his task, when he had but one candle remaining, the ranger put flint to steel and lit it, then went steadily about the field, lighting each candle in turn, until all the area was glowing softly from two score muffled lights, points in the darkness.

Elbryan knew not how long the candles would last, how long it would take their heat to melt the snow domes above them, the droplets falling to extinguish the flames. He stood for a long time and the domes burned—too long, it seemed to him, and he suspected then that something beyond the ordinary was happening here, that some other force was at work in keeping those candles burning.

He heard his name called softly. Turning to the dark row of stately pines, the ranger instinctively understood the source. He moved inside the grove, across the covering of snow to the secret cairn.

Something was terribly wrong, Elbryan realized, terribly out of sorts, as if the very harmony of this place had somehow been stolen away. Suddenly this holy place, this place he had presumed prepared by the Touel’alfar themselves, seemed to him no sanctuary at all.

Elbryan leaned heavily on Hawkwing, staring at the cairn, and it took him some time to realize that he could see the stones far too distinctly, that there was simply too much light here.

Its source was the cairn itself, glowing green!

Elbryan could hardly draw breath as he noticed one of the top stones shift. He wanted to turn and flee; every survival instinct within the ranger told him to run away.

But he could not flee, held in place by something he did not understand, by something beyond the power of his own will.

The cairn blew outward, weirdly, slowly and not violently, all the rocks rolling up atop one another to form walls on either side of the grave; the light intensified so that Elbryan could see clearly the remains within, rotted and withered, a hollow shell of the man they had once been.

His staff was up in front of him now, defensively, as if ready for whatever would come next, but the alert ranger nearly swooned when that corpse opened its eyes, showing two red dots of light—when it sat up suddenly, its back too stiff and straight, that posture alone showing that it was far from natural.

“Be gone, demon,” the ranger whispered ineffectively.

As if some wire were attached to its back, the zombie stood suddenly, moving straight up without use of its hands, without bending its legs.

Elbryan fell back a step—again came that urge to flee, his mind telling him that this monster was too great for him—but he planted Hawkwing firmly and used it to support his position, holding steady before the undead thing.

“Who are you?” Elbryan demanded. “What manner of creature? Of what weal, good or evil?”

That last question echoed in Elbryan’s mind, sounding ridiculous, for what manner of goodly force could so torture a body at rest? Still, the ranger did not dismiss his knowledge that this was a blessed place, that this body, and the soul that had inhabited it in life, had been elf-friend, at least.

The creature’s arms came up, reaching straight out toward the ranger, in a posture that might be threatening or pleading.

But then the undead thing was there, right before him, propelled by something other than its legs—was there, barely a foot away, its bony fingers clasped about the ranger’s throat!

Elbryan grabbed at the arm and tried futilely to break the impossibly strong hold. He tried to yell out in protest, but had no breath. How he wished that Avelyn were there! That the monk would step in and blast this wicked thing with the magical stones!

But no, the ranger remembered. The vision was for him alone; this fight was for him alone. Clearing his panic, Elbryan brought Hawkwing tip between the zombie’s arms, grabbed the staff at both ends and twisted it, using its leverage to break the hold.

For a moment, he thought the twist would break his own neck instead, but finally, he wriggled free, jumped back a step, and smashed his staff hard against the side of the creature’s head.

He might have hit it with a blow of his breath, he realized, as the monster didn’t flinch in the least, just came on steadily, those straight arms reaching again for his throat.

Elbryan went into a sidelong dive, meaning to put some distance between himself and the monster, thinking that he should string his bow and let fly some stinging arrows.

But when he came up from the roll, the zombie was there, suddenly, magically. The ranger got his staff and his arm up to block, but the creature’s backhand sweep was too heavy, sending Elbryan tumbling back the other way.

He came up in a run and ducked low to avoid another blow—for again, the zombie had somehow beaten him to the spot—and scrambled through the thick pine branches, cutting this way and that, trying to keep away from any predictable course.

Twice he turned corners to see the monster waiting for him. One time he ducked the attack, skidding to his knees but coming right back up agilely to run on. The second time, the ranger got grabbed painfully by the shoulder but somehow squirmed free before the monster could crush him in a hug.

Soon Elbryan was at the edge of the grove, standing before the candled field.

The monster was across the way, off to the side.

Elbryan’s jaw slackened at the familiar sight, at the exact image he had last seen in the mirror, except that the zombie now stood where the specter of his uncle Mather had stood before. All was too quiet, too serene.

“Uncle Mather?” he asked the thing.

Then it was before him, so suddenly, clubbing him with those rock-stiff arms, sending him tumbling back into the pines.

Elbryan felt warm blood rolling from one ear and had to shake his head repeatedly to force the dizziness away. The creature, whatever it was, could hit like a giant!

He turned a corner within a triangle of tight pines, expecting correctly that the zombie would be there. Up came Hawkwing in a blurring defensive circle, Elbryan working brilliantly to parry and dodge the deceptively quick strikes of the stiff-limbed monster, then even countering once, twice, thrice with a deft stab, a sudden club to the side of the monster’s head, and a third stab, this one nailing the zombie right between the eyes.

The vicious blows seemed not to affect the creature at all.

Across came its clubbing arm, and Elbryan, confused, dove away from the blow, taking the hit but not hard as he fell. He rolled through several branches, coming to his feet again in full flight, wondering what he might do against the likes of this monster, fearing that the dactyl itself had come against him, had lured him to this spot that he might be destroyed once and for all.

He crashed through a tangle of branches to find the zombie standing before him. Not surprised, the ranger continued on, bringing his staff down hard, right into the creature’s face.

It didn’t flinch, except to smack Elbryan across the shoulder with one arm, stealing his forward momentum and launching him sideways instead.

“I have to get a sword,” the ranger lamented, glad that the branches had softened his tumbling fall. Then he was up and running, hoping to put some distance between himself and the creature, that he might devise some strategy. He wondered if he should flee the area, into the deeper forest where he was more at home.

Elbryan dismissed that thought; however futile his efforts seemed, he had played a part in bringing this creature to the world, and he must see to its destruction.

He ran on instead through the winding ways of the grove, cutting down every side path, trying to keep his movements unpredictable so that the monster could not appear before him. All the while, he was circling in toward the heart of the grove, moving determinedly toward the ruined cairn.

He came through the last line of trees into the green light. The opened grave loomed before him, and the zombie monster appeared ‘right behind him! The creature pounded him hard between the shoulder blades, launching him into a forward roll that ended abruptly when he crashed against some of the cairn rocks.

Dazed, bleeding, Elbryan pulled himself up to his elbows, looking over the edge of the cairn. He knew that he must get up and run, knew that the monster was stalking in from behind.

The ranger froze in place, staring wide-eyed into the open pit. There, positioned as if it were the very heart of the grave, lay a sword—and not just any common sword but a work of art, a beautiful, gleaming treasure. If the tip of its blade was set upon the ground, the end of its balled hilt would not have reached Elbryan’s waist, and the width of the blade was no more than the distance between the knuckle and first joint of Elbryan’s smallest finger, but there was an unmistakable solidity and strength to the weapon, an aura of power.

The ranger reached in to the limit of his arm, to find that the sword was just out of range.

He heard the zombie right behind him.

Then, somehow, the sword was in his hand, and Elbryan spun and swept the weapon in a furious arc. Bluish-white light trailed the length of its path, stealing the green hue, and the zombie fell back and growled.

Elbryan scrambled to his feet, trying to inspect the blade without losing sight of his dangerous opponent. The sword was incredibly light; a blood trough ran down the center of the blade—and that blade was forged of silverel, the ranger suddenly recognized! The crosspiece, which curved back toward the tip of the blade, was similarly forged of the precious elven metal and tipped in gold; the hilt was wrapped in blue leather, tied tight by unmistakable silverel strands. Most wondrous of all, though, was the ball anchoring the hilt, a balance to the blade, for it, too, was of silverel, but was hollowed and set with such a gemstone as Elbryan had never seen—blue and with patches of gray and white like storm clouds crossing an autumn sky. And there was a power in that gem, the ranger knew, magic such as the magic of Avelyn’s stones.

Elbryan let Hawkwing fall to the ground—he wondered if he would ever again need to use the bow as a staff—and brought the sword out before him, weaving it slowly, feeling its balance.

He tossed it easily from hand to hand, moving it in the sword-dance, then thrusting the sword out to keep the zombie at bay, swinging it wide to entice the monster in.

But the zombie showed the man new respect and stayed back, growling, the red dots of light that were its eyes glowing furiously.

“Come on, then,” Elbryan said quietly. “You would have me dead, so come along and play.”

The zombie fell back into the branch tangle; Elbryan rushed to follow.

But the creature was gone, out of sight, and the ranger realized that he, too, had to keep moving, that the fight had become even more a game of cat and mouse, for this time, both he and the zombie were the cats.

He stayed on the narrow trails mostly, using his speed, hoping to spot the monster before it was right beside him. He decided to angle his way back to the candlelit field and was not surprised when he arrived there to find the zombie waiting for him. The ranger understood then that this was how it was supposed to be, that this challenge on this field had been predetermined. He stalked toward the monster, and it came to him slowly at first, then in a furious rush, its arms flailing wildly.

Elbryan parried and struck, fell back on his heels, tumbled sidelong in a roll, and came right back in a ferocious charge, that magnificent sword leading. Now his hit did indeed sting the zombie, the sword tearing a deep gash in the rotted flesh, smacking hard against a rib.

The zombie came across with a sweeping backhand that caught ducking Elbryan hard across the shoulder. But the ranger stubbornly held his position and stood straight, stabbing at the ribs again and then sweeping the blade in an arc for the monster’s neck.

Up came a zombie arm to block; the sword’s gemstone flared with sudden power and the blade crackled with energy, as if it had caught a bolt of white lightning and held it fast

The sword severed that blocking arm cleanly, right above the elbow and slashed across the face of the ducking monster.

Blinded, the zombie fell back and howled in agony, but Elbryan was upon it in an instant, the mighty sword diving through the monster’s chest in a quick thrust, then coming out and sweeping down diagonally, shearing through the collarbone, down and across, deep into the rotted chest.

The zombie went hard to the ground and burst apart with a bright green flash that sent Elbryan stumbling backward, that sent all the world spinning in the ranger’s eyes.

Elbryan awakened sometime later, the eastern sky just brightening with dawn, his head cradled in his arms atop the bottom stones of the intact cairn.

“Whole again?” he asked skeptically, or perhaps, he realized, it had been whole all along.

The ranger started to rise but found that every bone in his body ached, and only then did he realize how cold he was. He put his head back down, wondering if he would die out here, alone and cold, wondering what had brought such a nightmare.

Then a curious thought hit him, and he looked up, truly puzzled, staring hard at the cairn.

“Uncle Mather?” he asked breathlessly, and he knew that it was true, that this was the grave of his uncle Mather, the ranger.

But, he wondered, had it all been a dream, then? The monster?

The sword?

Too intrigued to feel his pain, the ranger struggled to his feet, and as he came up above the stones, he saw, on the ground at the head of the cairn, a familiar, beautiful sword.

Elbryan stiffly reached out his hand and started around to retrieve the weapon, but the sword came to him, floating to his grasp!

He held it up before his admiring gaze, studying the craftsmanship, the gleaming silverel, the magnificent gemstone pommel, the blue, the storm clouds.

“Tempest,” he whispered, suddenly realizing the significance of that unique gemstone. This was Tempest, Mather’s sword, one of the six ranger swords forged by the elves in a time long past.

“Indeed,” came a melodic voice from behind and above.

Elbryan spun to see Belli’mar Juraviel sitting calmly on a low branch, smiling at him.

“Mather’s sword,” Elbryan said.

“No more,” replied ‘Juraviel. “Elbryan’s sword, earned in the dark of night.”

The ranger could hardly draw breath.

“My old friend,” Elbryan said at length, “all the world has gone mad, I fear.”

Juraviel only nodded, unable to disagree.

CHAPTER 42

Reputation

Winter’s icy grip weakened at last, more than three weeks after the vernal equinox. Snow still fell, but often it turned in mid-storm to a cold rain, and ground that had been deep with white powder was now slick with gray slush. The change came as a mixed blessing to Elbryan and his forest band. While their lives certainly became more comfortable, their nights no longer spent so closely huddled to a fire that their eyebrows singed, winter’s relaxed grip offered the invading monsters even more mobility. Now goblin, powrie, and fomorian giant patrols struck deep into the forest, and though these scouts were often discovered and destroyed by Elbryan’s people, the danger to the group increased daily.

Pony still had not returned from the south. After three weeks, though, Paulson and his two trapper companions had come back with a fairly thorough description of the monstrous army’s movements. It was as they had feared—the monsters using the occupied towns as base and supply camps while they sent their dark tendrils further south, first in probes, but soon, so Paulson believed, in great numbers.

“They’ll strike Landsdown within a week, unless we get hit with another storm,” Paulson explained grimly.

“The season’s past,” Avelyn remarked. “There will be no more storms severe enough to slow our enemies.”

Elbryan agreed; Belli’mar and the other elves—who remained far in the shadows about the human camps, hidden from all save the ranger and the centaur—had told him as much.

“Then Landsdown’s to fall,” said Paulson.

“We must get word to them,” Avelyn offered, looking at the ranger, who in turn looked at Paulson.

“We already telled some farmers,” Paulson explained, “and yer girl’s been through with the same news.”

Elbryan perked his ears up considerably at that bit of news.

“But will they listen?” Avelyn wanted to know.

“Who’s to make them?” asked Paulson.

Elbryan closed his eyes and considered that. Indeed, the men and women of the frontier towns north of Palmaris could be a stubborn lot! The ranger decided then that it was time to put Belli’mar’s troop to good use. The mobile elves could get to Landsdown ahead of the monsters, and if the sight of an elf didn’t shake some sense into thick heads, then let the folk of Landsdown get what they deserved!

“I will see to Landsdown,” the ranger promised, and he moved on to other matters. “What of our own folk?”

“We’ve got a hundred not taking well to the life,” said Bradwarden. “Tough enough folk, but we’ve asked too much o’ them.”

“Is there any place we might take them?” the ranger asked.

The three trappers were at a loss; Brother Avelyn could think of no sanctuary closer than St. Precious in Palmaris, but how they could ever get a hundred people that far south without alerting the monsters was beyond the monk. Bradwarden’s expression told the ranger that the centaur was thinking along the same lines as he, that the elves and the sanctuary of their hidden home might prove valuable here. But Elbryan, who had lived long in Andur’Blough Inninness, didn’t think it likely that so many humans, however desperate their situation might be, would be invited in. Belli’mar Juraviel, easily the friendliest of the elven band, and the one most acquainted with humans, had even refused to be seen among the encampments explaining that his presence would probably only frighten those too foolish to know friend from foe.

“Then we must make a place for them,” the ranger decided, “and keep them away from our enemies until such time as we may usher them far to the south, behind the militia lines of Honce-the-Bear’s Kingsmen.” He looked at Paulson, Cric, and Chipmunk. “See to it,” he bade them, and they nodded.

Good soliders, Elbryan mused.

The next week moved along uneventfully. Elbryan, Bradwarden, and Avelyn came upon a group of a dozen goblins chopping firewood, and summarily destroyed them. When a fomorian came rushing to the goblins’ rescue, Bradwarden tripped the giant, and the first thing it saw when it looked up—and the last thing it ever saw—was the fierce ranger glaring down at it, powerful Tempest sweeping down.

Elbryan had little contact with the elves that week. He had met with Juraviel soon after his fireside discussion with his more conventional commanders, and the elf had reluctantly agreed to send a handful of his fellows south to warn Landsdown.

“I fear that we are being dragged into the middle of a fight that is meant for humans,” Juraviel had groaned, to which Elbryan only lightly responded, “Of your own accord.”

At the end of the week, Juraviel and Tuntun came to the ranger with welcome news indeed. “The folk of Landsdown are on the road south ahead of the advancing monsters,” Juraviel explained. “Every one.”

“And they are being met and ushered more swiftly by soldiers of your king,” added Tuntun.

“My thanks to you and yours,” the ranger said solemnly with a low bow.

“Not to us”—Tuntun laughed—“for the folk were on the road before we ever arrived.”

Elbryan’s expression turned quizzical.

“Your thanks to her,” explained Juraviel, and on cue, Pony stepped out of the shadows of a thick spruce.

Elbryan rushed to her, embracing her in a huge hug. It took him some time to realize that the elves had announced her, and thus, that the elves had met her! He looked from Pony back to Juraviel and Tuntun.

“You had already told her of us,” Juraviel said dryly.

“But I believe our appearance shocked her anyway,” added Tuntun, again, in better spirits than was normal for the surly elf.

“I was still in Landsdown, the last one there, when they came upon me,” Pony explained.

Elbryan looked her over carefully, satisfied that she was not injured, only muddy and weary from so long a ride.

“All the way to Palmaris,” she answered his unspoken question. “No horse will ever match the run of Symphony! He took me all the way to Palmaris without complaint, and all the way back at equal speed. The kingdom is alerted now, the soldiers are on the road, and our enemies will win no more victories by surprise.”

Elbryan lifted his hand to brush back a stray lock of the woman’s thick, dirty hair. He turned his fingers gently to flick a speck of mud from her cheek, though his gaze never left her shining blue eyes. How much he loved her, admired her, respected her! He wanted to crush her to him, to make love to her forever, and to protect her—and that was his dilemma, for if he tried to protect this marvelous woman, Jilseponie Ault, then he would surely be stealing the very essence of her, the will and the strength that he so loved.

“All the world should thank you,” he whispered. He turned to make a remark to the elves, but the pair, so wise in the ways of all the world, were long gone, granting the lovers their privacy.

“They knew we were out here, in great numbers, and now they wonder why the signs have lessened,” Elbryan explained to Avelyn, the ranger astride his horse, beside the standing man just inside the cover of thick trees lining a bowl-shaped field. A blanket of slushy snow still covered the field, shining blue-white in the pale light of a bright half moon. Diagonally, across the field to the northwest, moving through the stark lines of thinner trees, came three forms, obviously goblin scouts.

“Perhaps they will believe that we have all departed,” Avelyn offered hopefully. Indeed, more than two thirds of the human group had gone further to the east, leaving less than forty warriors at Elbryan’s disposal, not counting the secretive elves, whose number even the ranger didn’t know.

“That would be their mistake,” the ranger answered grimly.

The tone of his voice made Avelyn glance his way, and the monk was glad to see that Tempest was still sheathed at the side of the saddle Belster O’Comely had commissioned for Elbryan before the coming of the monsters, and that Hawkwing was likewise in place, on a holder that looped the bow about a quiver of arrows.

But then, to Avelyn’s surprise, Elbryan stepped Symphony out of the shadows onto the mild southern slope of the bowl-shaped vale, out of cover.

Across the way, perhaps a hundred yards, the goblins stopped and stared, then scrambled among the trees, fitting arrows to bowstrings.

“Elbryan!” Avelyn whispered harshly. “Come back!”

The ranger sat quietly, cutting a regal figure, his bow and sword at rest.

Three arrows went up into the night sky, errant shots that landed far short or far wide of the ranger.

“They do not even believe that we can see them,” Elbryan said quietly, obviously amused.

Avelyn scrambled out to Elbryan’s side, putting Symphony between him and the goblins. “Better that we had not seen them,” the monk huffed, “or better still that they had not seen us!”

“Calm, my friend,” the ranger replied as another arrow thudded into the snowy ground, barely twenty feet away. Brave Symphony held perfectly steady; Elbryan wished that his human friend had as much faith.

Avelyn peeked under Symphony’s head, to see that the goblins had gone to the bottom of the field’s slope, still under the respectable cover of the stark deciduous trees.

“Three shots at a time, and they’re likely to get lucky,” Avelyn remarked. The monk looked up to see Elbryan slowly bringing Hawkwing to bear, then, with hardly a movement, letting fly an arrow.

Avelyn looked back in time to see a goblin catch it in his chest He couldn’t see the arrow, of course, just the sudden jerk of the dark silhouette, followed by a backward drop to the ground. The other two scrambled in sudden retreat, slipping as they tried to get back up the slope.

Elbryan held his pose, his bowstring fully drawn and perfectly steady.

“Get them quick,” Avelyn prodded.

“It must be sure,” Elbryan answered. “There can be no miss.” He waited as the goblin pair weaved, then at last found his opening and let fly, the arrow cutting a straight, swift line to take a second goblin in the side of the head. The one remaining howled and scrambled, fell to its belly, and slid halfway back to the bottom.

“Oh, get him!” cheered Avelyn. “Ho, ho, what!”

But Elbryan had put up his bow, sitting calmly on Symphony, his head tilted back, his eyes closed, as if he were simply enjoying the breeze of the moonlit night.

“What?” Avelyn asked, the monk watching the goblin running off once again to the top of the ridge and then beyond, lost from view. “Ho, ho, what?”

Elbryan slowly opened his eyes and looked down at the man. “It is all about reputation,” the ranger explained, and he turned Symphony and started walking back to the trees.

“Reputation?” Avelyn echoed. “You let the last one get away! It will surely report that we have not left, that we, that you, at least, remain . . .” The monk’s voice trailed off and a smile spread across his round face. Of course, terrified goblin would return, blabbering its report. Of course, the goblin would tell them that the mysterious ranger on his mighty stallion remained, would tell them that death waited for them in the forest.

“Ho, ho, what!” Avelyn bellowed in sincere admiration. “Let them know of Elbryan, then!”

“No,” the ranger corrected. “Let them know of Nightbird. Let them know and let them be afraid.”

Avelyn nodded as he watched the ranger and his mount melt away into the forest night. Indeed, he thought, and well they should be afraid!

Elbryan did his sword-dance, as he had done so many times in Andur’Blough Inninness. Tempest weaved its wondrous lines about him slowly—turning, stooping, and rising in perfect balance. One foot followed the other and then took up the lead: step, step, thrust, and retreat.

All flowed slowly, beautifully. He was the embodiment of the warrior, this muscular naked man, the height of harmony, one with his weapon.

From the trees behind Elbryan, Pony and Avelyn watched awestruck. They had come upon the scene quite accidentally, and the monk, seeing Elbryan first and seeing that he was quite naked, had tried to turn Pony down a different path. But she, too, had spotted the man, and no amount of coercing from Avelyn would deflect her.

In watching Elbryan, his graceful moves, his trancelike intensity, Pony came to know so much more of him, to see him as clearly as if she were lying in his arms, sharing his heights of passion and joy.

This was different but no less intense, she realized. Like their coupling, this was a joining of body and spirit, a physical meditation somehow above the norm of human experience, somehow sacred.

Avelyn had seen this type of practice before—it was not so different from the physical training the monks received at St-Mere-Abelle—but he had never seen a dance as graceful as Elbryan’s, as perfectly harmonious.

And Tempest, seeming no more than an extension of the ranger, only added to that beauty, the light sword swishing about, leaving a glowing trail of bluish-white.

“We should be away,” the monk whispered to Pony as Elbryan came to one long pause in his routine.

Pony didn’t disagree; perhaps they were indeed peeping at something which was Elbryan’s alone. But as the ranger started his movements again, as Tempest came up and about, perfectly level and parallel with his broad shoulders, she found that she could not turn away.

Nor could Avelyn.

Elbryan finished soon after and slumped to the grass; Pony and Avelyn stole away.

When Pony met Elbryan more than an hour later, she had to work hard to hide her feelings of guilt, her feelings that she had somehow violated him. Finally, it was too much.

“I saw you this morning,” she admitted.

Elbryan raised an eyebrow.

“At your exercise,” Pony admitted. “I—I did not mean . . .” She stopped, stammering, and lowered her gaze.

“And were you alone?” said Elbryan.

Something in his tone brought Pony’s gaze up to meet his, and in the hint of a smile at the corner of his mouth, the woman found the truth revealed.

“You already knew!” she accused.

Elbryan brought a hand to his chest, as if wounded.

“You knew!” Pony said again, and she slapped her hand against his shoulder.

“But I did not know if you would tell me,” the ranger said evenly, and Pony backed away.

“We came upon you by accident,” the woman explained.

“We?”

Pony glared at him.

“Yes, you and Avelyn,” Elbryan revealed.

After a long pause, Pony asked bluntly, “Are you angry?”

Elbryan smiled warmly. “There is nothing I wish to hold secret from you.”

“But I remained,” she went on, “I watched you until the end of your dance.”

“I would have been disappointed if the sight of me so could not hold you in place,” Elbryan said playfully, and all tension was abruptly gone.

Pony wrapped the man in a hug then, and gave him a deep kiss. “Will you teach it to me?” she asked. “The dance, I mean.”

Elbryan looked hard into her face. “It was a gift to me from the Touel’alfar,” he explained. “A gift that I will, in turn, offer to you, but only with the blessings of the elves.”

Pony was honored, and she moved to kiss Elbryan again, but a rustle at the side caught her attention.

Paulson moved out of the brush. “The caravan must’ve traveled half the night,” he said, referring to a goblin supply train they had been watching, coming from the north. “We hit it today, or it makes Weedy Meadow.”

“Are they still along the river?” asked Elbryan.

The big man nodded.

Elbryan looked at Pony, who understood her role, and without further bidding, she ran off to find Avelyn and gather together those warriors who had been put under her charge.

Elbryan closed his eyes and sent his thoughts into the forest, to Symphony—the stallion grazing, as always these days, not so far away.

“Let us be off,” the ranger then said to Paulson, “to prepare the battlefield as best suits us.”

There was no high ground in the path of the caravan, except those hills surrounding Weedy Meadow, and that locale would be too close to the occupied village. Elbryan and his forces had to go out further to the north, had to intercept and destroy the caravan before any aid could come from the monsters already encamped in the area.

But there was no high ground, just thick woodlands, giving way to the brown and gray stones that lined the riverbank. At least the river would form a barrier to their enemies, the ranger thought, preventing an easy escape.

“Two groups coming,” Bradwarden explained, catching up to Elbryan and the others as they determined their attack routes. “Small one in front, goblins mostly, but with a giant helping, cutting the trees and clearing the way.”

“For wagons?” Elbryan asked, and he hoped that he was right.

“War engines,” the centaur explained. “Two big contraptions, catapults, all set on wheels and pulled by three giants each.”

“Too many,” muttered Paulson, standing at Elbryan’s side. The ranger looked at the man, no coward certainly, and wasn’t sure that he could disagree. Seven giants—at least—and a host of powries and goblins might indeed be more than the ranger and his band could handle.

“Well, we can hit at them anyway,” Paulson offered a moment later. “But we best be ready to run off if the tide turns against us.”

Elbryan looked at Bradwarden. “What of scouts?” he asked.

“Oh, they’ve plenty o’ goblin rats running about the trees,” the centaur replied, smiling widely as he lifted a twig to pick his teeth. “Two less, now,” he said mischievously.

The ranger made a subtle movement, one that only Bradwarden caught, putting his finger up beside his ear, indicating a pointy ear, thus an elf.

The centaur nodded; the elves were in the area, and Elbryan was confident that he and his band would not have to worry much about any goblin scouts.

Pony came riding in then on a roan mare, one of several wild horses that would allow themselves to be ridden. Brother Avelyn came huffing and puffing behind her, the monk trotting along without complaint.

“The most important task before us is the destruction of the war engines,” Elbryan decided. “For surely they will be put to deadly use against the towns to the south, even against the high walls of Palmaris.”

The ranger paused for a while and considered all that he had heard. “How many in the front group?” he asked the centaur.

“Ah, a motley bunch,” Bradwarden replied sourly, as if even speaking of the creatures left a foul taste in his mouth. “A dozen, I’d say, hacking at the trees, tearing at them, while the giant clears what’s fallen. Ugly wretches. I’ll kill the lot of them, if ye want.”

Elbryan almost believed that the centaur would do just that. “Can you handle a giant?” he asked.

Bradwarden snorted as if the very question were insulting. The ranger turned to Pony. “Take ten and the centaur,” he explained. “You must destroy that front group and quickly. The rest will come in with me to cut off the main caravan, right in between the groups.”

“Facing six giants?” Paulson asked skeptically.

“Drawing their attention,” the ranger explained, “long enough for Avelyn to burn the powrie catapults. After that, we can scatter as we must, but my hope is that many monsters will be dead in the wreckage.”

“But they have scouts,” Paulson argued. “They might be knowing we’re about afore e’er we get near them.”

“The scouts are all dead,” Elbryan, said firmly. Paulson, and many others, looked at him hard.

“Yer elfin friends?” the big man asked. “I’m not sure I’m liking that.”

“Tell me that after the battle,” Elbryan replied wryly, then to Pony he shouted, “Be off!”

Paulson sighed, accepting the ranger’s word for it. He was surprised when Pony tapped him on the shoulder, indicating that she wanted him and Cric and Chipmunk to work with her group up front.

“We will come straight in at them along the riverbank,” Pony explained to Elbryan as she and the others moved away.

“And we hit from the side, through the trees,” the ranger replied. He nodded at his beloved. He could feel that tingling excitement, prebattle, and he knew Pony felt it, too. Indeed, there was danger for him and for Pony, but this was their life, this was their destiny, and for all the horror and all the fear, it was exciting.

Elbryan had to grit his teeth and let the front group of monsters move past his position, though with every hack of a goblin axe against one of the beautiful trees, the ranger wanted to rush out and cut the creature down.

The goblins and their giant escort moved along slowly but steadily, and soon after, Elbryan and his companions heard the rumble of the war engines, the grunts of the towing giants.

“Hold until they are right upon us,” the ranger instructed, “then let fly your arrows and loose your spears. Aim for the giants only,” the ranger quickly added. “They are the most dangerous. If we can bring a couple of them down with the first volley, our enemies will be at a sore disadvantage.”

“And if we don’t?” surly Tol Yuganick grumbled. “Are we to run in front of six giants to be squashed?”

“We hit at them as hard as we safely can,” the ranger replied evenly, trying to keep his continuing frustration with the disagreeable man out of his voice, “and then, when we must, we flee. A single caravan is not worth risking many casualties.”

“Easy for you,” Tol snapped back, “up on that fast horse of yours. The rest of us are running, and I’m not thinking that many can outrun the likes of a giant!”

Elbryan glared at the man, wishing that Pony had taken him with her group, or even that Tol had been sent off to the east with the other refugees. Tol was a fierce fighter, but the amount of discord he caused made him a detraction, not an asset.

“Wait until they close,” the ranger said again, addressing the whole group. “They think that they have scouts in place, and will be caught unawares. Concentrate your missiles on the giants pulling the front catapult. Let us see what remains after the first volley.”

He turned to Avelyn then. “How many will you need with you?”

The monk shook his head. “None,” he replied. “Just keep their attention ahead of them, and I will get in behind! Stay back from the catapults, I warn you. I am feeling quite powerful this day!”

With that, the monk scrambled off into the brush, and Elbryan nearly laughed aloud watching him go, watching the light step that had come over Brother Avelyn Desbris. The monk had found peace within himself, ironically, in the midst of a war, a battle that Avelyn knew justified the actions that had weighed so heavily on him these last years.

Elbryan turned his attention back to the scene before him, ten yards of trees, followed by a few yards of cleared brush, a dozen feet of river stones, and then the river itself, waters rushing fast with the beginning of the spring melt. He heard the rumble of the war engines above that watery voice and discerned, by the alternating sounds, both sharp and muffled, that the caravan was moving right along the edge of the riverbank.

The ranger motioned to his companions, who started slinking from tree to tree, setting up their shots. Elbryan held his place, behind the tangled branches of two close hemlocks. He glanced about for the elves, and hoped that they were nearby. None in all the world could better concentrate their shots, and even a giant, the ranger knew from personal experience, could be brought down by the small arrows.

Up in front, one of the women signaled that the caravan was nearly upon them.

Elbryan fitted an arrow to Hawkwing and eyed his course. He contacted Symphony telepathically, and the horse nickered softly.

The first of the giants came into sight, bending low, pulling hard, a heavy harness strapped across its torso. Two others were close behind, in similar posture.

Elbryan felt the anxious gazes of his companions upon him, waiting for him to start it all. He was somewhat concerned that no sounds of battle came to him from further south, from the lead group, but he and his companions were committed, he knew, and would have to trust that Pony would not let the goblins and giant get behind them, cutting off any quick retreat.

The ranger let fly his first arrow even as he kicked his heels against Symphony’s ribs and the horse leaped forward.

The lead giant grunted, more in surprise than in pain, when the bolt dove into his shoulder, and then all the air about the monster and its two companions erupted as a dozen arrows and nearly that many spears came slicing in.

Elbryan fired again and again, scoring a hit each time as Symphony guided him to the open ground before the caravan. By the time he got there, the lead giant was down and dead, the other two were scrambling to get out of their encumbering harnesses, while a score of powries and twice that number of goblins were hooting and rushing about, grabbing for weapons or diving for cover.

Out came several of Elbryan’s companions, right behind him, and all of them, and the ranger too, breathed a sigh of relief to finally hear the sound of battle behind them.

One of the powries stood tall on the first catapult, barking out commands.

The ranger’s next shot laid the dwarf low.

Pony charged in hard, running her horse right across the lead line of goblins, her sword slashing hard across the face of one, then darting out to stick a second in the throat. This was the easy part, she knew, for she and her companions had caught the monsters by surprise, and diminutive goblins couldn’t take a solid hit. Before the woman had even swung her sword, half the small creatures lay dead or squirming in agony on the ground.

But then there was the not so little matter of a fomorian giant.

Pony tugged hard on her mare’s mane, turning the horse when she saw the behemoth moving to intercept. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the galloping charge of Bradwarden, the centaur singing at the top of his considerable voice, waving a huge cudgel as easily as if it were a tiny baton.

The giant braced as the centaur came in, but Bradwarden skidded short and leaped about, putting his tail closest to the monster. Thinking that the centaur had changed his mind and was trying to flee, the giant lunged for that tail, but Bradwarden’s haunches came up high, the centaur kicking out with both his hind legs, hard hooves perfectly aligned with the stooping monster’s ugly face.

The giant staggered backward, its legs buckling under it.

Singing wildly, the centaur charged in, bashing the monster about the head with his heavy club.

Then Pony rushed by, her sword slashing a line across the side of the giant’s neck.

“Hey, but ye’re stealing me fun!” the centaur protested, leaping about again and snapping off a second mighty double kick, this one connecting on the giant’s massive chest and throwing the monster flat to the ground.

Bradwarden smiled, seeing Pony run down another goblin, seeing all the wretched creatures falling fast before the deadly group. And seeing, most of all, the giant, dazed and helpless, up on its elbows, its head lolling about.

Perfect height for an underhand swing.

The second giant went down before it ever got out of the harness. The third did get out, but Elbryan put an arrow into its eye, and half a dozen other arrows hit it in the neck and face.

It, too, slumped to the ground.

Of more concern, though, were the powries, taking up their weapons, and the giants from the second catapult, out of their harnesses and with hardly a scratch on them.

“Hurry, Avelyn,” Elbryan muttered under his breath. “Do not delay.”

“Here comes Jilly! Flying fast!” one man cried, and Elbryan was truly glad for the timing and for the much-needed boost to his group’s tentative morale. The monstrous troop in the south had been overrun, so it seemed.

“Concentrate your shots on the giants!” the ranger bellowed, and then under his voice, he repeated, “Hurry, Avelyn.”

Bradwarden galloped off to catch the woman and her fast-flying roan, but the centaur skidded to a stop, seeing Chipmunk tearing free a pair of daggers from a dead goblin, but with tears streaming down his face.

“It’s Cric!” the man wailed “Oh, my Cric!”

Bradwarden followed his gaze to a tumble of a pair of goblins and, unmistakably, a bald-headed human lying among them.

“He’s dead!” the small nervous man declared.

“Where is yer third?” the centaur asked. “The big one?”

“Paulson’s running up ahead,” Chipmunk explained. “Says he’ll kill every goblin, every powrie, every giant.”

“Get on me back, man, and hurry!” the centaur ordered, and Chipmunk did just that. On they charged, Bradwarden singing a rousing song and Chipmunk forcing away his tears, locking them behind a wall of sheer anger.

Avelyn crouched behind a tree, barely ten feet from the side of the trailing catapult. The monk’s frustration mounted, for though two of the giants had run off toward the fighting up front, the third had remained defensively in place, with a host of powries staying up on the catapult, some of them with crossbows.

Avelyn would have to get closer, he knew, for his fireball to have any real effect, but if he went out in the open, he figured that he would be grabbed or shot down before he ever loosed the magical blast.

The monk understood the situation up front, understood that Elbryan could not buy him very much more time without endangering many lives. He called up his serpentine shield and, purely on instinct, he rushed out of the brush and dove to the ground, rolling right under the catapult.

He heard the powries crying out, knew that he hadn’t much time, and tried to focus on the ruby, on its mounting energy.

Then the giant was kneeling beside the catapult, its face down to the ground, its long arm reaching under for poor Avelyn.

He had to roll away, but then stopped suddenly as a small crossbow bolt skipped off the ground right beside him. He glanced back to see a pair of powries crawling under the war engine, coming for him with prodding spears.

Avelyn closed his eyes and prayed with all his heart. He felt the tingling power of the ruby, as if it were begging or release; he imagined the sudden stabbing pain when the powries drew near.

Avelyn’s eyes popped open, the man staring into the ugly face of the giant.

“Ho, ho, what!” the monk howled in glee, and boom! a ball of flame engulfed the catapult, incinerated the powries crawling in behind the monk, and blinded the giant in front of him. The great wooden structure went up like a huge candle; those unsuspecting powries standing atop it cried out and dove for the ground, rolling to extinguish the flames. One unfortunate dwarf dove right in the path of the howling giant. The fire on that particular dwarf was indeed extinguished as a huge booted foot crushed the diminutive creature flat. The burning giant continued on with hardly a thought for the dwarf, running blindly, swatting futilely at the flames. It slammed into a young tree, snapping branches and stumbling, but held its balance—stupidly, for the ground offered its only chance of smothering the flames—and ran on.

Avelyn clutched the serpentine tightly as burning chips of wood sizzled down around him. The gem wouldn’t protect him from smoke, he knew, and so he realized he had to get out from under the burning war engine. He started to work himself to one side, but then a wheel succumbed to the flames and the gigantic catapult creaked and rocked to the side, pinning the monk.

“Oh, help me,” Avelyn breathed, trying to squeeze back the other way. “Ho, ho, what?”

Avelyn’s blast did much to even the odds, leaving only two giants and a score of powries against Elbryan’s thirty. The ranger could not accept such an even fight, though, for if he lost a fifth of his force, it would be too many for the gains of this one encounter. He started to call for a retreat, holding Pony back as she galloped up beside him on her strong roan, but then Bradwarden came by, singing again, a rowdy tune, with a growling Chipmunk on his back, daggers in hand.

“Halt!” Elbryan called to the centaur, but even as he spoke there came a sudden humming sound, a noise the ranger recognized as the thrumming of many delicate but deadly elvish bows.

Several powries tumbled from the lead catapult.

Bradwarden bore down on the closest giant, Chipmunk leading the way with a hurled dagger, then a second, third, and fourth in rapid succession, all aimed perfectly for the behemoth’s face, all hitting the mark and digging in deeply with the strength of the man’s rage driving them.

The giant howled in agony and clutched at its torn face with both hands, and Bradwarden hit it in full stride, bowling it to the ground.

Elbryan could not halt the flow of his furious forces then, certainly not wild-eyed Paulson, who dodged the thrust of a powrie spear, lifted the dwarf into the air, and tossed it a dozen feet, to crack its head against a tree trunk.

The remaining giant ran away into the woods; those powries out of the immediate rush scattered, wanting no more of this wild band.

“Take apart the second catapult!” Elbryan commanded his forces. “Feed its logs to Avelyn’s fire.”

“Where is Avelyn?” Pony asked as her roan trotted past Symphony.

“In the forest with the elves, likely,” said Elbryan. “Perhaps in pursuit of the giant.”

As if on cue, the burning catapult creaked again and slanted over farther. Elbryan stared at it, sensed something amiss.

“No,” the ranger murmured, slipping down from his horse. He started walking toward the burning things then began running, scrambling to the ground as close as he could get to the catapult’s highest edge. Elbryan peered through the thick smoke. There were two bodies near him, and he was relieved to recognize them as powries.

“But what were the powries doing under the catapult?” the ranger asked with sudden horror.

“Bring a beam!” he shouted, standing tall and hopping excitedly. “A lever! And quickly!”

“Avelyn,” Pony breathed, catching on to the source of her lover’s distress.

Most of the fighting was finished—several men and the centaur had already begun taking apart the intact catapult Bradwarden, working at the catapult’s long arm and great counterweight, heard the ranger’s desperate call.

Chipmunk popped out the last fastening peg, and, with the strength of a giant, the centaur lifted free the huge beam. Men scrambled to help him, but even with all of the hands, the best they could do was drag the beam to Elbryan and the burning catapult.

“Ropes to the other side,” Elbryan commanded, as he and several others began setting one end of the long pole under the highest side of the burning catapult. “It must be pulled right over, and swiftly!”

They tugged, they lifted with all their strength. Pony got Symphony and her roan around the back, ropes looped about the war engine and tied to the tugging horses. Finally, with one great heave, the group uprighted the catapult, which fell over with a tremendous groan of protest and a huge shower of orange-yellow sparks.

There lay Avelyn, motionless and soot covered.

Elbryan rushed to him, as did all the others, Pony pushing her way through to be beside this man she had come to love as a brother.

“He does not breathe!” Elbryan cried, pushing hard on the man’s chest, trying to force the air into him.

Pony took a different tack, going for the monk’s pouch, fumbling with the stones until she at last brought forth the hematite. She had no idea how to proceed—Avelyn had not formally trained her with this most dangerous of stones—but she knew that she must try. She sent her thoughts into the stone, remembered that Avelyn had done as much for her, and indeed, for Elbryan.

She prayed to God, she begged for help, and then, though she did not believe that she had accessed the stone’s power in the least, she felt a soothing hand above her own, and looked down to see the monk staring up at her, smiling faintly.

“Hot one,” Avelyn said between coughs that brought forth black spittle. “Ho, ho, what!”

“The design was impressive,” Elbryan admitted to Belli’mar Juraviel and Tuntun, the elves sitting with the ranger at Avelyn’s bedside much later that night.

Avelyn opened a sleepy eye to regard his newest companions. He had known the elves were about, of course—everyone in the camp did—but he had never actually seen one of the Touel’alfar before. He stayed quiet and closed his eyes once more, not wanting to scare the sprites away.

Too late; Elbryan had noticed the movement.

“I fear that your prophecies of doom hold much truth,” the ranger said, shaking Avelyn a bit to show that he was speaking to him.

Avelyn opened one eye, locked stares not with Elbryan but with the elven pair.

“I give you Belli’mar Juraviel and Tuntun,” the ranger said politely, “two of my tutors, two of my dearest friends.”

Avelyn opened wide his eyes. “Well met, what,” he said boisterously, though he wound up coughing again, not yet ready for such exertion.

“And to you, good friar,” said Juraviel. “Your power with the stones is encouraging.”

“And great will that power need to be,” added Tuntun. “For a darkness has come to the world.”

Avelyn knew that all too well, had known it since the days immediately after his departure from St-Mere-Abelle—had known it, in retrospect, since his journey to Pimaninicuit. He closed his eyes again and lay still, too weary to speak of such things.

“We know beyond doubt that these monsters are not simple raiders but a cohesive and organized force,” Elbryan stated.

“They are guided,” Tuntun agreed, “and held together.”

“We need to speak of this another time,” said Juraviel, indicating the monk, who seemed as if he had drifted off to sleep once more. “For now, we have the immediate battles before us.”

Both elves nodded and slipped quietly out of the tent, past the sleeping soldiers and the alert guards without a whisper, seeming to all about as no more than windblown leaves or the shadow of a bird.

Elbryan sat with Avelyn for the rest of the night, but the monk did not stir. He was deep in thought, in sleep at times, recalling all that he had heard of the darkness that was on the land, of the demon dactyl and the blackness within men’s hearts.

“Our master will not be pleased,” Gothra the goblin whined, the one-handed creature hopping frantically about the small room.

Ulg Tik’narn regarded his fellow general sourly. The powrie had little love of goblins and found Gothra a pitiful whining creature. The powrie could not deny Gothra’s statement, though, and gave the goblin more credit than he gave Maiyer Dek, for the giant was perfectly oblivious of their increasingly desperate situation. The villages had been captured, that was true, but too few humans had been killed, and this mysterious Nightbird and his friends were wreaking havoc on every supply group that came down from the north, something the merciless dactyl had certainly noticed—the arrival of the spirit who called himself Brother Justice confirmed that fact.

And Ulg Tik’narn knew that he, most of all, would be blamed for the interfering humans. But the powrie was not without allies of its own, and was not without a plan.

CHAPTER 43

A Place of Particular Interest

“Tearing and scarring!” the centaur wailed, stomping about, splashing in the mud and puddles and smashing his heavy club against the ground. A drenching rain fell all about the region, turning the last of the snow to slush and softening the ground.

“They are cutting the evergreens in the vale north of Dundalis,” Elbryan explained grimly to Pony. “All of them.”

“Then the day is all the grayer,” she replied, looking in the general direction of what had once been her home. Of all the places in the area, only Elbryan’s private grove was more beautiful than the pine vale and the caribou moss, and none elicited more wistful memories from the young woman.

“We can stop them,” the ranger said suddenly, seeing the profound pain on Pony’s fair features. He sighed as he finished, though, for he and Bradwarden had just concluded a similar conversation in which the centaur had called for an attack, but Elbryan had reasoned that the clear-cutting might be no more than a trap set for their band. They had become a large thorn in the side of the invading army, and no doubt the monstrous leaders in Dundalis and the other villages wanted to get the secretive band out in the open and deal with them once and for all. Goblins were stupid things, but powries were not, Elbryan knew, and he understood that these dwarvish generals would recognize the importance of beauty to the humans.

“Too close to Dundalis,” Pony lamented. “They would have reinforcements upon us before we could do any real harm to their clear-cutters.”

“But if we sting them and send them running,” Bradwarden argued again, “might that they’ll be thinking twice before going back in that valley!”

Pony looked at Elbryan, the Nightbird. This was his game, his force to command. “I would like to hit at them,” she said quietly, “if for no other reason than to show my respect for the land they despoil.”

Elbryan nodded grimly. “What of Avelyn?”

“He is in no state to entertain thoughts of battle,” Pony replied with a shake of her head, the movement spraying little droplets of water from her thick, soaked hair. “And he is busy with his gemstones, looking far, so he said.”

Elbryan had to be satisfied with that; any work Avelyn was doing was likely vital, for the monk was at least as dedicated as Elbryan himself, or any of the others out here. “Symphony can bring us only a handful of horses,” the ranger stated, improvising, thinking out loud. “We’ll take only as many as can ride, and only volunteers.”

“My roan will bear me,” said Pony.

“I ride when I’m walking.” The centaur laughed.

Elbryan replied with a smile, then fell within his thoughts, calling out through the rain and the trees to Symphony, the black stallion not so far away. Within the hour, seven riders, Paulson and Chipmunk among them—both still fuming over the loss of Cric—and Bradwarden beside them, set out through the forest, making their winding way toward the evergreen valley. The elves were with them, as well, Elbryan knew, shadowing their every move, serving as silent scouts.

They arrived at the northern slope of the valley without incident, to look down upon a score of powries, a like number of goblins, and a pair of giants, clearing away the trees. This was one of the few times of the year when the ground in the vale was brown, for the caribou moss wasn’t in season and the snow was all but gone. Still, the sight of the low, neat evergreens was impressive, a reminder to the ranger and Pony of the beauty of this place, this valley that they had so treasured in their youth.

“We stay close, we hit fast, and we get away,” Elbryan explained, addressing them all but eyeing Paulson directly. The big man, so pained by the loss of his friend, was likely to ride right out the other end of the valley, the ranger realized, and charge into Dundalis, killing everything in his path. “Our mission here is not to kill them all—we’ve not the numbers for such a task—but to scare them and sting them, to chase them away in the hope that they will fear to leave the shelter of the village.”

Pony, Paulson, and Chipmunk went with Elbryan, moving down to the left, while the other three followed Bradwarden down to the right. The rain intensified then, as did the wind, sheets of water blowing past, making them and their mounts all thoroughly miserable. But Elbryan welcomed the deluge. The monsters were as miserable as they, he knew, and the noise of the storm would cover their approach, perhaps even their first attacks. The one drawback was that the elves, even then moving into position lower on the slope, would have a difficult time with their bows.

No matter, the ranger mused as he picked his way among the low pines, wide of the area where the monsters hacked away. Today was a day for swords, then, and Elbryan felt comfortable indeed drawing Tempest and laying the magnificent sword across his lap.

The blade came up swiftly as the ranger passed around one bushy spruce, to see the branches jostled by something within.

Belli’mar Juraviel popped his head out in plain view; Elbryan heard Paulson and Chipmunk suck in their breath behind him, their first real sight of the ever-elusive elves.

“They are behind the ridge in great numbers,” Juraviel said to the ranger. “Many giants among them, and those with stones for throwing! Be gone from this place, oh, be gone!”

Before Elbryan could begin to respond, the elf disappeared within the thick boughs, and then a rustle across the way told Elbryan that Juraviel had exited the back side of the tree and was probably long gone already.

“Trap,” the ranger whispered harshly to his three companions, and he kicked Symphony into a run. The four widened their line, weaving about the trees, coming suddenly upon a group of powries and goblins, the monsters too startled to react.

Elbryan leaned low in the saddle and slashed one across the face, then drove Tempest into the chest of another as Symphony thundered past. Chipmunk took one in the eye with a dagger and cut the ear off another as it tried to dive aside, while Pony scattered a trio of goblins, the whining creatures more than willing to run away.

Paulson’s maneuvers were more direct, the bearish man running down one powrie, trampling it under his mount, then splitting the skull of another with his heavy axe. Roaring and charging, looking for another target, the big man guided his horse out to the side of the others, cut a close circuit, of one tree, and ran smack into a fomorian giant, the horse and rider bouncing more than the behemoth.

Paulson fell from his mount into the mud and looked up to see the giant, a bit dazed but far from defeated, shove his horse aside, then take up its monstrous, spiked club.

He knew that he would soon be with poor Cric.

He was weak and sore, but he could wait no longer. Brother Avelyn understood that he and his friends, that all the world, needed answers, needed to know the exact cause of this invasion. And so he fell into the enchantment of his powerful hematite, let his spirit walk free of his battered body, and then let it fly upon the winds.

He looked to the south, to Dundalis and the fight in the vale. He saw the monsters readied on the hill, beginning their charge, organized as an army and not a simple collection of marauding tribes.

Avelyn could do nothing except pray that Elbryan and his riders were swift enough and lucky enough to get away.

The monk’s thoughts turned him back to the north, and there he went with all speed. Soon he was far beyond the sounds of battle, the forest rushing past beneath his floating spirit. How free he felt, as he had on that long-ago day—that day a million years ago in another life, it seemed—when Master Jojonah had first let him walk outside of his corporeal form, when he had floated above St.-Mere-Abelle to see the carvings on the monastery roof.

Yet another caravan of monsters, laden with engines of war and moving inexorably south, washed those peaceful thoughts from Avelyn’s mind.

He came past the storm, out of the rain, but though the sky was brighter, the scene before the monk, the towering outline of the Barbacan, was not. Avelyn felt the evil, feared the evil, and knew suddenly that if he went in that dark place now, he would not get out.

Still, his spirit moved toward the Barbacan, drawn by the monk’s need to know. He floated up past the towering spires of natural stone, over the southern lip of the barrier mountains, and looked down upon a blackness more complete than any moonless night.

If ten thousand monsters had marched south, five times that number were gathered here, their dark forms filling the valley from this southern mountain wall all the way to the plain between the black arms of a singular, smoking mountain some miles to the north.

A smoking mountain! It was alive with the magic of molten stone, the magic of demon dactyls.

Avelyn didn’t need to go any closer, and yet he felt compelled to do so, driven by curiosity, perhaps.

No, it wasn’t curiosity, the monk realized suddenly, nor was it any false hope that he might do battle with the creature then and there. Yet he could not deny the tug of that lone, smoking mountain, calling to him, compelling him . . .

He had been noticed; there could be no other answer! The demon dactyl had sensed his spirit presence and was trying to draw him in, to destroy him. That realization bolstered Avelyn’s strength, and he turned away, the southlands wide before him.

“You have come to join with us,” came a soft call, more a telepathic message than an actual voice, though Avelyn recognized the tone of the speaker. His spirit swung about again, and there, coming over a rocky bluff, was the ghost of the man who had trained beside him all those years in St.-Mere-Abelle, the man who had gone to Pimaninicuit to share in the glory of their God, and who, so it now seemed, had fallen so very far.

“To join with us,” Quintall had said. To join with us.

“You court demons,” Avelyn’s spirit cried out.

“I have learned the truth,” Quintall countered. “The light within the shadows, revealing the lies—”

“You are a damned thing!”

Avelyn sensed the spirit’s amusement. “I am with the victor,” Quintall assured him.

“We will fight you, every mile, every inch!”

Again, the amusement. “A minor inconvenience and no more,” Quintall replied. “Even as we speak, your mighty champion and your precious companion are dying. You cannot win, you cannot hide.”

The spirit stopped abruptly as Avelyn, boiling with outrage, attacked, his spirit flying fast against the nearly translucent outline of the evil ghost, locking with the creature, their battle as much one of wills as of physical strength.

They wrestled about, their power borne of faith, Avelyn’s for his God, and Quintall’s for the demon dactyl. They twisted and gouged, floating about and through the bare windblown rocks of the Barbacan. Quintall’s grasp was the darkness of the demon—cold, drawing the very life force from his opponent. Avelyn’s grasp was the sharpness of light, burning his foe.

They locked in agony, neither gaining an advantage, rolling and floating, and finally, they were apart, facing each other, circling, loathing.

Avelyn knew he could not win, not here, not with the demon dactyl so close, and the notion that the ghost knew something about Elbryan and Pony that he did not bothered Avelyn more than a little. Even worse, their fight would draw unwanted attention from the smoking mountain, the monk feared; and if the dactyl came upon him as he battled this evil spirit, he would surely be destroyed.

Avelyn was strangely unafraid of that possibility, would go willingly to his God’s side if his death came in a battle with this purest of evil. But the monk had to put his own desires aside, for the others back in the forest would need to know what he had learned, would need to know of the smoking mountain and the Barbacan, the confirmation of their dark suspicions.

Avelyn would get his fight, he decided, but not until the world was properly warned.

“You are a damned thing, Quintall,” he said to his dark foe, but the ghost only laughed and came on.

Avelyn resisted the urge to meet that charge and his spirit flew away, soaring fast for the south. He heard the taunts of Quintall, the ghost wrongly thinking the monk had fled in fear, and he ignored those barbs as meaningless.

Avelyn hoped that he and Quintall would meet again.

Pony and Chipmunk continued their wild ride, weaving about the pines, cutting sharp corners, Pony’s sword flashing, Chipmunk’s seemingly endless stream of daggers spinning out. Or, when either of them was too close for such weapons, they merely spurred their powerful steeds on, running down the helpless powries or goblins that ventured into their path.

Even those monsters not in panic, even those trying to get some angle on the riders, could do little against the sheer power and speed of the rushing horses.

“To me! To me!” Pony heard Bradwarden call, and she led the way to the centaur and his three companions, who were enjoying similar success.

Elbryan, though, did not follow. He was not surprised by the disappearance of Paulson; the man was too consumed by grief and rage, and in truth, the ranger feared that he should not have brought Paulson out here, not now, not so soon after Cric’s demise.

The ranger was surprised, however, when he saw the big man’s delay was not by choice, when he saw Paulson scrambling in the mud, trying desperately to stay out of reach of a giant’s smashing club. Elbryan kicked Symphony into a straight charge. He wished that he had Hawkwing readied, that he could lead the way with a stinging arrow. He let the horse serve as missile instead, rushing in right beside the engaged giant, slamming against the creature as it stooped low in its attempt to get at Paulson.

The giant slipped down into the mud; Symphony staggered and slid but held his balance.

“Run!” Elbryan cried to the man, and terrified Paulson didn’t have to be told twice. He scrambled about the pines, blinded by the rain and by sheer terror. He fell in the mud, but was scrambling up even as he hit the ground, his legs pumping desperately.

Elbryan tried to keep a rear guard, thought to go and scoop Paulson into the saddle behind him, but then realized that such a maneuver would cost them both too much time, would allow the stubborn giant to fall over them. And Elbryan had no time to spend in battling such a foe, not here, not now, for all the southern slope of the valley was thick with monsters, including many giants, most carrying sacks of heavy stones. Rocks began bouncing all about the valley floor, skipping in the mud, more likely to squash powrie or goblin than any of the eight attackers, though that possibility did little to dissuade the monstrous reinforcements.

Elbryan noted to his relief that Pony, Bradwarden, and the others were making a clean escape, running fast in a line up the north slope, back for the cover of the deeper forest. The ranger noted, too, that Paulson’s riderless mount was close behind them, and while he was glad that the horse had escaped, he was not pleased by the sight.

Now Paulson would have to run all the way out of the valley, and he would never make it unless Elbryan and Symphony could cause enough confusion behind him. On the ranger went, now taking and deftly stringing Hawkwing, weaving a zigzag course about the pines, and letting fly an arrow whenever a monster showed its ugly face.

He kept up the dodging, the quick bursts to break free of any flanking movements, for several minutes, but time was soon working against him as more and more monsters poured onto the valley floor, as his options for flight lessened. A glance back showed the ranger Paulson’s lumbering form—at least he thought the dark speck scrambling up the southeastern slope was Paulson—but showed him also the huge form of the stubborn giant, in close pursuit.

His game was ended, the ranger knew, and he spun Symphony in a tight circle about the next tree—poked a powrie hiding amid the thick boughs in the eye with Hawkwing for good measure—then cut a straight line in pursuit of Paulson and the giant.

Huge stones splattered in the mud all about him, stripping the branches from the sides of nearby trees, and the shouts of a hundred monsters followed Elbryan out of that valley.

But those shouts were fast receding, Symphony’s great strides outdistancing the pursuit, and sheer luck saw the ranger through the shower of giant-thrown stones. He got over the lip of the valley, spotted the distant form of the lumbering giant, and plunged fast among the skeletal forms of the leafless trees.

Paulson was caught; he tripped over an exposed root and went facedown into the mud and slush. He heard the giant’s victorious laughter, imagined the spiked club coming up high, and covered his head with his hands, though he realized that meager defense would do him little good.

The giant was indeed closing for the kill, lifting its deadly weapon, when an arrow thudded hard into its back, turning its evil laughter into a sudden wheeze. Outraged, the behemoth spun.

Elbryan stood right up on Symphony’s back, the horse in full gallop. He drew out Tempest and put his bow to the saddle. The giant was near a wide-branching elm with thick, solid limbs.

“Be quick and be sure,” the ranger said to Symphony, who understood his plan perfectly.

The horse angled near a second elm, its branches intertwined with the one near the giant, and Elbryan leaped away, running, surefooted, along one rain-slicked limb.

The giant turned and stared curiously as the suddenly riderless horse continued to bear down upon it, but the monster, after a moment’s thought, seemed satisfied with that and lifted its club to meet Symphony’s charge.

At the last second, the horse veered sharply to the side, and the giant lunged, and only then did the stupid fomorian notice the second form, running along the branches, running right by its bending form.

Tempest flashed like blue-white lightning, tearing a long line across the monster’s throat. The giant came up with a roar and swung hard, but Elbryan had already dropped off the back of the limb, and that sturdy branch stopped the club far short of the mark. Under the limb came Elbryan, Tempest stabbing, then slashing upward into the monster’s loins as it tried futilely to extract its spiked club from the stubborn branch.

And even worse for the giant than the stabbing, searing pain down low was the wound across its throat, the wound that spurted blood wildly and refused to allow the monster to draw breath. Its rage played out, as the terrible wound and the flying blood took away the monster’s strength. The giant let go of the club, then, and staggered backward, grasping at its torn throat. It looked down through blurred eyes to see the wicked man back atop his stallion, the other man, the easy prey, climbing up behind him.

The giant reached for Elbryan and Paulson, but its senses were playing tricks now and the men were fully twenty feet away. Reaching, reaching, the giant overbalanced and fell to the ground.

The behemoth heard the hooves receding into the forest, heard the distant voice of a human female, and then the darkness closed in.

CHAPTER 44

The Revelations of Spirits

“It was a trap, set for you, who lived once in Dundalis,” Juraviel said. The elf sat with Pony and Elbryan near Mather’s grave in the diamond-shaped grove. Tuntun was nearby, along with the other elves who had come to the area, and who, Juraviel had informed Elbryan, would soon be returning to Andur’Blough Inninness.

“How would they know that?” Elbryan asked, not yet willing to believe that the cutting in the evergreen vale had been done specifically for them.

“They knew that many of the folk battling them had fled Dundalis,” Juraviel answered. “The village was deserted before they arrived. It would follow that they understood the valley north of the town to be an important place, perhaps even a sacred place.”

“No,” Pony argued. “They would not believe it to be more important than was the village itself, and that we deserted.”

“And I doubt that powries, and certainly not goblins and giants, hold any appreciation for beauty,” Elbryan added.

Juraviel fell silent, digesting the logical arguments. Still, it bothered the elf that the monsters had gone into that particular valley.

It bothered Elbryan, too, for the scarring of the evergreens made no sense. The monsters’ take of lumber would not have been useful; the spruce and pines were too short for catapults, too wet and sappy for wood fires, and too pliable for any construction. With deeper forests all about them, filled with taller trees of harder wood, why would the powries go into the evergreen valley? Only to lure their enemies, Elbryan had to reason, particularly Jilseponie and him, the two to whom the valley was indeed sacred.

But it made no sense to the ranger, for the plan was too subtle. How might the monsters have garnered such information about the leaders of their enemies?

“They knew,” Elbryan said flatly. “They had to know.”

“How?” Juraviel demanded.

A whistle from the trees—from Tuntun, they realized—alerted them of a visitor, and a moment later, Brother Avelyn ambled in to join them. He looked much better, seeming his old bouncy self, except for a slight limp.

“Ho, ho, what?” Pony said to him playfully, drawing a smile from the monk.

“They knew,” Avelyn remarked as he sat down hard on the ground. “They knew, and they know much of us. Too much.”

“How have you discerned this?” Juraviel asked.

“A ghost told me,” Avelyn replied. Elbryan perked up his ears, wondering if the monk had been in contact with Uncle Mather.

“While you fought in the valley, I went far to the north,” the monk explained. “I tell you now that this force which has come upon us is but a predecessor, a testing probe, and that our enemy, the demon dactyl, has many times this number of soldiers to send down upon us.”

“Then we are doomed,” Pony whispered.

“Our enemy has another ally, as well,” Avelyn went on, looking directly at Elbryan. “The ghost of a man you killed, in my defense.”

“Brother Justice,” the ranger reasoned.

Avelyn nodded. “His name is Quintall,” he said, for the other title seemed perfectly ridiculous now. “I spoke with this ghost briefly, before we battled, and I tell you, he knew of us, of you and of Pony.”

“He and I once did battle,” the ranger reminded.

Avelyn was shaking his head before Elbryan even finished the predictable sentence. “He knew that you were in trouble, in the valley. He predicted that both of you would be slain.”

“Then it was a trap,” Juraviel said.

“Indeed,” remarked Avelyn. “They knew how best to draw us—you, two, at least,” he said to Elbryan and Pony.

“How could they?” Pony wanted to know. “Brother—Quintall did not know us well, certainly did not know our affinity with the pine vale.”

“Perhaps the ghost has been about us,” came a voice from a nearby tree. The group glanced over to see Tuntun sitting calmly on a branch.

That seemed plausible enough, but Avelyn suspected that he would have sensed Quintall’s presence had the spirit indeed been about. “Perhaps,” the monk admitted, “or might it be that Quintall is not the only one who has fallen to the darkness of the dactyl?”

To the small group whose very lives depended on absolute secrecy, there could have been no more unsettling possibility than that of a traitor in their midst. A thousand questions filtered through Elbryan’s and everyone else’s thoughts as he considered each person of the band. When he came to privately question the loyalty of Bradwarden, the ranger realized that this exercise was truly folly.

“We know no such thing,” Elbryan said firmly after a lengthy pause in the conversation. “Likely it was the ghost, a spy for our enemies. Or perhaps the powries are more cunning than we first believed. Perhaps they have prisoners hidden away and have tortured information from them.”

“None from Dundalis, surely,” argued Pony. “None who might know of our fondness for the valley.”

“It is all speculation,” the ranger insisted. “Dangerous thoughts. How will we function if there remains no trust among us? No,” he decided, his stern tone showing that he would brook no compromise on this point, “we will not cast suspicion on any in our group. We will not speak of this outside our immediate circle, and not speak of it at all unless some more substantial evidence can be found.”

“We must be careful then,” Avelyn offered.

“Will this grove be next?” Pony asked, a question that unnerved Elbryan.

“All the world will be next,” Tuntun said, shifting the focus, “if Avelyn’s words are true.”

“They are,” the monk insisted. “I saw the monstrous gathering in such numbers as I would never have imagined.”

“In greater numbers than their nature would allow,” agreed Juraviel, “were they not guided.”

Pony, who hadn’t been involved in the previous discussion at Avelyn’s bedside, seemed not to understand.

“Powries and goblins would not ally for long if there was not a greater power, a greater evil, holding them together,” Juraviel explained.

Pony looked at Avelyn, thinking of his prophecies of doom all those weeks together on the road, thinking of the weakness of the world the monk constantly berated and of the name he gave to it. “The dactyl?” she asked. “You are certain?”

“The dactyl is awake,” Avelyn said without hesitation.

“As we feared in Caer’alfar,” Juraviel added.

“But I thought that the dactyl was the weakness in men’s hearts,” Pony reasoned, “not a physical being.”

“It is both,” Avelyn explained, recalling the training he had received at St.-Mere-Abelle and thinking it ironic now that those same men who had taught him of the demon dactyl had, through their own weakness and impiety, helped to facilitate the return of the monster. “It is the weakness of man that allows the demon to come forth, but when it does, it is a physical monster indeed, a being of great power who can command the wills of those with evil in their hearts, who can dominate the monstrous hordes and tempt men such as Quintall, men who have fallen from the ways of God, to its side.”

“There are more beliefs than those of your church,” Tuntun put in dryly.

“And all our gods are one God,” Avelyn replied quickly, not wanting to offend the elf. “A God of differing names perhaps, but of similar tenets. And when those tenets are misinterpreted,” the monk went on, his voice turning grave, “when they are used for personal gain or as a means of exacting punishment or forcing submission upon others, then let all of Corona beware, for the demon dactyl will rouse from its slumbers.”

“It is a dark time,” Juraviel agreed.

Elbryan bowed his head but in thought and not in despair. Such philosophical discussions did not elude the ranger, but Elbryan understood that his role here was to consider their position in terms of their day-to-day existence, that he might properly guide those folk, closer to two hundred than to one, who had come under his care. At that moment, the ranger had more immediate problems than some mythical monster hundreds of miles away, for if there was indeed a traitor in their midst, then the threat would increase.

“They knew, Uncle Mather,” Elbryan whispered when at last the image came to him at Oracle. “They knew that scourging the valley would wound me, would, perhaps, even bring me out of hiding. Yet, how can they know of me, more than the name of Nightbird, which I have not hidden, and of my exploits against them? How could they know of my loves, of a place that is special only within my heart?”

The ranger sat back, leaning on the back wall of the small cave. He continued to stare silently, not expecting an answer but hoping that, as was often the case, the image of his uncle Mather would guide him through the jumble of his own thoughts, to reason through his dilemma.

He saw another image in the mirror—or was it merely in his mind?—one of a man he had selected to go along on the raid to the evergreen vale, but who had refused, claiming sickness. Elbryan knew well that the man had not been ill, and he considered the sudden cowardice truly out of character. But with no time for such petty problems, the ranger had dismissed the incident.

Elbryan envisioned again the return of the battered group to the main encampment: Paulson dropping down wearily from Symphony’s back, Pony leaning against Bradwarden as if, were it not for the centaur’s solid frame, she would have simply tumbled over to the ground. He saw reflected in the mirror those images that had been peripheral to him at that time: a supposedly ill man standing at the side of the camp and, more important, the expression on that man’s face, hardly noticed at the time, but clear now to Elbryan.

The man was surprised, truly surprised, that they had returned.

Using all the stealth he had learned in his years with the Touel’alfar, Elbryan followed Tol Yuganick out of the encampment late one dark night, several days after the abandoned raid on the evergreen valley.

The big man, supposedly in search of firewood, looked back over his broad shoulders often, Elbryan noted, obviously trying to ensure that he was not being followed. His precaution did little against the stealthy skill of the ranger, though, and so Tol was oblivious of Elbryan’s presence, obviously so, when he met with a bandy-limbed powrie less than two miles from the band’s present hideout.

“I did as you demanded,” Elbryan heard the big man complain. “I delivered them, right where I said I would.”

“Yach! Ye said the ranger,” the powrie grumbled back, “and his woman friend. Ye made no talk of other warriors or of that wretched centaur!”

“Did you think Nightbird would be so foolish as to go so near Dundalis alone?”

“Silence!” the powrie snapped at him. “Take care yer attitude, Tol Yuganick; Bestesbulzibar is not far, I promise, and he hungers for human flesh.”

Elbryan silently mouthed the unfamiliar name and noted how Tol’s ruddy face blanched at the mere mention. The ranger didn’t know what this creature, Bestesbulzibar, might be, but his respect for it as an enemy was already considerable.

“We must defeat Nightbird,” the powrie insisted, “and soon. My master has noticed the problems here, though we are many leagues behind the battle lines, and my master is not pleased.”

“That is your problem, Ulg Tik’narn, and not my own!” Tol growled. “You have used me, powrie, and left a foul taste in my mouth that no river could wash out were I to swallow the whole of it!”

Elbryan nodded, glad that the man felt some remorse for his traitorous actions.

“And I’m done with you and with Bestesbulzibar the winged devil!” He turned indignantly on his heel and started to stride away.

“Yach, and with the ghost that finds yer dreams,” the powrie asked slyly, “the ghost who beckons to Bestesbulzibar’s every call?”

Tol Yuganick hesitated and turned back.

“And what might Nightbird do if he discovers your treachery?” Ulg Tik’narn asked.

“We had a deal,” Tol protested.

“We have a deal,” Ulg Tik’narn corrected. “Ye’ll do as I say, fool human, or me master will destroy ye most unpleasantly.”

Tol bowed his head, his face contorting as he struggled, pragmatism against conscience.

“Ye already a fallen thing,” the powrie went on, chuckling. “Yer course cannot be reversed, yer errors cannot be corrected. Ye delivered Nightbird to us once, and now ye must do so again, for unless he’s taken, there’ll be no rest for ugly Tol Yuganick, no sleep that will evade the intrusions of the ghost Quintall, no path that will get you far enough from the flight of Bestesbulzibar, who is all-powerful.”

Elbryan could hardly draw breath at the realization that he and his little band had made such an impact on the very heart of this monstrous army. He recognized the name of the turncoat spirit, of course, and considering that the powrie referred to Quintall as but a pawn of Bestesbulzibar, the ranger suspected the identity of that creature.

“There is a grove,” Tol began reluctantly, “diamond-shaped.”

The words stirred Elbryan; he put an arrow to Hawkwing before he even realized and had the bow leveled, its mark the space between treacherous Tol’s eyes.

“It is even more special to the ranger, a place that he will not allow to be defiled, whatever the odds,” Tol went on.

Elbryan didn’t want to kill the man; whatever Tol’s weakness, the ranger didn’t want to shoot him dead without explanation, without hearing the threats that had been laid upon the man to turn him so.

But Elbryan held no such sympathy for powries, and so he shifted the angle of the bow just a bit, gritted his teeth, and let fly, the arrow whipping across the twenty feet, unerringly, so he thought. At the last moment, the arrow turned in mid-flight, thudding hard into a tree. Ulg Tik’narn was away in the blink of an eye, running fast into the forest night, but before Tol could move, the ranger leaped before him, Tempest in hand. A glance at the fleeing powrie told Elbryan that the creature posed no immediate threat.

Tol, on the other hand, had his huge sword in hand, eyeing Elbryan nervously.

“I heard,” the ranger said, “everything.”

Tol didn’t reply, just glanced around, looking for an escape.

“You cannot outrun me in the woods at night,” Elbryan said evenly.

“Then you outrun me,” the big man retorted. “I’ve wanted your head since the first day we met, smelly ranger, and be gone now or be sure that I’ll get it!”

Elbryan recognized the true fear behind that bluff. Tol had no desire to fight him, had no desire to face the mighty cut of Tempest.

“Throw your weapon to the ground,” Elbryan said calmly. “I’ll not play judge to you, Tol Yuganick, not out here. You come with me back to the camp and speak your crimes plainly, and let us see what the people choose for you.”

Tol scoffed at the notion. “Drop my weapon that you might more easily wrap a noose about my neck?” he said.

“Unlikely,” the ranger replied. “The folk are merciful.”

Tol spat at him. “I give you one last chance to run,” he said.

“Do not do this,” Elbryan warned, but Tol came upon him in a wild rush, his heavy sword slashing.

Tempest flashed left, parried up, went out left again and then right, Elbryan easily fending off the clumsy attacks. The ranger poked the smaller blade ahead, bringing its tip near the hilt of Tol’s jabbing sword as he deftly sidestepped the large man’s forward thrust. A twist of Elbryan’s wrist brought Tempest’s blade hard against the big man’s hand, and a further twist turned Tol’s hand right over awkwardly.

Elbryan shoved wide his sword arm, and Tol’s weapon went flying harmlessly to the side, splashing down into a muddy puddle.

The big man gasped in desperation, unarmed and eyeing the deadly ranger.

“Do not,” Elbryan began, but Tol turned and stumbled away.

Elbryan flipped Tempest up above his head, lining the blade for a throw. He held back, though, as Tol passed the nearest tree, as a pair of muscled equine legs flashed out, connecting solidly on the side of the man’s head, launching him head over heels to crash hard at the base of a wide ash tree.

Bradwarden stepped into the small clearing.

“I followed him out here,” Elbryan explained.

“And I followed yerself,” the centaur replied. “And I was carrying Avelyn on me back. Ye should be more to looking past yer arse, though yer target’s past yer nose.”

Elbryan glanced all about. “And where is the monk?”

“Chasing a powrie,” Bradwarden explained. “Said not to worry about that little one.”

Elbryan looked over at Tol, the man’s head lolling about on his shoulders. He was in a sitting position, wedged in tightly against the hard trunk.

“I’ll not presume to judge him,” the ranger said.

“Always for mercy, as ye were with the three rogue trappers.”

“And that choice was the best,” Elbryan reminded.

“Aye, but this one is not,” the centaur insisted. “This one’s a fallen thing, with no redeeming. His crime cannot be tolerated, so I say, for he’d have given us all to the beast to save his skin.” Bradwarden eyed the dazed man contemptuously. “He knows it, too. Suren that ye’re showing him less mercy by letting him live with the terrible thing he’s done.”

“I’ll not play judge.”

“But I will,” Bradwarden said firmly. “Ye might want to be going now, me friend. Avelyn might be needing ye, and ye might want to not be watching this.”

Elbryan eyed the brutal centaur squarely, but understood that he had little power to sway Bradwarden’s determination. And whatever his feelings of mercy, Elbryan would not battle Bradwarden for the sake of Tol Yuganick, who had indeed fallen too far. He looked back at Tol, the man oblivious and probably already mortally wounded by the powerful kick.

“Be merciful,” the ranger said to Bradwarden. “He laments his choice.”

“He made the choice willingly.”

“Even if that is true, mercy is friend to the just,” Elbryan insisted.

Bradwarden nodded somberly, and Elbryan scooped up Hawkwing and ran off into the night, behind the departing powrie, though the ranger held faith that Avelyn would know how to deal with the dwarf. Less than ten steps into the woods, he heard a single thump, a centaur’s kick against a head propped by a tree trunk, and he knew that it was finished.

He felt sick to his stomach, but he could not disagree, not out here with so many lives at stake. Tol had chosen, and Tol had paid for his choice.

Around a bend far down the dark trail, the ranger happened upon a band of powries lying on the ground, most dead but some still twitching in the last moments of their lives. A lightning bolt had hit them, the ranger realized, and he knew that he was close.

He paused and tuned his senses to the night, and he heard speaking, not so far away. Running fast, but silently, Elbryan soon spotted Avelyn, making fast work of yet another powrie, the burly monk holding the dwarf under his arm, repeatedly slamming the creature’s head into a tree trunk.

Elbryan meant to stop there, but a movement farther to the south along the trail caught his attention. He came in sight of the last powrie—the one, Ulg Tik’narn, who had been speaking with Tol Yuganick. Sliding down to one knee, Elbryan had Hawkwing up and leveled. Again his shot was true, but again, the arrow swerved at the last possible moment and flew off harmlessly into the night.

Frustrated, the ranger abandoned his bow and ran on, sword in hand.

The powrie, apparently realizing that it could not possibly outdistance the long-legged human, skidded to a stop and turned about, a gleaming, serrated sword in hand.

“Nightbird,” the dwarf breathed. “Yach, ye die!”

Elbryan said nothing, just came in hard and fast, batting Tempest twice against the powrie’s blade, then thrusting the sword through the opened defenses, straight for the unarmored dwarf’s heart.

The blade turned aside, compelled by some force Elbryan did not understand, and the startled ranger was overbalanced suddenly, falling forward. He slapped his free hand across desperately, accepting the hit on his open palm from the smiling powrie’s sword.

“What?” the ranger asked, skidding aside and turning to squarely face this deceptive foe.

Laughing, Ulg Tik’narn advanced.

From a short distance away, Brother Avelyn watched the scene curiously, saw Elbryan perform another apparently successful attack, only to have Tempest fly wide at the last instant. The ranger was not caught unaware this time, though, and he held his balance and reverted to defensive posture quickly enough to prevent any stinging counters.

Avelyn put away the stone he was holding, graphite, for the lightning had been of little effect on this one when he had last used it. There was something very unusual about this powrie, the monk realized, some defensive magic that Avelyn did not understand.

He took out the carbuncle he had taken from dead Quintall, fell into its magic even as Elbryan slashed his weapon—to no avail—twice at the laughing powrie’s head.

Then Avelyn saw the reason, saw clearly the powrie’s studded bracers, glowing fiercely with enchantment.

“Good enough, then,” the monk growled. “Ho, ho, what!” Avelyn took out the other stone he had retrieved from dead Quintall, the powerful sunstone, and he sent its focused energies out.

“Yach, ye can not kill me, foolish Nightbird,” Ulg Tik’narn was saying, holding wide his short arms and steadily advancing on the confused Elbryan. “Me master protects me. Bestes—”

The word ended with a gurgle as the waves of magic-suppression rolled over the dactyl-forged bracers, as Tempest pierced through the dwarf’s chest.

“I do not know the name,” Juraviel admitted, looking across the campfire at Elbryan.

“But I do,” Avelyn put in, resting his bulk against a fallen log. “Bestesbulzibar, Aztemephostophe, Pelucine, Decambrinezarre—”

“All names of the dactyl demons,” Juraviel said, for two of the strange titles rang familiar to the elf.

“Then we know, if the powrie can be believed, that there is indeed a beast, a physical beast, guiding our enemy,” said Pony.

“Then we know,” Avelyn said with certainty, and he threw down the enchanted bracers, evil items that the monk would not allow to be worn. “I have known for some time of this beast and of its home.”

“The Barbacan,” said Elbryan.

“The smoking mountain,” Avelyn added.

A long moment of silence ensued, all five—the three humans, Juraviel, and Tuntun—feeling the weight of confirmation and feeling suddenly vulnerable. There was indeed a very real dactyl, and it controlled Quintall’s ghost, and—whether through Quintall or reports from its monstrous forces—it knew of their raiding band, knew of Nightbird.

Avelyn stood up and started away; Pony rushed to catch up to him.

“I know my destiny,” he said to her quietly, though Elbryan, who had moved to follow, and the two elves, with their keen ears, heard him clearly. “I know now why I was compelled by the spirit of God to steal the stones and run from St.-Mere-Abelle.”

“You mean to go to the Barbacan,” Pony reasoned.

“I have seen the army that has gathered there,” Avelyn replied. “I have seen the darkness that will soon sweep down upon us, upon all the kingdom: St.-Mere-Abelle and Palmaris, Ursal, and even to Entel on the Belt-and-Buckle. Perhaps far Behren is not safe.”

The monk turned back to look Pony directly in the eye, then past her, to Elbryan. “We cannot defeat the dactyl and its minions,” Avelyn insisted. “Our people have grown weak, and the elves have become too isolated and too few. The only way in which the darkness might be averted is if our enemy is decapitated, if the binding force that holds powrie beside hated goblin, if the sheer evil willpower that focuses the wild giants is destroyed.”

“You mean to travel hundreds of miles to do battle with a creature of such power?” Elbryan asked skeptically.

“No army gathered by all the human kingdoms could get near the dactyl,” Avelyn replied, “but I might.”

“A small group might,” Pony added, looking at Elbryan.

The ranger considered that notion for a moment, then nodded grimly.

Pony looked back at Avelyn, stared deeply into the eyes of this man who had become to her as a brother. She saw the pain there, the fear that was not present when the monk had proclaimed that he alone would go. Avelyn was afraid for her, and not for himself.

“You say it is your destiny,” Pony remarked, “and so, since fate has put me beside you, is it mine.”

Avelyn was shaking his head, but Pony pressed on.

“Do not even think to try to stop me,” she insisted. “Where am I to be safe, in any case? Here, when the powries lay traps meant for us? In the southland, perhaps, running ahead of the advancing hordes?”

“Or even in the elven home?” Juraviel added grimly, unexpectedly lending support to Pony’s argument.

“Where indeed?” asked the woman. “I would rather confront the monster face-to-face, to stand by Avelyn’s side as he meets his destiny, as all the world holds its breath.”

Avelyn looked at Elbryan as if he expected the ranger to protest. How could. Elbryan, so obviously in love with Pony, allow her to go?

But Avelyn didn’t fully understand the nature of that love.

“And I will stand by Pony’s side,” the ranger said firmly. “And by Avelyn’s.”

The monk’s expression was one of sheer incredulity.

“Was not Terranen Dinoniel an elf-trained ranger?” Elbryan asked, looking about and finally settling his gaze on Juraviel and Tuntun.

“He was half-elf, as well,” Tuntun put in, as if that fact put the legendary hero somewhat above Elbryan’s station.

“Then I will have to go along to make up the other half,” Juraviel said somberly. He met Tuntun’s wide-eyed stare without surprise. “With Lady Dasslerond’s blessings, of course,” he said.

“Ho, ho, what!” Avelyn burst out suddenly, surprised and obviously pleased by the unexpected support. But the boisterous moment could not last, not with so grim a prospect as a journey to the Barbacan before them. The monk looked in turn at each of them and nodded, then walked off to be alone with his conscience and his courage.

When Elbryan and Pony left the elves, they were surprised to find an eavesdropping friend, standing only a dozen or so paces into the forest, unseen and unheard despite his great bulk.

“Ah, but I knew it’d come to this,” Bradwarden said. “Humans”—the centaur spat derisively—“always thinking o’ ways to be remembered.” He shook his head. “Get yer saddlebags for me, then, ye’ll need one to carry supplies, and better if that one knows how to get away from trouble.”

“You intend to accompany us?” Elbryan asked.

“A long road,” the centaur replied. “Ye’ll be needing me pipes to soothe yer nerves, don’t ye doubt!”

PART FIVE

THE
BEAST

It is settled, Uncle Mather, a new stasis, a level of play. Our enemies know of us, and there is certainly concern among their ranks, but they have a bigger goal before them and that diversion gives us some hope, gives us the ability to proclaim with confidence that they will not catch us.

But neither will we deliver any significant blows. A pair of catapults fell before our fires, but what are they compared to the hundreds of war engines in a line rolling down from the Barbacan? We have killed nearly a dozen giants in the last two weeks, but how significant are they when a thousand more march against Honce-the-Bear? And now that we are known, our enemies take precautions, moving about in larger, better-prepared bands. Each kill comes harder.

So we will survive for the time, I believe, but we will do nothing decisive, not here, halfway between the fighting front and the source of the invasion. Yet, if Brother Avelyn is correct, if his destiny lies in the north and we can deliver him there, if he can battle and defeat the demon dactyl, then our enemies will be without their binding force. Who will quell the ancient and deep hatred between powrie and goblin when Bestesbulzibar is gone? It is likely that all the invasion will disintegrate into separate groups, fighting one another as much as the folk of the kingdom. It is likely that most of the giants, normally reclusive beasts, will turn back for their mountain homes, far from the villages of humans.

I do laugh when I consider how simple it all sounds, for I know that the path ahead is the darkest that ever I will tread, and that the end of that path is darker still.

Dark, too, is the journey for those men and women I leave behind, who will continue the fight while ushering their more helpless kin to a safer place—if one can ever be found. I hold no comforting illusions; that group is in danger as great as my own. Eventually, if they cannot find a haven, they will be killed, one at a time, perhaps, as was poor Cric, or perhaps the goblins will discover their camp in the night and slaughter them all.

What clouds are these that so cover our heads, blacker than the blackest storm?

It is the life that fate has chosen for us, Uncle Mather. It is the life that fate has thrust upon us, and I am proud indeed that few, so very few, have shrunk before their sudden, unasked-for responsibilities. For every Tol Yuganick, there are a hundred, I say, who will not give in to any threat, to any torture, who share loyalty and courage and who willingly take up the fight, even if that means their death, that their kin might win out.

I am a ranger, trained to accept duty, however harsh, and to accept whatever fate holds for me during the execution of that duty. That is my debt and my honor. I will fight, with all the skills the elves gave me, with all the weapons at my disposal, for those tenets I hold dear—for the protection of innocents and for the higher principles of justice above all else. And in that course, in these times, I have by reason of necessity become leader of the folk of the three villages. But they, these innocents placed in the path of war, and not I, are the true heroes of the day, for each of them—the trappers who could have been far from harm’s way; Bradwarden, whose fight this is not; Belster O’Comely and Shawno of End-o’-the-World—each of them willingly fights on, though they are not bound by debt. Every man, every woman, every child willingly takes up arms because of their common heritage, because they understand the value of unity, because they care for the fate of those in the towns to the south.

I understand now what it means to be a ranger, Uncle Mather. To be a ranger is to accept the frailties of humanity with the knowledge that the good outweighs the bad, to serve as an example, often an unappreciated one, that when darkness descends upon those about you—even many of those who, perhaps, persecuted you—they will recognize your value and follow that lead. To be a ranger is to show by example those about you what they might be when the need arises, to reflect openly the better aspects of what is in every human character.

The men and women I leave behind will serve as I have served, will lift up the spirits and the will, the courage and the conviction, of all those they subsequently meet.

And for myself I pledge now that I will deliver Brother Avelyn to the Barbacan, to the fiendish head of our enemy. And if I perish in the journey, then so be it. If all of us, my beloved Pony included, perish and fail, then let another take up my sword and my cry.

The blackness will not fall complete until the last free human spirit has succumbed.

—ELBRYAN THE NIGHTBIRD

CHAPTER 45

Parting

It took Elbryan and the other leaders of the rebel force several days to get everything organized with the twenty-five warriors and eight score refugees they would leave behind. The remaining band would cease its hit-and-hide warfare and concentrate on getting all the folk to safer points in the south, trying to parallel the advancing army without engaging it.

For those few heading north to the Barbacan, it was a difficult parting, but especially so for Elbryan, who had come to feel as a father to these people, as their trusted protector. If they were found and destroyed, the ranger knew he would never forgive himself.

But the other argument was more compelling; if the dactyl could not be defeated, then there would be no safe havens, then all the world as the humans knew it would be destroyed. Pony reminded the ranger often that he had trained those warriors who would escort the refugees, that they went with not only his blessing but also his woodland skills. And, like a father who has watched his children grow beyond his protection, Elbryan had to let them go.

His course, a darker road by far, lay the other way.

They set out at an easy pace, with Elbryan riding Symphony—but only for a short distance—that he might hasten out to run a perimeter guard, and with Pony and Avelyn walking beside Bradwarden, who had pipes in hand, but wouldn’t start playing until they had put the monstrous enclaves of Dundalis, Weedy Meadow, and End-o’-the-World far behind them.

Just out of sight of the encampment, the small group came upon a party of elves—there might have been five or there might have been twenty, so fleeting were their glimpses of the ever-elusive sprites—dancing amid the budding branches of several trees.

“What says Lady Dasslerond?” Elbryan inquired of Belli’mar Juraviel.

“Fare well, says she,” replied the elf. “Fare well to Elbryan the Nightbird, to Jilseponie, to good Brother Avelyn, to mighty Bradwarden, and,” he finished with a flurry, beating his tiny wings furiously to set himself gently down on the ground, “to Belli’mar Juraviel, who will represent Caer’alfar on this most important quest!” The elf dipped a low bow.

Elbryan looked up at Tuntun, who was sitting on the branch and smiling—a grin that did not seem so sincere to the perceptive ranger. “See to him, Nightbird,” the elven female said threateningly. “I will hold you personally responsible for my brother’s safety.”

“Ho, and a mighty responsibility that is, when facing the likes of a demon dactyl!” howled Bradwarden.

“If I had my say, Belli’mar Juraviel would remain with his own,” Elbryan replied. “Of course, if I had my way, then Pony—Jilseponie—would remain with the folk of the three sacked villages, as would Avelyn, and Bradwarden’s pipes would greet the dawn each day in this forest, his home.”

“Ho, ho, what!” bellowed Avelyn. “Brave Nightbird would fight the beast alone!”

“Aye, and cut a killing swath through the army ye seen ‘tween the arms o’ the dactyl’s mountain!” added Bradwarden.

Elbryan could only laugh at their jibes. He kicked Symphony into a short gallop, rushing down the path.

“Fare well to you, Nightbird!” he heard Tuntun call, and then he was alone, riding the perimeter, glad for this newest addition to the party, despite his comments to the contrary.

He sensed a movement not far away and asked Symphony to walk slowly. He relaxed when Paulson and Chipmunk came onto the path, some distance ahead and apparently oblivious of him.

“If we missed them, I’ll beat ye silly,” the large man huffed at Chipmunk, who wisely shifted to the side, out of arm’s reach. Elbryan did not miss the fact that they were dressed for the road, though the others would not be going to join with the refugees until the next morning. The ranger moved his mount into the cover of a pair of pines and let the two approach, hoping to discern their intent, thinking that they might have had enough of it all and were striking out on their own.

Aside from Paulson’s typical grumbling, he caught no direction to their conversation.

“My greetings,” he said suddenly as they neared, startling the pair.

“And to yerself,” said Paulson. “Glad I am that we did not miss yer departure.”

“Have you plans of your own?”

Paulson eyed him directly. “What’s for us with Elbryan gone?” he wanted to know.

The ranger looked hard at the man, then shrugged. “We will need to get the refugees to the south. There can be no further delays.”

“Ye’ve got more than a score of fighters for that task,” Paulson answered.

“A score that will need Paulson and Chipmunk to lead them,” Elbryan reasoned.

“They’ll more listen to Belster O’Comely,” Paulson argued. “And the able man’s already taken charge, by all accounts from the big camp. Our job here is done.”

“Then you are free of responsibility,” Elbryan replied, “to go as you will, where you will. And to go with my thanks and the gratitude of all who survived the invasion.”

Paulson looked at Chipmunk, and the small man nodded nervously.

“With you,” Paulson said suddenly. “The way we’re seeing it, the goblin that killed Cric was sent by this Bestesbulzi—thing, so we’re holding it responsible.”

Elbryan’s expression was skeptical.

“Are ye knowing anyone better for the woods?” Paulson argued.

“Ye just said that we were free to choose,” Chipmunk added sheepishly, ducking behind Paulson’s bulk as he spoke.

The others caught up to the ranger then, Bradwarden—with Juraviel nestled comfortably on his back, the elf tucked between the heavy packs—moving up right beside Elbryan.

“Our friends Paulson and Chipmunk would like to join us,” the ranger explained.

“We decided that a small group’d get through all the better,” Bradwarden complained.

“The two of us take up less room than yerself alone, centaur,” Paulson argued.

Elbryan smiled wryly at Bradwarden before the fearsome centaur could take offense. “True enough,” the ranger agreed.

“And we’re knowing the ways of the woods,” Paulson went on, “and the ways of our enemies. Ye get in a fight and ye’ll be glad that me and Chipmunk are with ye.”

Elbryan looked at Bradwarden again, since he and the centaur had been unofficially accepted as the leaders of the expedition. Bradwarden’s hardened visage fast softened under the ranger’s plaintive look. “Come along then,” he said to the two men. “But one bad word for me piping and I’ll be eating more than the meat that’s on me back!”

So they set out then, seven strong. Seven against the tens of thousands, and—in odds that seemed even less favorable—seven mortals against one demon dactyl. At the edge of the forest surrounding Dundalis, Elbryan slipped down from his mount.

“Run free, my friend,” he said to the horse. “Perhaps I shall return to you.” The horse did not immediately run off, but stood stamping the ground, as if in protest.

The ranger sensed that the stallion did not want to remain behind, and for a moment, Elbryan entertained the thought of riding all the way. But how could he do that in all good conscience, when he knew that Symphony might not be able to cross the mountainous Barbacan, and certainly would not be able to go into Aida’s tunnels with him.

“Run on!” he commanded, and Symphony bolted out of the immediate area, but stood quiet in the shadows of some trees not far away.

So it was Elbryan, and not the horse, who walked away, when the others caught up to him. It was not an easy thing for the ranger to do.

They struck out west more than north, wanting to cut a wide circuit around the long caravan that Avelyn had magically observed. Even from several miles to the north and west of End-o’-the-World, from atop a hillock, they could see a long line of dust rising into the air, moving south, descending upon Dundalis and the other towns.

“All the way to the Belt-and-Buckle,” Avelyn remarked grimly, and from that vantage point, it seemed impossible that the monk might be wrong.

There were no roads out here once the group got beyond the logging areas of End-o’-the-World. The forest was old, with tall, dark trees and sparse undergrowth, and there were rivers to follow, some whose waters had come all the way down from the high peaks of the Barbacan. Occasionally, the group came upon a lone house or a few clustered together, the real frontier families, living beyond even the meager civilization of the three small villages. It was not a comforting thing for the seven to find that every house they chanced upon, including one whose occupants had been friends of Paulson’s band, was deserted.

They found the reason the tenth day out, when Elbryan noted a line of tracks preceding them in the muddy riverbank.

“Goblins,” the ranger informed his companions, “and a few humans.”

“Could be a rogue band,” Bradwarden offered, “and nothing to do with our enemy in the north.”

“Goblins been in this region for a thousand years,” Paulson added. “Me friends’ve fought with them often, so they telled me.”

“But do goblins normally take prisoners?” the ranger wanted to know, and that admittedly unusual circumstance tipped them off that this was no chance incident, no rogue band.

The demon will draw all the goblins from all the holes, Avelyn had warned.

How Elbryan wished he still had Symphony with him, that he could ride fast to catch up to the band!

“We slip back into the woods to avoid them,” Bradwarden said. “No problem with that.”

“Except that they have prisoners,” Pony was fast to interject.

“We’re not knowing that,” Bradwarden replied.

“Human tracks with the goblins,” Avelyn argued.

“Might be that they had prisoners,” Bradwarden answered bluntly.

Elbryan was about to argue the point with the centaur, to point out that, whatever their mission, they first had to see if there were people in need of their assistance, when he got some unexpected help from Paulson.

“They’re running an army,” the big man reasoned, “so they’re needing slaves, if this raiding group is in league with the dactyl, then they’re knowing better than to kill those who might be worked to death.”

Bradwarden threw up his arms in defeat, and motioned for Elbryan to run on and see what he might see. The ranger did just that, circling west of the riverbank as he made his way to the north. He came upon them at last at a bend in the river, where the goblins—many goblins!—had stopped to drink, but were keeping a score of humans, three quarters of them women and children, back from the badly desired water.

The ranger bowed his head as he considered the options. Thankfully, there were no giants or even powries to be seen, but there were at least fifty goblins down there, with several, Elbryan noted, wearing the black-and-gray insignia of the dactyl’s army. Even if he and his powerful band attacked the group, how might they stop the goblins from killing the prisoners?

Elbryan went back to report to his companions, expecting that a furious argument would ensue. Was their mission the overriding factor here, for if they attacked and were beaten back, killed, or captured, then who would go on to the smoking mountain to stand against the demon dactyl?

“Only fifty?” Bradwarden huffed. “And only goblins? I’ll warm me bow on the first score, trample the second score, and give me club a taste on the last ten!”

“How do we hit them without endangering the prisoners?” the ever-pragmatic Pony asked. The question was not meant to dissuade any attack, Elbryan knew in looking at his determined companion, but to logically guide the group in the best possible direction.

“We separate them,” Elbryan answered. “If even one or more ventures away into the woods, lags behind, or gets too far in front . . .”

Six grim nods came back at the ranger. Within the hour, they were shadowing the caravan, learning their enemies’ movement, discerning the pecking order among the goblin ranks. At one point, when the riverbank grew more narrow and impassible, the goblins sent a group of six out to find a new route.

They died quickly, quietly, cut down by bows and daggers, by flashing sword and crushing cudgel. So fast and complete was the massacre that Avelyn never used his magic. The monk did get in close enough to one wounded goblin to finish it with a flurry of deadly punches, but he kept his magical energy in reserve.

When it became apparent that the first six would not return, the goblins sent out a couple more to find them. Elbryan, Juraviel, and Bradwarden shot them down as soon as they were out of sight of the caravan.

“They are onto us,” Pony reasoned when the band of seven moved back to view the main group, goblins rushing about nervously, tightening the ropes on the prisoners, herding the miserable humans together. The worst of it for the onlookers came whenever a goblin beat a human, particularly when one slapped a small child to the ground. Gritting his teeth, holding discipline supreme to emotion, Elbryan held his companions at bay. The goblins were wary, he reminded them all; this was not the time to strike.

“We hide the bodies,” Elbryan plotted, “and let any more scouts they send out go unhindered. Let them find the paths. When they are on the move again, the forest thick about them, we hit them hard.”

“Aye,” the centaur agreed. “Give them a couple of hours to think that their miserable kin just ran away. Let them drop their guard again, and then we’ll take the lot of them and pay them back for every slap.”

Elbryan looked to Avelyn. “You must play an important role,” the ranger said. “We will cut the goblins to pieces, I do not doubt, but only your magic can protect the prisoners long enough.”

The monk nodded grimly, then looked at Pony. Elbryan did as well, sensing that the pair, Avelyn and Pony, shared a secret. The ranger’s expression grew even more incredulous when he noticed Avelyn hand a piece of graphite to her, and green malachite after that.

The goblins did indeed send out another pair of scouts, and these two moved unhindered through the woods, then went back to the main group reporting no sign of their missing eight companions. Since desertions among goblin ranks were surely not an uncommon thing, the goblin leaders seemed to relax almost immediately, and with new trails found, they soon started the caravan along its plodding way once more.

And again, they were shadowed, every step, and even led, though they did not know it, by the ranger as he scouted out the perfect spot for the ambush. Elbryan had found just what he was looking for, a narrow pass between a steep, high ridge and a muddy pond, and was returning to lay out the plans when he found that his hand was being forced.

Pony’s expression was the first indication that something was wrong, and as soon as he gained a vantage point on the monsters, the ranger figured it out. A dispute had arisen between one or more of the prisoners and their goblin captors, and now the humans were being punished once more. Elbryan winced with every blow, feeling the pain as acutely as if the goblin’s club had been aimed at him; but again, he tried to hold back, tried to keep perspective and hold the greater goal above his emotions.

But then one prisoner, a young man of about the same age Elbryan had been when Dundalis was first overrun, was pulled from the line. The goblins’ intentions for this one soon became obvious; they meant to make him an example. The young man was forced to his knees, his head pulled low, exposing the back of his neck.

“No, no, no,” Elbryan whispered, and truly he was torn. All the plan and all the prisoners had a better chance if the ambush was carefully plotted and choreographed, and yet how could the ranger stand idly by and watch this unfortunate young man be sacrificed?

Elbryan could not watch idly, of course, and as soon as Hawkwing came up, the others realized that the time for action was upon them.

The goblin’s sword went up high, but fell harmlessly to the ground as Elbryan’s arrow slammed into the creature’s chest. Elbryan came charging through the trees, screaming wildly, readying another arrow.

Goblins scrambled, one calling out commands—until its words became a gurgle, its mouth filled with its own blood, Elbryan’s second arrow deep in its throat.

“Oh, hurry!” Avelyn cried to Pony, for the two had laid plans of how they might get to the prisoners.

Pony was trying to hurry, concentrating with all her will on the malachite. She had done this before, in practice with Avelyn, but now the pressure was intense, the price of failure too great.

“Ho, ho, what!” Avelyn howled at her. “You know that you can do it, and do it well, my girl!”

The encouragement pushed her over the edge, into the depths of the stone’s magic. She felt her weight lessening, felt as light as a feather.

Avelyn lifted her easily from the ground and threw her in the direction of the monstrous caravan. Pony floated up as she went, grabbing the branches of trees and propelling herself along. She crossed over Elbryan, the ranger engaged with sword now, battling a line of goblins and, amazingly, driving them back.

She crossed over the goblins, scrambling high and keeping quiet, until she was, at last, directly above the huddled group of prisoners. Pony held her breath, noting the movements of the goblins, thinking by their actions and by the snatches of screamed commands she caught that they were indeed planning to harm the human prisoners.

The woman looked worriedly at the other stone Avelyn had given her, then at her own sword, wondering which she would be better to trust. Either way, her situation was about to become desperate.

Elbryan’s rage did not relent. Two goblins rushed to intercept him, but he batted their weapons aside with a furious two-handed swipe of Hawkwing. He dropped the bow as it moved past the creatures, and in the same lightning-fast movement, drew out Tempest, thrusting it into the belly of the closest creature. The ranger punched out with his free hand, connecting solidly on the other goblin’s chin, and he charged on, tearing free his sword.

The stunned goblin rubbed its chin and tried to rise to follow, but Bradwarden was right on the ranger’s heels and was quick to trample the wretched thing into the dust.

Then the centaur was beside Elbryan, singing at the top of his voice, running goblins down and clubbing goblins down. Their momentum carried them deep into the goblin ranks, but began to ebb as the creatures finally organized a defense about them.

The goblins came at them in a semicircular formation, but the integrity of the monstrous line was compromised quickly, for Belli’mar Juraviel, perched on a branch some distance away, plucked at them with his tiny but deadly bow.

At the same time, Paulson and Chipmunk caught up to their fighting companions, the small man leading his way in with a line of hurled daggers.

“On me back!” the centaur roared to Elbryan. “We’ll get to the prisoners!”

But not in time, Elbryan thought, looking past the goblin ranks to the pitiful group. He prayed that Pony and Avelyn would do their part well, and wondered if his rage had betrayed them all.

Avelyn could hardly see the goblin ranks and knew not at all which creature was in charge. As soon as Pony was away, the monk searched for some hiding spot for his bulky frame, but realized that he had little time to spare. He settled for a clump of birch trees, throwing his body into their midst as he threw his mind into the hematite he tightly clutched. He was into his spirit-walking, already rushing fast away, before his great bulk ever settled amid the tangled branches.

The monk’s spirit flew past Juraviel, the sensitive elf taking note, though the ghostly form was surely invisible. He swept past Paulson and Chipmunk, past Bradwarden and Elbryan, past the front ranks of goblins, until he came to the miserable prisoners and the monstrous guards about them. One in particular was calling out commands, and Avelyn’s spirit made a straight line to that body, pushed into the physical form, and battled for control.

Possession was never easily accomplished, a difficult and dangerous practice, but no one in all the world could summon the powers of the stones as thoroughly as Avelyn Desbris, and the monk was desperate now, for the safety of others and not for himself.

He ejected the goblin’s spirit almost immediately and continued barking out commands, but these did not concern the prisoners at all. “Flee!” he yelled to his charges. “Run to the trees, into the forest. Run away! Run away!”

Many goblins did just that, more than eager to be gone since the furious ranger and the powerful centaur were crushing through their ranks.

Others, though, meant to get their taste of human blood before they left.

Pony saw them, two of them, running from the area of the fight but angling their course and their weapons to pound the prisoners as they passed. The woman’s concentration was taxed to its limit as she tried to fall into her other stone while maintaining the weightlessness of the malachite, all the while, keeping her eyes on the monsters, measuring their progress.

She was out of time. Her mind let go of the malachite and she dropped the ten feet to the ground, landing right between the surprised goblins.

They screamed, Pony screamed, and they spun about, bringing their weapons to bear, as the woman grabbed their shoulders.

Pony was quicker, falling into the stone, the graphite.

There came a sharp crack, a sudden black flash, and the two goblins fell to the ground, twitching violently as they died.

“Forget the woman!” Avelyn the goblin chief cried to another monster that was swinging about to bear down on Pony, and the monk rushed to intercept. He tried something new then, connecting his mind back to his physical body and bringing in new magic from a second stone that his own form clutched, as he went.

“Kill humans!” the goblin howled in Avelyn’s face, but the monk reached up with an arm that more resembled that of a tiger than of a human or a goblin. He took away the creature’s protest as he took away its face.

“Ho, ho, what!” the monk-turned-goblin roared, eyeing the transformed arm. “It worked!”

Indeed it had; Avelyn had reached out across the distance, had connected with his own physical being while holding control of the goblin’s form. But the strain had been great, too great, and the monk felt himself losing control immediately, his spirit soaring back past the fighting, back to the birch trees. In his last effort of will, right before he lost consciousness, the monk reached back out to the goblin’s body, and as the creature became aware of its physical form once more, it found its own arm—or at least an arm that was connected to its body—moving up to claw viciously at its own face.

The surprised, confused creature stumbled backward, its other, normal appendage grabbing at its torn face. Surprise turned to horror, to agony, as it stumbled near Pony, and the woman drove her sword into its back, its tip poking right through the goblin’s chest.

Pony then turned her attention to the prisoners, bidding them to run off, out of harm’s way. Most of the men and a few women would not go, however. Wearing masks of grief, no doubt for loved ones this monstrous band had slain, they charged the other way, into those monsters battling Elbryan and the others, fighting with weapons they snatched from goblin dead, with sticks or rocks found on the ground, or with their bare hands.

It was over in a matter of minutes, with more than a score of goblins lying dead, the rest running, scattering into the forest. Several humans had been injured, as had Bradwarden—though the tough centaur thought little of his cuts and bruises—and Avelyn returned to them shortly, on unsteady legs, carrying the worst headache the monk had ever known. Still, without complaint, the good monk used his hematite once more, this time to lessen the wounds of the injured.

Elbryan gathered up Paulson and Chipmunk and called to Juraviel, the four moving out from the gathering to ensure the goblins were not rallying for any counterattack.

In more than an hour of searching, the foursome found only a pair of goblins hiding in one spot, and another running stupidly in circles.

So the ambush had worked, near to perfection, and the prisoners were free, but that left the ranger with a new dilemma and a new and unasked-for responsibility.

“Belster is no doubt many miles to the south by now,” Avelyn reasoned, “out of our reach. Even if I use the stones to contact him, we’ll not easily get to him and hand off our new friends.”

“They are a tough lot,” Pony added hopefully, “but inexperienced with goblins and the like.”

Paulson gave her a sidelong, incredulous glance.

“With these goblins, at least,” the woman corrected. “They’ve not battled the army of the dactyl before.”

Paulson conceded that point.

“It would take us weeks to prepare them correctly, that they might have a chance of escaping on their own,” the woman finished.

Elbryan absorbed all their words, sifted through their suggestions. After a moment, his gaze settled on Paulson and Chipmunk.

The big man understood that gaze well; Elbryan had never asked him and Chipmunk to come along, had, in fact absolved them of all responsibilities. But the ranger was about to place a new responsibility on the pair, Paulson realized. He wanted Paulson and Chipmunk to shoulder the burden of the new refugees and find a way to take them south. Paulson, full of anger at the loss of his dear friend, did not want to abandon this quest and neither did Chipmunk, but they would for the sake of the refugees. That realization struck the big man profoundly; for the first time in many years, he felt like a part of something larger than himself, a cohesive circle of comrades, of friends.

“There is another choice before us,” Belli’mar Juraviel said from the low branches of a nearby tree. The elf had been keeping a low profile, not wanting to frighten the skittish refugees. The sight of Bradwarden had unnerved the folk almost as much as had the sight of the goblins, and the elf thought it better to hit them with one surprise at a time.

The group looked up to the elf, resting easily, his legs crossed at the ankles, feet dangling a few yards above their heads.

“There is a place where they might know shelter, not so far from here,” the elf remarked.

Hopeful nods came from every head, except for Elbryan. Juraviel’s tone intimated something more profound to the ranger, that not only was there a mere place for shelter, but a very special place indeed. Elbryan remembered the run that had brought him to Dundalis, Nightbird’s first journey. He had crossed the Moorlands, coming from the west. Now he and his troop were once again west of the Moorlands, though miles farther north.

“We can get them there, then, and continue on our way,” Pony reasoned.

“Not we,” Juraviel replied, “but I alone. This place is not so far, but not so close, a week’s march, perhaps.”

“In a week, we could bring them almost all the way back to Dundalis,” Bradwarden reasoned.

“To what end?” asked the elf. “No one remains to help them there, and all that area is full of monsters. The place I speak of holds many allies, and there are no monsters, of that I am sure.”

“You speak of Andur’Blough Inninness,” Elbryan reasoned, and when the elf didn’t immediately deny it, the ranger knew that his guess was correct. “But will your Lady accept so many humans into the elven home? The place is secret, its borders closed and well hidden.”

“The times are not normal,” Juraviel replied. “Lady Dasslerond gave a score of us leave to join in your struggles, to go out and take stock of the happenings in the wider world. She will not refuse entry to the humans, not now, with darkness all about them.” The elf gave a smile. “Oh, do not doubt that we shall put enchantments over them, a bit of boggle in their meals, perhaps, to keep them disoriented that our paths remain hidden when they are turned out into the wider world once more.”

“We should all go,” reasoned Pony, who desperately wanted to view the elven home, who could sit for hours and hours to listen to Elbryan’s tales of the magical place.

Elbryan, too, was tempted, would have loved to see Andur’Blough Inninness again, especially now, to bolster his resolve before he completed this all-important, perilous journey. The ranger knew better, though. “Every day we spend moving to the south, and every day it takes us to get back even to this spot, our enemies strike deeper into our homeland and more people die,” he said calmly.

“I shall take them alone,” Juraviel announced. “As you recognized your destiny, Brother Avelyn, so I recognize my own. You will introduce me to the folk in the morning and I will lead them away to safety.”

Elbryan looked long and hard at his winged friend. He wanted Juraviel along on this journey, needed the elf’s wisdom and courage to bolster his own. But Juraviel was right; he alone could take the refugees to safety, and though the quest to the Barbacan was paramount, the needs of so many innocents could not be ignored.

In the morning came the second painful parting.

“So there you are at long last!” Tuntun cried to Symphony when she spotted the stallion trotting across a field north of Weedy Meadow. Most of the elves were long gone, some shadowing the human band that had gone to the south, but most on the road back to Andur’Blough Inninness. Tuntun and a couple of others had remained in the area, though, to continue their survey of the invading army.

This wasn’t the place where Tuntun wanted to be.

The elf had been searching for Symphony, her desires formulating into a definite plan.

She approached the horse tentatively, but soon found that she could indeed connect with the stallion. The turquoise was tuned to Elbryan, but Tuntun, with her elvish blood, could make some sense of it, could fathom the horse’s greatest desires, at least, if not his actual thoughts.

Symphony was apparently in complete agreement with her.

Tuntun had little trouble getting the great stallion to accept her, and Symphony leaped away as soon as the elf climbed a top him, running fast for the north and west.

CHAPTER 46

The Fiend’s Fiend

He couldn’t feel the stone beneath his feet, and he hated that fact of his existence more than anything else in all the world, more even than he hated this monster, this demon, his savior. For all the benefits of this wraithlike existence, Quintall missed the tangible sensations of his mortal form, the feel of grass or stone on his bare feet, the smell of dinner cooking, of brine when he looked out over All Saints Bay, the taste of shellfish or of the exotic herbs the Windrunner had taken on at Jacintha.

He stood now, or rather floated, in the dactyl’s great columned hall at Aida before the obsidian throne and the monstrosity that was his god.

“We will be in Palmaris by midsummer,” Bestesbulzibar explained, coming forward in his seat, the rough folds of its red hide shining in the orange glow of the lava rivers, pouring down through the walls and onto the floor at either side of the wide dais. “And Ursal shall be besieged when the season turns to autumn. Then the winter snows will not work against us as we roll on to the south, to Entel and the mountain range that separates the kingdoms.”

“And will we stop there?” the spirit asked.

“Stop?” scoffed the dactyl. “We will entreaty with Behren’s many chieftains, then find ways to use them against one another, and finally, when they do not expect war, we will sweep south. And all the world will be mine. Let humanity know its age of darkness.”

Quintall couldn’t disagree with the dactyl’s reasoning. There were minor points untouched, to be sure. Alpinador, despite the brutal border raids and the subsequent, determined march to the coast, remained intact, but the northern kingdom was not an organized place and was not populous enough to pose any real threat.

“It is an age well earned,” Bestesbulzibar said. “Your kin have only themselves to blame for the coming storm; their own weakness opened the way.” The demon waved its wings and a rush of hot air passed through Quintall, a sensation the spirit somehow felt. And with that blow, Quintall remembered.

He remembered in incredible detail: all that he had been, all the promises of his mortal life. He remembered St.-Mere-Abelle, the journey to Pimaninicuit. He remembered Avelyn, damned Avelyn, and the rivalry. He heard again Avelyn’s voice, his screams of protest when the Windrunner had been sunk, a voice touched, Quintall now knew, by God. He remembered chasing the rogue monk, the tales in town after town of the mad friar and his words of warning, words that rang all too true now.

Quintall looked at his demon master; he knew the dactyl had shown him his mortal memories only to torment him. Since he had come to Aida, since the moment of his mortal death when the hematite broach had somehow transported his spirit to Bestesbulzibar, Quintall had remembered only that last encounter and not the path that had led him to Avelyn and the monk’s powerful friends.

But now—now he remembered. Everything. And he knew that he was a doomed thing, knew the dactyl’s claims were true, that Avelyn’s warnings were true. The weakness of mankind, the impiety of the Abellican Church, the murders of the Windrunner’s crew, his own jealousy of Brother Avelyn—all these things had fed the demon dactyl, had awakened the darkness that now encroached upon the world.

Quintall loathed Bestesbulzibar but realized he was powerless against the fiend, realized he had fallen to the dactyl and that he could not escape.

Bestesbulzibar extended its hand palm down and telepathically demanded that Quintall pay homage.

The doomed spirit took the hand and kissed it.

There could be no redemption.

And Quintall knew the demon read his every thought, that his hopelessness only made the creature something more.

“You are useful to me,” Bestesbulzibar said suddenly, “as you visit the dreams of men such as the fool Yuganick, as you walk unnoticed among our enemies. But I can do all that, Quintall.”

The dactyl paused, and Quintall, in light of the last statement, expected that his time was at its end, that he would be blasted out of existence or thrown into a bottomless pit of eternal torment.

“I need more from you,” the dactyl decided. Bestesbulzibar looked from Quintall to one of the lava rivers. “Yes,” the creature muttered, talking more to itself than to the ghost. It moved across the dais, dipped one arm into the molten flow, then looked back at Quintall.

“Yes,” the dactyl said again. “Do you not long to feel the sensations of the corporeal world once more?”

Quintall did indeed.

“I can do that, my stooge. I can give you life, real life, once more.”

Quintall felt his spirit drifting toward the creature, though it was surely an unconscious movement.

“I can make you something greater,” the demon whispered, and again the great black wings beat softly and a gust of hot wind passed through the spirit. After the gust, the heat remained.

The heat remained, and Quintall understood he was feeling the warmth of the lava!

Bestesbulzibar began a long, slow chant in a language the spirit did not understand, a guttural, cracking language of clicks and sounds that could only be equated with an old man clearing his phlegm-filled throat. Bestesbulzibar then spat upon Quintall, and the goo did not pass through the spirit, but struck him and stuck to him. Bestesbulzibar repeated the action over and over until Quintall was thoroughly slimed, then the fiend grabbed the spirit and, as Quintall screamed out in instinctive protest, plunged Quintall into the lava.

All the world was blackness, was searing heat and unbearable agony, and Quintall knew no more.

He awoke later, much later, though he was unaware of the passage of time. He was in the throne room still, standing, not floating, upon the solid floor.

He was a creature of lava, shaped like a man, shaped roughly as he had once been with arms and legs, rock hard torso and head, and joints somehow fluid, molten and glowing bright orange but not dripping away. He felt awkward, but he felt! He looked on in amazement as he opened and closed his black, orange-striped hand, understood the unearthly strength in that grip, and knew he could crush a stone—or the head of an enemy.

The head of Avelyn.

Bestesbulzibar’s wicked laughter drew Quintall from his contemplations.

“Are you pleased?” the demon asked.

Quintall did not know how to answer. He began to speak, but the sound of his own voice, of a voice that resonated like a rock slide, frightened him.

“You will grow accustomed to your new body, my stooge, my general,” the dactyl teased, “my assassin. No giant could stand before you, and no man. When Palmaris falls, you will lead my army into the city, and you will take the seat of Honce-the-Bear’s deposed King when Ursal is mine.”

His power, sheer strength, was dizzying, overwhelming. Images of conquest flooded Quintall’s every thought. He felt he could destroy Palmaris all by himself, that no weapon, that no man, could possibly stand before him.

“Train your new body,” Bestesbulzibar instructed. “Feel its powers and limitations and apply all that you once learned of the martial arts to this form. You are my general now, and my assassin. Let all men, let all creatures of Corona, tremble before you.”

The fiend ended with yet another hideous laugh, but this time, Quintall heard his own grating voice joining in.

“The war goes well, my pet,” the dactyl went on. “While you were asleep, your spirit binding to this gift I gave you, I viewed the southland, the unstoppable progress. Palmaris falls before midsummer, I say, and another powrie force sails to join us, makes fast for the Broken Coast. One army will march south, the other west, inland, until they join at the very gates of Ursal! Who will stand before them? The feeble King of Honce-the-Bear?”

“I know nothing of kings,” Quintall replied.

“But you do!” the dactyl teased. “You know of your Father Abbot, the doddering old fool, and even he is a more worthy foe than the jester who sits on the throne of Honce-the-Bear. Who will stand before the beast then?”

The answer seemed obvious to fallen Quintall. No one would stand before the beast, before his master, before his god. Suddenly, the man-turned-spirit-turned-lava monster wanted desperately to smash through the gates of Ursal, to take his place on the throne of Honce-the-Bear.

Even more than that, Quintall wanted to visit St.-Mere-Abelle, to face Father Abbot Markwart and Master Jojonah, to make them grovel at his stony feet and then step upon them and squash them, grind them to death. They had used him, he understood now, all too clearly. They had used him in sending him to Pimaninicuit, and then again when they turned him into something less than human, when they turned him into Brother Justice, the instrument of their anger. So now Bestesbulzibar had done the same thing, but in Quintall’s estimation, the demon dactyl was by far the worthier master.

“You will watch over Aida and serve in my absence,” Bestesbulzibar announced.

Quintall knew better than to question the beast at all.

That very night, the demon swept out of its mountain home, flying fast to the south to its minions. In mere hours, Bestesbulzibar covered the hundreds of miles to the base at Dundalis, where it found a rattled Gothra of the goblins and Maiyer Dek of the fomorian giants arguing fiercely.

How their words caught in their throats, how all the camp about them fell to stunned silence, when the dactyl dropped between them, when the absolute darkness fell from the night sky.

“Tell me!” the dactyl demanded, and both started talking at once, and both were silenced by a mere threatening glare. Bestesbulzibar looked at Maiyer Dek squarely.

“Our camps swell to bursting,” the giant chieftain explained, even its thunderous voice seeming meek before the demon. “More should be sent south to face the armies of our enemy!”

The demon’s eyes flared with fire. Its head snapped about, an accusing glare falling over the trembling goblin.

“Ulg Tik’narn cannot be found,” Gothra stated. “Likely he is dead.”

“So?” The demon snorted, for there seemed no shortage of potential replacements.

“The region is not secured,” the goblin went on. “Nightbird owns the forest.”

“He is a thorn!” Maiyer Dek roared. “And a charging giant does not stop to pluck a thorn!”

“A thorn that interrupts supply—” Gothra began, but he was cut short by the bloodcurdling shriek of the demon dactyl.

“Enough!” the beast thundered. “You mean to stall our thousands for the sake of this one man, this Nightbird?”

“Each area must be secured in t-turn,” the goblin stuttered, realizing that this discussion was not going very well. Goblins by nature were conservative in their warfare tactics, securing territories one by one, then methodically moving along, rarely attacking unless complete victory could be assured.

Bestesbulzibar had little patience with that.

“I demand Palmaris, yet you hold back thousands to retain this pitiful village?” the dactyl roared.

“No,” Gothra protested. The goblin general wanted to explain its reasoning, wanted to make its master see that supply lines might be interrupted, equipment and needed reinforcements destroyed or delayed, and that the result in the south, at Palmaris’s very gate, perhaps, could be disastrous.

Gothra, no fool—at least by goblin standards—wanted to argue his point in logical, rational terms, but all that came from the goblin’s mouth was an agonized scream as Bestesbulzibar reached out with one hand, clamping the goblin’s head and pulling Gothra in. Smiling wickedly, Bestesbulzibar lifted its other hand so that all could see, then extended one finger, and with a thought, lengthened the fingernail into a terrible claw. A sudden, impossibly long swipe brought a shriek from Gothra, and the demon shoved the goblin back.

Gothra stared down at the line of blood running from forehead to crotch, then looked back at the demon.

Bestesbulzibar’s hand reached out and clenched the air, and the demon’s magic grabbed at Gothra—or at least at the goblin’s skin, pulling it from the goblin’s body as completely as if the demon were helping Gothra out of clothing. The fleshless thing fell quivering, dying, to the ground.

Not a sound came from about the beast as, clothing and all, the dactyl devoured the torn skin of Gothra.

“Who was Ulg Tik’narn’s second?” Bestesbulzibar asked.

There came no immediate reply, but then one trembling powrie was pushed forward from the ranks to stand before the master.

“Your name?”

“Kos—” the dwarf’s voice trailed off, lost in the terrified gasps.

“He is Kos-kosio Begulne,” Maiyer Dek offered.

“And where did Kos-kosio Begulne stand on this issue?” the dactyl asked.

Maiyer Dek smiled confidently. “He wished to move south,” the giant lied, for Maiyer Dek liked the thought of Kos-kosio, not a strong personality, in command of the powrie forces. “Or at least to strike hard and quickly at the petty human raiders, that the issue be settled and the greater road be open.”

The demon nodded, seeming pleased, and Kos-kosio stood a bit straighter.

“You are the powrie commander now, Kos-kosio Begulne,” Bestesbulzibar announced. “And you and Maiyer Dek shall share the leadership of the goblins until a suitable replacement for Gothra can be found.” Bestesbulzibar shared his glowering visage with all gathered near. “You two I charge with delivering Palmaris on the Masur Delaval by midsummer’s eve. I will see you at the gates of Palmaris, my generals, and if I find need to see you before those gates are mine, then look upon Gothra’ s fate as your own!”

With a flourish, a thunderous beating of wings, and a bit of magic to make the flames of the main fire in the camp leap high into the night, the demon dactyl took wing, flying fast for the west to view the other occupied villages, to see its massing might spread out beneath it. Satisfied as End-o’-the-World was left behind, the beast turned northward, thinking to swoop low over the newest caravan plodding south, to encourage its minions and to strike fear in their hearts all at once.

But something else caught the beast’s attention, some sensation, some presence the dactyl had not felt in many centuries. Lower went the demon, and slower, turning tight circles, sharp eyes scouring the terrain, keen ears tuning to every sound.

There was an elf about, Bestesbulzibar knew. One of the Touel’alfar, the dactyl demon’s most ancient and hated of enemies.

CHAPTER 47

One Harmony

The night was still, and undeniably beautiful. Every so often a cloud would rush overhead, pushed by southwestern breezes, but for the most part the stars shone crisp and clear, and the smell of spring was everywhere, the smell of new life.

It was a lie, Elbryan knew, all of it. The smell of new life would fast give way to the smell of goblins, powries, and giants, and the stench of death. All this serenity would be shattered under the thunderous march of the black horde, the crack of powrie whip, the rolling war engines.

It was a cruel lie: the quiet, the serenity, the spring breeze.

A movement to the side caught the wary ranger’s attention, but he did not go for his weapon, recognizing the light, graceful step and the smell—like a field of distant flowers, the gentle fragrance carried on soft breezes—of the woman so dear to him. Pony came through the brush lightly, wearing only a soft silken nightshirt that didn’t reach her knees. Her hair was down now, loose and wild, and it framed her fair face in a sensual manner, brushing her cheeks, one thick lock wrapped down and about her chin, that sent Elbryan’s heart pumping.

She looked at the man and smiled, then crossed her arms to ward the breeze and turned, staring up at the night canopy.

“How could I have brought you out here?” the ranger said to her, moving up behind her and touching her gently on the shoulder.

Pony bent her head atop that hand and shifted backward, leaning against Elbryan. “How might you have stopped me?” she asked.

The ranger chuckled softly and kissed the woman’s hair, wrapping his strong arms about her. How indeed? he wondered, marveling, as always, at Pony’s free spirit. He could not truly love Pony, he knew, could not love who she was, if he meant to control her, for surely any attempt to harness Pony would defeat the very free spirit that Elbryan so adored. She was his in heart, but her own in will, and the ranger could not have stopped her from coming along, short of knocking her unconscious and tying her in a cave!

The woman turned within Elbryan’s grasp, her soft face just below his, looking up at him.

Elbryan stared at her for a long, silent moment. An image of her lying dead at the end of a goblin spear came to him and he looked away suddenly, looked up at the stars, and wondered how he would live, what point there would be in going on with his life, if anything happened to Pony.

He felt her hand brushing against his cheek, and then the touch grew more firm as Pony turned his face back to look into her own. “We are each of us in danger,” she reminded him. “And I might die, as Elbryan might die.”

“Do not even utter such horrors.”

“Possibilities,” Pony corrected, “chances that we each took of our own volition, chances borne in duty. I would not want to live in the world that will be if the dactyl is not destroyed; rather that I had died fighting the fiend in the faraway Barbacan . . .” Her voice trailed off and she rose to her tiptoes, her lips brushing Elbryan’s in a gentle kiss. “Rather that I died beside my friend, my love.”

He started to look away again, unable to come to terms with that distinct possibility, but Pony’s hand caught his chin firmly, forcefully, and turned him back to face her, all gentleness suddenly gone from her fair features.

“I am a warrior,” the woman declared. “I have fought all of my life, since the day I wandered the road from destroyed Dundalis. I see my duty as no less than your own.”

“Of course not,” Elbryan quickly agreed.

“And if I am to die, then let it be in battle,” Pony said through gritted teeth. “Let it be against the demon dactyl, delivering Avelyn, that the foul beast might be destroyed. I am a warrior, my love. Do not begrudge me a fitting end!”

“I would rather that your end and my own be together a hundred years hence,” Elbryan replied, a helpless smile finding its way across his face.

Pony reached up to touch that smile and felt the sharp stubble of the ranger’s beard, several days grown. “Ah, but my love,” she said quietly, “put that fine elvish blade of yours to use on that beard, else I fear my face will glow from your scraping.”

“More than your face, my love,” Elbryan teased, and he lifted Pony up before him, biting her softly just under the chin, then turning his face so that his beard rubbed against her neck.

She slid back down, keeping tight to him, until their eyes met, and suddenly the play was gone from their smiles, all teasing lost in sudden intensity, in the knowledge that their time together might be nearing a very brutal end. Pony kissed him then, hard and passionately, her hands moving to grab tightly at his thick hair, to pull him even closer, though there was already no space between them.

Elbryan wrapped her even more tightly, squeezing her in his powerful grasp. One arm slipped down to the back of her bare leg, then up under the nightshirt, over the smooth skin of her buttocks, gently up her back, bracing her as Elbryan slowly shifted her down to the ground.

“Potion,” Avelyn argued.

Bradwarden snorted. “Potion o’ dizziness, then. What fool brewed such a magic as that? A drink to set ye on the ground, when a club might do a better job!”

“Potion of courage!” Avelyn protested, taking a deep swig, then wiping his forearm across his face.

“Potion o’ hiding,” Bradwarden said seriously, changing the tone.

Avelyn stared hard at the centaur.

“Oh, I been known to have me drinks,” the centaur said. “ ‘Tis boggle I’m favoring, and not a potion in all the world’ll kick ye harder than that. But I’m drinking at times for celebrating, me friend, at the solstice and the equinox, and not for hiding.”

The accusation hit the monk hard, especially considering the source. Avelyn had grown quite close to Bradwarden over the first weeks of their journey, a bond more of respect than friendship. Now there was no mistaking the somber, accusing tone of the normally jovial centaur; Bradwarden did not approve of the monk’s little flask.

“Perhaps you simply do not have as much to hide from,” the monk said quietly, defiantly lifting the flask to his lips.

He didn’t drink, though, not then, held back by an unrelenting stare.

“The more ye hide, the more ye need to hide,” Bradwarden replied. “Ye look at me, Brother Avelyn. Ye look into me eyes to know that no lie comes from me lips.”

Avelyn lowered the flask and stared hard at Bradwarden.

“Ye did no wrong in taking the stones,” the centaur said.

“What foolishness is that?” the monk protested.

“Ah, but ye cannot hide from me, Avelyn Desbris,” Bradwarden said without hesitation, his confidence only bolstered by the monk’s too-loud protestation. “Ye’re not afraid of yer kinfolk, not the monks, not any other Brother Justice that might come hunting ye. No, me friend, ye’re afraid o’ Avelyn, of what ye did and of yer eternal soul. Did ye stain it, then?”

“You know nothing.”

“Ho, ho, what!” the centaur boomed in a fair imitation of Avelyn. “I know the ways o’ men, the ways o’ Avelyn. I know that yer drinking yer ‘potions o’ courage’ is no more than yer hiding from yer own past, from decisions ye made—and good ones at that! Hear me now, because I would not lie to ye, I’d have no reason to lie to ye: ye did right in running, in taking the stones, even in killing the man who meant to kill yerself. Ye did what ye had to do, me friend, and so let go yer guilt, I say, and see better the road ahead. Ye said ye knew yer destiny, and I’m believing in that destiny, else I’d not have come. Ye’re meant to face the dactyl, I say, to destroy the beast, and so ye will, but only if yer mind’s clear, and only if yer heart’s clear.”

The words, coming from so mysterious, so wise, and aged a creature, hit Avelyn profoundly. He looked back at his flask and saw it for the first time as an enemy, a sign of weakness.

“Ye’re not for needing yer potion,” Bradwarden said. “Aye, but when ye beat the dactyl, then I’ll take ye out for a bit o’ boggle, and ye’ll know what it means to see the world turn!” He reached out and grabbed Avelyn’s wrist, pulling the flask further from the man, and locking gazes. “Avelyn needs not to hide from Avelyn,” he said in all seriousness, and the monk, after a pause, nodded slowly.

“From the dactyl, now!” Bradwarden said suddenly, satisfied that he had gotten his point through. “Now, ye’re wanting to hide from the dactyl until the time’s right, but ye’ll find yer flask a bit small for that!”

Avelyn said nothing just nodded again. He was amazed that Bradwarden had so seen through him, had looked so clearly into his heart and soul, and had recognized the taint of guilt there. This drink that he always kept handy was no potion of courage but an admission of cowardice, a means for hiding from his own past.

Avelyn continued to stare at Bradwarden, and smiled as the centaur smiled, as the monk tossed the flask into the brush.

Now, finally, Avelyn could face his destiny with no regrets for the path that had led him to this place.

The centaur took up his pipes then and softly played, for such was the magic of Bradwarden’s song that no goblin, no monster, no human, no animal even, could possibly discern its source in the forest night. His tune, mournful and hopeful all at once, calmed Avelyn and bolstered his resolve. It floated through the trees to caress the lovers, and further out to where Paulson and Chipmunk kept a watchful eye on the forest night.

And thus the group was bound by Bradwarden’s song, one band, one purpose, one harmony.

The quiet night brought no such rest for Tuntun and Symphony. The elf watched the stallion closely to see if he was tiring, but the great horse ran on and on, slipping through the leafy shadows like the passage of Sheila herself, running to the horizon and beyond.

They had a quest, these two, every bit as vital to them as the hunt for the dactyl was to the seven who had left before them. For Tuntun, the sting of being left out of that all-important journey had not diminished, and no logical arguments could change the way the elf felt about it. Tuntun’s stake in destroying the dactyl was no less than Juraviel’s or that of any other elf or human. But it was more than that, the elf knew, and she had to admit it to herself, for it was her heart and not her mind that had forced her out here. Tuntun had to rush along, had to chase the group, in part because Belli’mar Juraviel—her closest friend despite their constant squabbling—was among them, but also in part because Nightbird led that troop. The elf could no longer deny her feelings for the ranger. She had played an important role in getting Elbryan to this point and, as a mother clings to her child, Tuntun could not bear to let him go off without her.

Yes, it was Nightbird more than anything else that had the sprite riding hard through the forest night. It was the man she had trained, the man she had grown to love. She trusted in the ranger—never had she seen Elbryan’s better—but even so, she would stand beside him in this, his darkest of hours, in this, his pinnacle of glory.

The elf bent her head low over Symphony’s flying mane and bade the horse to run on, and Symphony, as connected to the ranger as she, needed no encouragement and no outward guidance.

CHAPTER 48

Enemies Ancient

“You and your friends saved us all, I do not dispute,” Jingo Gregor said, his voice cracking from the strain of the last few weeks, the overwhelming surprises and horrors. “Yet are we to walk willingly to a place of enchantment?” He looked pleadingly at the boughs, at the rarely seen guide who had led him and his companions through a trackless region, heading south and with towering mountains now in sight.

“Better that than to face the goblin hordes,” Belli’mar Juraviel answered. “I offer refuge, a haven as safe as any place in all the world. And the offer is not given lightly, I assure you, Master Jingo Gregor. You are as strange to the Touel’alfar as are we to you, and the valley that is home to my people is not open to humans. Yet I take you there, for if I do not, then surely you and all your companions will perish.”

“I am not ungrateful, good Juraviel,” Jingo Gregor replied.

“Just wary,” Juraviel finished for him, moving down the tree so that the man could see him clearly, one of the few views the elf had allowed to any of the humans. “And well you should be, given the tragedies that have come to you and your clan. But I am not your enemy.”

“That much has been proven,” Jingo agreed.

“Then rest easy, for Andur’Blough Inninness is not so far,” Juraviel said to him. “Consider yourself blessed to look upon the elven valley of mists.” There was an unconscious edge to that last statement, reflecting Juraviel’s own doubts about this decision to take humans to the secret valley. True, Elbryan had been taken in and trained; true, Lady Dasslerond had allowed Juraviel, Tuntun, and the others to go out to find the ranger and help him with his fight. But to take humans to Andur’Blough Inninness without the express permission of Lady Dasslerond was indeed a stretch of the Lady’s compassion, and Juraviel was not certain that the troop wouldn’t simply be turned away; perhaps the paths into the misty valley would be altered and hidden even from Juraviel. Lady Dasslerond was merciful, the elf knew, but she was, above that, pragmatic and protective of her realm. The welfare of the Touel’alfar she placed above all else, perhaps even above the lives of a score of unfortunate human refugees.

Despite the hints of doubt in Juraviel’s tone, Jingo Gregor seemed satisfied with the words—a speech Juraviel had offered to the man several times over the last few days. Juraviel held nothing but sympathy for this ragged group, many of whom had lost loved ones in the goblin raids upon their homes, and most of whom had been tortured and violated by the wretched creatures. The elf would offer those comforting words to any and all, as often as they needed to hear them, reassuring the poor folk even though he himself wasn’t so certain of the outcome.

Jingo Gregor moved off then, back to the warmth of the campfire and his eighteen companions. Juraviel, too, moved back toward the campfire, tightening his perimeter watch, though the humans had no idea of the elf’s movements, so silent was he as he crossed the higher boughs of the budding trees.

The fire burned low—it had never been truly high, for Juraviel opted for caution, though he was fairly certain there were no monsters in the area, no organized groups anyway. Now the fire was no more than embers, their orange glow casting faint illumination over the resting forms of the humans, the light seeming appropriate for the rhythmic breathing of the sleeping folk.

Juraviel, too, was near to sleep, the elf comfortably nestled in the V of a high branch. He should have been watching the ground, he knew, but in accord with the wistful nature of his kind, his eyes kept lifting skyward to the stars and the mysteries.

And then to something else, something darker and more sinister, moving swiftly across the sky, heading for the camp, for Juraviel. The elf sensed the presence of the demon dactyl as surely as the dactyl sensed him, felt the awfulness, the sheerest of evil, the coldest of deathly chill.

With great effort, Juraviel pulled his thoughts from the night sky and the approach of doom and slipped quickly down, branch to branch, finally dropping right in the middle of the camp. He ran about, kicking at feet, whispering harshly, until all the humans were roused.

“Be gone!” the elf commanded. “Flee to the forest in groups of five and four, each in a direction of your own!”

Questions came at him, and at the stupefied leaders of the group, but Juraviel did not relent. “Tarry not!” the elf warned. “For death comes on wing! Be gone to the forest!”

The dactyl was close, so close! The humans scrambled, trying to gather some things, trying to put on boots, at least, as they stumbled and were pulled to the darkness of the forest night.

Juraviel remained at the glowing fire pit until all had gone, his eyes ever skyward, looking for the blackest of forms.

He felt it, he saw it, the dactyl swooping down from on high, rushing past the tangle of branches with hardly a care, spinning at the last moment, halting its descent to land lightly on the ground opposite the diminutive elf.

Juraviel drew out his slender sword but wondered what use it might be against the horrific demon. He prayed that all the folk would rush back in at the monster and join in his fight, but it was a wish that the elf had to dismiss, knowing that if the folk did come to his aid, they would all perish with him.

“Touel’alfar,” the demon dactyl remarked in its mighty voice. “Not many are your kind. Not so strong, not so strong.”

“Be gone from this place, demon,” Juraviel responded in as firm a voice as he could muster. “You have no hold over me, no claim to my heart or my soul. I am the master here, and I reject you and your lies!”

The dactyl laughed at him, mocking his words and his courage, making him feel like an insignificant thing. “Why do you believe that I want claim to such worthless things as your heart and soul, elf?” the demon growled. “Your heart, perhaps,” Bestesbulzibar teased, “that I might feast upon it, savoring the sweet blood of a Touel’alfar.”

As he spoke, Bestesbulzibar slowly began to circle the fire, and Juraviel moved as well, keeping the embers between him and the demon—though when he thought about it, the elf realized that the flames, were they blazing high, would prove no barrier at all to the creature of the fiery pits of the underworld.

“Why are you out, Touel’alfar?” Bestesbulzibar asked. “Why are you away from your valley—yes, I know of your valley. I have seen many things since I have awakened, foolish elf, and I know that your kind is diminished greatly, that your world is smaller now, a mere canyon in a world that is grown too wide and too human. So why are you away, elf? What is it that brings you so far from home?”

“The darkness of the demon dactyl,” Juraviel answered firmly. “Your shadow has roused the Touel’alfar, foul beast, for you are not unknown to us.”

“But what shall you do about Bestesbulzibar?” the dactyl roared suddenly, and sudden, too, was the monster’s rush, a quick burst right across the fire, scattering embers in a blinding shower. Juraviel struck fast and hard with his small sword, scoring a solid hit, but that hardly slowed the great beast whose armored hide held even the elvish blade at bay, whose clawed hand slapped the sword from Juraviel’s hand while the demon’s other hand grabbed the elf by the throat, lifting him easily up into the air.

“Oh,” Bestesbulzibar moaned, as if in ecstasy. “I could tear it out, elf,” the demon teased, running the claws of his free hand over Juraviel’s tiny chest, “and hold it up before your eyes, biting into its red flesh even as you watched it beat its last.”

“I do not fear you,” Juraviel gasped with what little breath remained to him.

“Then you are a fool,” Bestesbulzibar replied. “Do you know what comes after life, elf? Do you know what awaits you?” The demon laughed wickedly, bellowing thunderously into the still night.

“No torment . . .” Juraviel gasped.

“For you are true of heart,” Bestesbulzibar mimicked evilly, and then the beast laughed again all the louder. “No torment,” the fiend agreed: “Nothing! Do you hear? Nothing, elf. There is no afterlife for a miserable wretch such as thee! Only unknowing blackness. Savor your precious seconds, foolish elf. Beg me to let you see one more dawn.”

Juraviel said nothing. He tried hard to hold to his faith, whose precepts insisted that a good life would indeed be rewarded in the afterlife. He considered Garshan Inodiel, who was God to the elves, a god of justice and promise, not unlike the god of the humans. But in the face of the darkness that was Bestesbulzibar, Belli’mar Juraviel knew despair.

“But why are you out?” the demon asked again, giving a sidelong, scrutinizing glance at the elf. “And what do you know?”

Juraviel closed his eyes and said nothing. He expected to be tortured, to have his limbs torn from his body, perhaps, until he confessed all he knew, until he betrayed his friends who had gone to the Barbacan. No, I must not think of that! the elf told himself firmly, and he turned his thoughts once more to Garshan Inodiel, trying to blanket everything else under the serenity of his God.

But then, in perhaps the worst torture of all to the valiant Touel’alfar, Juraviel felt the encroachment, felt the dark and cold presence of Bestesbulzibar creeping into his thoughts, scouring his mind. He opened his eyes in horror to see the demon’s contorted features, flaming eyes closed as Bestesbulzibar concentrated, using his magic to scour the elf’s brain.

Juraviel fought valiantly, but he was overmatched. The more he tried not to think of Elbryan and the others, the more they were revealed to Bestesbulzibar. The demon would get what it wanted, he feared, would devour him, and then would be off to devour his friends!

“Avelyn,” Bestesbulzibar whispered.

“No!” Juraviel cried, and he kicked out with all his strength, his foot slamming the demon right in the eye. The wriggling elf broke free and tumbled to the ground. He tried to scamper away, but Bestesbulzibar towered over him, looking down, laughing, teasing.

“You do not belong here,” came a sudden, melodious voice, one that caught and held the demon’s attention. Both Bestesbulzibar and Juraviel turned to see Lady Dasslerond come out of the brush, flanked by a dozen other elves, bows and swords in hand.

“You live still!” the demon howled at the sight of the Lady of Caer’alfar, an elf he had known centuries before.

“And you walk Corona again,” the Lady replied, “and surely all of the world weeps at the sight.”

“Surely all of the world should!” Bestesbulzibar retorted. “Where is your Terranen Dinoniel now, Dasslerond? Who will stand before me this time?” As he spoke the last, he turned his ominous gaze upon Juraviel, and the poor elf shook with the fear that he had given his friends away.

“Who, Dasslerond?” the demon insisted. “You or this pitiful elf that cowers before me?” Bestesbulzibar looked all around at the encircling sprites, and laughed more loudly than ever. “All of you together, then? Well done, I say, and let us commence. Better for me that the nuisance of the Touel’alfar be done with here and now!”

“I’ll not fight you,” Lady Dasslerond replied coolly. “Not here.” That said, she held aloft a huge green gemstone, shining with power, its illumination turning everything in the area a shade of green—everything except Bestesbulzibar, for the shadow of the demon could not be overcome by any light.

“What trick is this?” the fiend protested. “What foolish—” The words were lost in the demon’s throat as all the world began to shift and change, features blending together in a greenish mist and then growing clear again, crystalline under the stars, bright and beautiful.

They were in Andur’Blough Inninness, all of them. Lady Dasslerond and Juraviel, all the elves and the refugees, and Bestesbulzibar.

“What trick?” the fiend roared, suddenly angry, suddenly recognizing that he should not be in this place, the very heart of elvish power.

“I invite you to my home, creature of shadow,” Lady Dasslerond answered, her voice edged with weariness from the tremendous exertion of power it had taken to transport the group—or, in effect, to change the very ground beneath their feet. “You cannot defeat me here, not now.”

The demon growled and considered the words, felt the strength of the Lady and her fellows in this, their domain. “But soon,” Bestesbulzibar promised.

The Lady held aloft the green gemstone, the heart of Andur’Blough Inninness, now shining fiercely.

Bestesbulzibar’s unearthly roar, one of pain and outrage, stole her breath. “So you saved the pitiful elf and the humans he escorted,” the fiend sneered. “What good will it prove when all the world is mine?” Out came the black wings and the demon dactyl lifted away to the hum of elvish bows, the melodious tumult of elvish insults.

Any true joy felt by the Touel’alfar at the demon dactyl’s retreat was short-lived, though. By necessity, Lady Dasslerond had allowed Bestesbulzibar to tread upon this, their most sacred and secret of places, and though the fiend was correct, Bestesbulzibar could not yet face them all in Andur’Blough Inninness, they had done nothing to diminish the demon.

Juraviel joined Lady Dasslerond as she stood over the spot from where Bestesbulzibar had departed. The ground that had been under the fiend’s clawed feet was blackened and torn.

“A wound that will not heal,” the Lady said despondently.

Juraviel knelt to better inspect the ground. He could smell the rot there: the earth itself was tainted from the fiend’s presence.

“A festering wound that will slowly spread,” the Lady admitted. “We must tend the ground about this spot vigilantly, for if ever we fail to counter with our magic and our song the rot that is Bestesbulzibar, it will grow within our valley.”

Juraviel sighed and looked hopelessly at his Lady, his guilt obvious upon his fair face.

“The dactyl grows strong,” she said, not accusingly.

“I have failed.”

Lady Dasslerond looked at him incredulously.

“The demon knows,” Juraviel admitted. “The demon knows of Elbryan, of Avelyn, and the plan.”

“Then pity Elbryan,” the Lady replied. “Or hold faith in Nightbird and in Brother Avelyn, whose heart is true. They went north to do battle with Bestesbulzibar, and so they shall.”

Juraviel continued to look down upon the black scar that the demon had left upon the ground of his precious home. Indeed, Bestesbulzibar had grown strong to so taint the very land of Andur’Blough Inninness. Juraviel’s Lady had bid him to hold faith, and so he would, but the fear was obvious on his face as he looked from the scar to the north.

“And now we have duties,” Lady Dasslerond went on, speaking more loudly, directing her words at all the elves. “All of us. We have unexpected guests who must be comforted and then taken from our homeland to a place of their own kind, a place of safety—if any place in the world remains safe.” She looked back down at the black scar upon her beautiful valley. “We have much work to do,” she said softly.

CHAPTER 49

Hunted

“The terrain grows more wild, Uncle Mather, more fitting to the nature of our enemies. The trees are older, never harvested by humans, and darker. The animals do not fear us, do not respect our weapons or our cunning.”

Elbryan rested back against the diagonal tree root in this impromptu room of Oracle, digesting his own words. They were true enough; in this region so far to the north of any known human settlements, all the world seemed somehow larger and more imposing. The towering mountains that formed the dread Barbacan loomed less than a day’s march away, dominating the northern horizon, making the travelers feel smaller still.

“It brings me mixed feelings,” the ranger went on. “I fear for our safety—will I be able to protect my friends, not necessarily from the threats of our enemy but from the simple truths of survival in this region? And yet, out here, I am somewhat more free than ever, more true to the training the elves have given me. There is no room for error in the far north, no margin of safety, and that keeps me ever vigilant, on my guard, tingling with wariness. I am afraid, and thus, I am alive.”

Again, Elbryan sat back, smiling at the irony of it all. I am afraid, and thus, I am alive.

“If given the opportunity, most people would choose a life of quiet luxury,” he said softly, “would choose to surround themselves with servants, with concubines, even. That is their mistake, for out here, danger ever present, I am ten times more alive than ever they could be. And with the challenge that is Pony—and with the challenge I hope that I pose for her—I am many times more satisfied. It is, I believe, the difference between physical satisfaction and true lovemaking, the difference between release and passion. I may die soon following this course before me, but out here, at one with my spirit and my nature, on the edges of catastrophe, I have lived many times more than most will ever know.

“So I do not regret this journey that fate has laid before me, Uncle Mather, nor do I regret that the others—Bradwarden and Avelyn, Paulson and Chipmunk, and most of all, Pony—have been swept along this course. I pity Belli’mar Juraviel, that he could not see it through, that duty turned his path.”

Elbryan put his chin in his palm, resting, thinking, and staring always at the faint image at the corner of the mirror. It was true, all of it; he hated the death and the suffering, of course, but he could not deny his excitement, and the sense of righteousness, the belief that he was indeed making a difference in the world.

He looked closely at Mather’s image, seeking a smile of approval or a frown that would indicate his feelings were not true but merely a contrived defense against despair. He looked closely, and he saw a shadow beginning to creep in across the glassy surface within the depths of the mirror. The ranger sighed, thinking this a sign of disapproval, thinking that he might have fallen into a trap of justifications, but gradually he came to understand that it was not a cloud emanating from Mather or from his own true feelings. Elbryan began to understand that it was something else, something darker by far.

Elbryan sat bolt upright, unblinking. “Uncle Mather?” he asked breathlessly, a coldness creeping into his very body.

A coldness, a blackness, a living death.

The ranger’s mind was whirling, trying to make sense of the undeniable event. Only one creature could bring such darkness, he realized, and then, suddenly, he understood. Whether Mather had facilitated the warning from the other side of life, or whether it was simply a connection wrought of the magic of Oracle, Elbryan neither knew nor cared. What he did know was that the demon dactyl was searching for him, for them, sending its otherworldly vision out far and wide.

Fear gripped Elbryan as he realized that his own use of Oracle might be helping his enemy locate him and his friends. He leaped up, slamming his head against the roots and ground that formed the cave’s ceiling, and rushed to the mirror, turning it down, breaking all connection. He scrambled for the exit then, pulling down the blanket and wrapping it about the mirror, then crawled out into the waning daylight, calling for Avelyn.

From the flow of molten lava, the demon dactyl pulled its latest creation—a glowing spike, a tapering spear—and held it aloft.

“Fools all.” The beast laughed, eyeing its masterpiece, a weapon that would find and destroy the pitiful humans seeking Aida. Into the spike, the beast sent its vision, the telltale tracings of human-woven magic. Into the spike, the demon sent its power, the strength of the underworld, the strength to burn.

Then the beast called to its elite guards, the armored giants, and to their leader, Togul Dek.

When the brute was before the dark master, Bestesbulzibar held forth the glowing spear.

Togul Dek hesitated, feeling the heat, the intense magical strength.

Bestesbulzibar thrust the nine-foot spike forward and growled a final warning, and Togul Dek, more fearful of the demon than of the fiery implement, grasped it without further hesitation, though the giant winced as his flesh touched the diabolical weapon.

Togul Dek’s expression became one of surprise, for the spike felt cool to the touch.

“Take ten with you,” Bestesbulzibar commanded. “Humans approach my throne. The spear will lead you.”

“Does Bestesbulzibar who is King want any living?” the giant asked, barking each word.

The dactyl scoffed as if the notion were absurd, revealing that he did not think these pitiful few worthy of his time and energy. “Bring me their heads,” he instructed. “You may eat the rest.”

The giant stamped one boot and spun away, collecting its ten closest allies among the elite guard and sweeping out of the throne room.

The dactyl dismissed the remaining guards and moved back to one of the glowing lava rivers, dipping his clawed fingers into the fiery stone, feeling the power of the magic that was his alone to command, musing again about the darkness of his complete rule.

“How could I have been such a fool?” Avelyn lamented, dropping his round head into his plump hands.

“How so?” Pony demanded, realizing they had no time for doubts and blame. Each challenge had to be met without regret for past decisions.

“I should have known that the dactyl would search us out, should have anticipated his magical vision,” Avelyn replied.

“We do not know that the dactyl has searched us out,” Elbryan interjected. “Perhaps the shadow at Oracle was but a warning. We have met with few enemies since our departure, only one organized group that we even know was part of the demon’s army. Why should Bestesbulzibar—”

“Speak not that name aloud so close to the dactyl’s home!” Avelyn warned. “Do not even think it, if you can so discipline your thoughts!”

Elbryan nodded an apology to Avelyn and to all the fearful others. “We do not know that it is too late,” the ranger said softly.

“Ye put up the guard, then?” Bradwarden asked.

Avelyn nodded. Using the sunstone he had taken from Quintall, he had enacted a shield against divining magic. It was not a difficult enchantment, actually, and one that powerful Avelyn could maintain with the focused sunstone for a very long time without severely taxing his energies for other magics.

It was one that Avelyn should have enacted, he now realized, even as they set out from the region of Dundalis.

“Stupid!” Paulson grumbled, eyeing the monk dangerously, and then he stormed away.

Elbryan was quick to follow, catching up to the man, grabbing him by the elbow, and leading him farther from the camp behind a shielding wall of evergreens where they could speak in private.

“You did not mention that we should enact such a protective shield,” the ranger pointed out.

“I ain’t no wizard,” Paulson argued. “I didn’t even know about such a thing.”

“Then it is good that we have Avelyn with us, who can block the demon’s sight.”

“If the damned demon ain’t upon us even now,” Paulson retorted, and he glanced about nervously as he spoke the grim words.

“I’ll not tolerate any placement of blame on this journey,” Elbryan said sternly.

Paulson stared at him long and hard, finally relenting under the ranger’s unblinking stare. Instead of growing defensive, as was his nature, the big man tried hard to see things from Elbryan’s perspective. Finally, he nodded. “It’s good that Avelyn is with us,” he said sincerely.

“We’ll get there,” Elbryan promised, and started away.

“Hey, ranger,” Paulson called after Elbryan had gone a few steps. Elbryan turned to regard the man, noting his grin.

“We’ll get there, eh?” Paulson cracked. “Ye sure that’s a good thing?”

“I am sure it is not,” Elbryan replied, matching the big man’s grin.

From the edge of a high, rocky bluff, crouched defensively behind the stone, the companions watched the latest caravan wind its way out of the Barbacan. Goblins comprised the bulk of the line, trudging with heads down, looking thoroughly miserable, especially those chained to the various powrie war engines—catapults, ballistae, and great corkscrew boring machines meant to drive huge holes in castle walls.

The caravan went on and on, exiting a pass in the dark mountain wall and forming a line that went out of the companions’ sight to the east.

“Alpinador, too, is under siege,” Elbryan reasoned.

“The dactyl will use the summer months to drive right to the coast, no doubt where more powries await his armies,” Avelyn added, and then, considering his own words, he snorted loudly. “Unless of course the demon’s soldiers have already driven to the coast. Ho, ho, what!”

“Then no time for wasting,” remarked Bradwarden, a few feet away, behind the others on a lower point. The centaur obviously could not climb up the stone and crouch, and so he had spent the last half hour waiting rather impatiently, listening to descriptions of the exotic powrie war machines and to Paulson’s unending giant count.

“We have to wait for Pony,” Elbryan reminded the anxious centaur.

“Then wait no more,” came a voice from ahead, and the group turned as one to see the woman moving lightly down the trail.

“There are several passes that will get us through,” she explained. “This trail branches a quarter mile from here; the left road winds back down and out of the range, but the right climbs higher and into the mountains, which are not so deep.”

“Is there cover?” Elbryan asked.

Pony shrugged. “As much as we can hope for,” she replied. “Boulders line the trail on both sides, but if our enemy has guards posted in proper position, they will likely spot us.”

“Then we must spot them first,” Elbryan said determinedly, taking up Hawkwing. He sent Chipmunk off and running, flanking them to the left, bade Pony guard the right, and he, himself, moved in front of Avelyn, Paulson, and Bradwarden, taking a long lead.

Within an hour’s time, they had climbed high across the southern face of the dark mountain, to the edge of the tree line, where the wind blew chill. Elbryan, far in the lead and out of sight of the others, left markers showing his course, but even with this, the ranger was fearful that they would all get separated and lost. The Barbacan was a wild place, as untamed as any land the ranger had ever seen; a place of huge, rocky outcroppings, jagged stones, and thick copses of dark trees. It was a place where a trail ended abruptly in a hundred-foot drop, or a boulder might come suddenly down upon an unwary traveler’s head. A place of the most primal danger, it was a place where the ranger felt most alive.

A slight noise to his right put Elbryan into a crouch, his hand going from his bow to his sword. He slipped to shelter behind a stone, then dropped flat on his belly, peeking out around the edge at a small ravine, a cut in the mountain filled with trees and brush.

The noise came again, soft footsteps, and Elbryan followed it to its source, just a shadow moving gracefully through the tangle. He took up Hawkwing again, his eyes never leaving the target.

And then he relaxed as the shadow moved through a clear area. “Pony,” he called softly, catching her attention. He noted the stealthy manner in which she approached, and that kept him on his guard.

“Goblin,” she whispered from a short distance, not daring to cross the last clearing to come beside Elbryan, “high and to the left beyond the twin pines and behind the jutting stone.”

Elbryan scanned in that direction, but had to move out from his rock even to spot the jutting stone. He nodded as the place, though not the goblin, came into view.

“How many?”

“I saw but one,” Pony answered. “There could be more, further to the left and down.”

Elbryan glanced back along the trail. He had moved from shadow to shadow, and it was unlikely that the goblin had spotted him from that distance, but Avelyn, and particularly Bradwarden, would have trouble being inconspicuous. By the ranger’s calculations, the trailing trio would soon be well within the goblin’s view.

He noted a movement up above, a dark shape coming atop the jutting rock. Torn and uncertain, the ranger fitted an arrow to Hawkwing. “If there are more, they’ll soon know of us,” he whispered.

“Perhaps I can get behind the spot,” Pony replied.

Elbryan started to ponder that possibility, then noted the goblin’s attention was occupied—by something back along Elbryan’s path.

“It knows of us,” the ranger explained, and up came his bow. The shot was fully a hundred yards, and he had no more of a target than the goblin’s head and shoulders, and in the crosswinds of a mountain face. His arrow hit the mark right down the middle, and the dark form fell away.

There came a cry and a second shape darted out from behind the boulder, scrambling away.

“We are known!” the ranger called to Pony and the pair jumped up and started in pursuit, though they had little hope of catching a creature in this wild tangle. Just a few steps away, though, they skidded to a sudden stop, seeing the goblin coming back, staggering out of a copse and across an expanse of bare rock.

They watched curiously as the monster jerked suddenly, then fell over, and a moment later, Chipmunk appeared from the brush behind the creature, scampering up to retrieve his daggers.

“Well done,” Elbryan said, though the man was far from earshot.

“And a good thing it is,” Pony added.

“All three of us,” the ranger instructed, “and get Paulson as well. We must search the area to make sure that no other sentinels were nearby to witness the kills.”

The four did just that, circling the area and spying out the spot from every conceivable angle, looking for goblins or any signs that goblins had been about. When they were at last convinced that the kills had been unnoticed, Elbryan hustled them along, coming to a bowl-shaped depression as night descended across the wild mountains. The ranger would have liked to go farther, but they could not travel the difficult and dangerous terrain in the dark, and they certainly could light no torches.

They set their camp with confidence that their progress had gone undetected; they could not know that a giant carried a weapon which had sensed the kills and had led its wielder right to the spot of the disposed goblin carcasses, a spot not so far from their encampment.

The night was cool and quiet, save the moan of the wind across mountain stones. Elbryan and Pony sat close, huddled under a blanket. To the side loomed the huge shape of Bradwarden, the centaur using its bulk to shield Avelyn from the wind. Paulson and Chipmunk were out and about, guarding the perimeter.

“Tomorrow we climb more sheer faces,” Elbryan said with some concern.

“Oh, don’t ye worry,” Bradwarden assured him. “I’ll find me way.”

“I am more concerned with Avelyn,” the ranger remarked. As if on cue, the snoozing monk rolled over and snored loudly. “He is in no shape for this.”

“He will make it,” Pony said with determination. “I have traveled with Avelyn for many months and have never known him to complain. He sees this as his destiny; he will not be denied by any mountain obstacles.”

Elbryan studied Avelyn for a long while, considering his own experiences with the man, and conceded the point.

“Besides,” noted the centaur, “he’s getting the best of sleep.”

Again as if on cue, the monk shifted and snored.

“Chipmunk?” Paulson whispered, his voice quickly buried under the moaning wind. “Is that yerself?” The big man crouched lower, peering intently at a group of trees, the source of the unmistakable sound of a footstep.

Only then did Paulson realize that there seemed to be one extra tree in the group. “Damnation,” he whispered, turning to run.

A spinning sliver, flickering in the quiet light, spun right past his head, causing him to cry out and fall away. He hit the ground, looking back toward the giant, noting its surprised, jerky movement as Chipmunk’s dagger hit it squarely in the chest with a metallic ring.

“Come on, then!” the big man cried, scrambling to his feet, gaining confidence in the knowledge that his trusted comrade was nearby. The ringing sound of that last impact played in his mind, though; giants were tough enough adversaries without metal armor!

And this one was indeed armored, Paulson realized as the monster closed on him. Again came the spinning slivers, two in rapid succession, this time angled higher to hit the monster about the head. Both did, and both were repelled by a metal helm.

“Don’t stay to fight!” Paulson called and he turned to flee, noticing then an orange glow emanating at the giant’s side. Mesmerized, the big man hesitated, then he screamed out, realizing that the glow was a spearlike weapon carried by a second giant! He got his weapon up to block, but the demon-forged spike blasted right through it, right through Paulson’s raised forearm, and deep into the man’s belly.

Waves of searing agony ripped through Paulson. He had never imagined the possibility of such pain. Hardly conscious, he felt himself lifted high into the air and then, with a flick of the giant’s huge arms, he was flying free, launched into the night, into death.

Chipmunk ran screaming for his life, tears of fear and horror and the loss of yet another friend streaking his cheeks. Giants were all about him. He could feel the heat of the orange glow following his path. He had to get back to the camp, and yet, he realized that to do so would put them all in jeopardy, would likely bring about the end of the quest!

Chipmunk found a hole instead, burying himself quickly under piled leaves at the base of a thick tree. His confidence mounted as a pair of giants stomped past, oblivious of him. A third came rushing by, and then came the one carrying the glowing spike.

That giant, too, started past, but skidded to a stop just beyond the hole, compelled by the demonic weapon.

Chipmunk tried to cry out as his covering was pushed aside, as he looked up at the towering, fifteen-foot-tall monster, up at the huge, awful spike. He tried to cry out, but no sound would come forth, only a breathless gurgle, that ended abruptly as the monstrous spike fast descended.

The cries of the doomed pair had alerted Elbryan and the others to the danger, so they were not unprepared when the first of the giants crashed through the brush and charged over the rim of the bowl-shaped encampment. The leading brute, apparently thinking the centaur a mere horse, tramped right by Bradwarden, who stood with head and torso bowed.

As the giant passed, Bradwarden turned, lifting his heavy bow and letting fly. The arrow hit solidly, denting the armor plate and driving through, but not so deep as to cause any serious wound. Three quick strides later, the centaur was upon the giant, ramming hard into the behemoth’s back. Bradwarden’s heavy bow, swung as a club, rang off the plated armor, splintering as it hit. The giant stumbled and went down, the centaur in fast pursuit, cursing his foolishness in using the bow and reaching for his cudgel. But two more giants were close behind, following their friend in, now bearing down on Bradwarden.

“What does it do?” Pony asked Avelyn as the monk held aloft a stone the woman had not seen before, a clump of black octahedral crystals.

“It is lodestone,” Avelyn explained. “Magnetite.” He went silent then, sending his thoughts into the stone, using his magical energies to ignite those powers within the stone. The giants were bearing down on Bradwarden in a straight line; Elbryan had gone off to the side and was now calling out the presence of more of the huge fomorians.

Pony left Avelyn’s side then, rushing to join with Elbryan.

The orange glow outlined them, three more behemoths closing in. Hawkwing went to work at once, arrow after arrow rushing down to bang hard against metal armor, into the breastplate, then repeatedly into the visor, several tips slipping through to sting the giant face, to make the monster howl in agony.

One of the three fell back from the charge, clutching at its face, blinded by the sting.

Elbryan dropped his bow and drew out Tempest as Pony scrambled by. He ordered her to the left, toward the giant without the glowing spike, for he sensed that the spike held some diabolical power.

Pony readily complied, thinking that the remaining giant, smaller than the spike wielder, would be a quicker kill—not that any giant was an easy kill! She rushed right for it, feigning a dodge to the side as it lifted its huge sword. By far the quicker, agile Pony went one step left, then back to the right, then straight ahead, under the awkward cut of the giant’s weapon, falling into a headlong roll that brought her right between the monster’s widespread legs.

The giant reacted quickly, snapping straight and tall, closing its legs to entrap the foolish human.

Pony’s graphite defeated that maneuver, though, sent a crackling bolt of energy along the monster’s inner thighs that left it swaying, legs widespread, as the woman worked her way out the back. Now Pony went to more conventional weaponry, drawing her sword and turning right back in on the monster, slamming the weapon hard against the giant’s lower back, seeking an opening between the protective plates.

She found none, but stayed behind the staggering brute, belting away as the giant tried to turn and grab her.

Elbryan didn’t know what to make of this armored foe, and especially of its glowing spike. Why weren’t the monster’s hands burning? the ranger wondered, for surely that spike was brutally hot.

The giant stabbed straight ahead, and Elbryan left those thoughts behind, suddenly more concerned with keeping his body from sporting very large holes. He went around to the side with a flourish, snapping Tempest against the pursuing spike, each hit sending a shower of orange sparks into the air.

Elbryan knew that he had to get up higher, within striking distance of the giant’s head. He knew the terrain, had marked it clearly in his thoughts before the night had fallen. He ran hard to the side, then leaped up atop a rounded boulder, gaining a foothold and turning back in a quick charge to meet the rushing monster.

Tempest snapped in, level with the giant’s eyes. Up came the spike to block, but too late, and Tempest slashed hard against the visor, twisting the giant’s head from the force of the blow.

Out came a straight thrust of the spike; Elbryan turned his hips and skittered back. The ranger leaped ahead and launched a vicious sidelong swipe as the heavy, awkward spike retracted. He connected solidly on the side of the giant’s head, knocking the helm away, the behemoth staggering a long stride to the side.

“The next will not be so blocked!” the ranger promised.

The giant was not without a trick of its own, though. It came at Elbryan, but shifted as Tempest came up to parry, as Elbryan’s feet turned defensively sideways, allowing the ranger to retreat back or to either side. The giant plunged the spear down low instead, right into the boulder, and Elbryan was too surprised to seize the momentary opening and charge ahead.

He had to leap away instead, far out to the side, crashing through twigs and saplings, for the boulder superheated, turned red, and then melted away right below him!

The ranger was dazed but knew that he had to keep moving as this pile of molten stone rolled down, igniting small, smokey fires among the twigs.

In the sudden glow, Elbryan saw more forms moving about the perimeter, giant forms, and between the reinforcements and that terrible glowing spike, the ranger knew that he and his friends were overmatched.

Avelyn fell deeper into the stone, felt its energy building to a critical mass. Lodestone was highly magnetic; its enchantment would send it fast to a metal surface. Impossibly fast, faster than a crossbow bolt.

The monk fell back, nearly toppling, as the stone suddenly zipped away, flying unerringly for the armored chest of the giant closest behind Bradwarden. It hit with a tremendous thump, jerking the behemoth from the ground, and then, to Avelyn’s amazement, for he had never really used magnetite before, the second giant in line shuddered violently as well.

Bradwarden had forced the helm off the fallen giant by then, his cudgel turning the monster’s head to mush before it could rise up. The centaur heard the commotion close behind and turned to see both giants slumping to the ground, the closest showing a neatly blasted hole right through its breastplate, right through its chest, right through its back.

“Oh, good shot!” Bradwarden congratulated Avelyn.

The monk was already running toward Bradwarden, toward the fallen giants, thinking to retrieve the stone. But then there were other giants, all about, huge shadowy forms blurring the otherwise straight line of the perimeter.

“On me back!” the centaur cried.

“My stone!”

“No time!”

“Everyone out!” came a call, Elbryan’s voice. “Avelyn with Bradwarden! Myself with Pony! Paulson with Chipmunk!” If the two are still with us! he added silently. “Out and away, to a direction of your own choosing!”

Pony could hardly believe what she was hearing, what she was seeing. They had come so far together, and now they were being forced into an impromptu, hardly organized retreat. She waited for her turning giant to align itself properly, then scrambled back between its legs once more. Again there came that nasty crackle of energy, and this time, the giant’s muscles betrayed it, tensing with the current, and the brute tumbled down.

Pony had no time to stop and take advantage of the situation, though, as she scrambled for the center of the encampment, for Avelyn and Bradwarden, hoping against hope that they might all link together once more.

She saw the monk lying across the centaur’s back, Bradwarden’s powerful legs pounding away up the north face of the bowl, the same direction from which the first giants had come. They made the lip and went over, and almost immediately after, all the sky lit up with the bright flames of a tremendous fireball.

Pony fell back, all the battle stopped for a moment, and when she caught her breath, the woman was satisfied to hear the receding hoofbeats. Avelyn and Bradwarden, at least, had gotten away.

But how might she and Elbryan? Pony had to wonder as she skittered down the rocky slope, a pair of giants in fast pursuit. Purely on instinct, the woman dove ahead, over the giant Bradwarden had killed. She felt a rush of wind and heard a crash behind her, a giant club smashing against armor.

Still she scrambled, expecting to be buried at any moment, expecting her life to end with a sudden, burning explosion.

Over the next giant she went, trying to regain her footing. But she tripped and stumbled, falling atop the third dead behemoth, her hand tearing against a jagged edge in the monster’s breastplate, then slipping into the gore of its torn guts.

There was fighting right behind her! She turned and saw Elbryan darting about the giant pair, Tempest working furiously. But he could not win! Even if he beat these two, others were coming fast, including the one with the glowing spike!

Pony’s hand instinctively clutched onto something hard and she retracted it to find the stone Avelyn had used. She stared at it curiously for just a moment, trying to discern its energy.

“Run!” came Elbryan’s cry.

Pony looked to the fight as she rose, saw Elbryan, Hawkwing in one hand, Tempest in the other, jump out of the path of a fast-descending club, then leap back suddenly as a sword swished across. Pony cried out, thinking her love cut in half, but Elbryan had been quick enough to dodge out of harm’s way.

He planted his feet as he landed and rushed straight ahead, screaming wildly, his sword now glowing a furious bluish-white, snapping to and fro, darting straight ahead, sparking as it banged against unyielding armor.

But the ranger’s tactic worked, the sudden rush forcing the giants into a short retreat, forcing them off balance. One went down over a fallen body, reaching out as it fell to grab its companion. Another short hop and attack by Elbryan had that one tumbling, too, both landing in a tangled heap.

The ranger had no intention of jumping atop them, not with other giants bearing in. He turned and ran as Pony ran, catching up to Pony as they scrambled together up the north slope, following the trail of their friends. Over the lip, they saw the effects of Avelyn’s fireball, small fires here and there, the largest being the one still burning atop the curled and blackened corpse of yet another giant. Down the pair ran through the heat and the smoke, stumbling, but using each other for support. They heard the roars behind them, knew that to stop was to die.

Into the night, the four survivors went, stumbling blindly, separated, two and two, with a third of their party dead.

CHAPTER 50

Flight

Avelyn lay across the centaur’s back, staring more behind than ahead, praying for his companions.

Bradwarden, though, would not turn back and would not slow. Determined, purposeful, the centaur pounded along the mountain trails, hooves digging firm holds and propelling him and his all-important passenger mightily. Soon after they had left the encampment, Avelyn had looped the cat’s eye about Bradwarden’s head, and so the centaur could see in the dark and was not slowed as were the pursuing giants—as were their own companions.

“We must find a defensible spot!” the monk kept shouting.

“We’ll not be stopping!” the centaur finally answered and, as if to accentuate that point, Bradwarden lowered his human torso forward and gained speed.

“A defensible spot!” Avelyn insisted. “To await Elbryan and Jilseponie, to bring them in to our side and together ward off the giants!”

“No giant’ll be catching us,” the centaur assured him. “Nor will Elbryan and Pony, though I lament their loss.”

“They are not dead!” the monk insisted.

“No,” agreed Bradwarden. “Resourceful, the both o’ them. Not dead, but not for catching us, and when ye kill the dactyl, we’ll come back out and find them both, I’m not doubting!”

Avelyn, dumbfounded, had no answers. He could hardly believe that Bradwarden would so leave their friends behind, deserting the pair in so perilous a situation. Avelyn came to understand then just how determined the centaur was, just how determined all his companions were, that he was the hope, that he alone might do battle with the dactyl and win. Avelyn believed, and had spoken it openly and often, that it was his destiny to meet with the hellish creature; and so his friends meant to get him there, and if all of them perished in the process then by their thinking, at least—so be it.

A great weight fell over the monk as he came to that realization, a responsibility beyond anything Avelyn Desbris had ever known: greater even than his eight-year dedication that had gotten him into St.-Mere-Abelle, to the fulfillment of his dearest mother’s lifelong desire; greater even than the task assigned him by the Church, and by God, to go to Pimaninicuit and prepare this latest generation of gemstones. Avelyn had been ready to argue with Bradwarden, to insist, even if it meant dropping from the centaur’s back, or using some magic against Bradwarden, that they stop and wait for their friends. But now the sobered monk remained silent and uncomplaining. Bradwarden meant to deliver him, and so Avelyn must be delivered.

Or all the deaths would be for naught.

They came through the pass of the great Barbacan with night still thick about them, having put many miles behind them in a furious rush. Bradwarden, clearly exhausted, would not think of stopping, though he was glad when Avelyn announced that he would walk and not ride for a time.

Overlooking the valley within the mountain ring, the pair were overwhelmed—particularly Bradwarden, who had not viewed the great encampment before. Thousands of campfires dotted the dark plain below them, thousands and thousands.

And beyond the masses loomed a single dark silhouette, a conical mountain tipped by a steady stream of dark smoke.

Aida.

“The dactyl’s home,” Avelyn whispered to the centaur, and Bradwarden needed no clarification, for both of them were staring squarely at the ominous mountain.

“We can get down and about the camp,” Bradwarden said a few moments later, after pausing to inspect the layout. The centaur pointed to the left, to one of the great black arms running down from the lone mountain, nearly to the base of the mountains Bradwarden and Avelyn had just come through. “Though we’re looking at a full day o’ walking,” the centaur finished.

“Out in the daylight near that swarm?” Avelyn asked doubtfully.

“Not a choice,” Bradwarden replied. “We’ll get behind the mountain arm and hope our enemy has not an army on the other side of it.”

Avelyn nodded and silently followed the indomitable centaur, denying his obvious exhaustion.

They were scrambling in the right direction, Elbryan knew, following their friends, though they certainly were not gaining any ground. Every so often, the pair crossed a low spot, a muddy puddle, and Elbryan spotted the deep tracks of Bradwarden. Widespread tracks, he noted hopefully; the centaur was in full run.

That was what Elbryan and Pony wanted. Duty told them that they must follow, but their higher purpose reminded them that all that mattered was the delivery of Avelyn. “Run on, Bradwarden,” Elbryan muttered more than once, and always Pony nodded her agreement.

Elbryan was surprised at how easy the mountain trails were to navigate, even in the dark. The Barbacan was an imposing range of tall rocky mountains, capped in snow year-round with many sheer cliffs, some with drops of two or even three thousand feet. But in this particular region, with the trail cutting between two such peaks and thus bringing the climbers nowhere near the top, the going remained steady and fairly easy. The ranger believed that they might see the other side, the slope down to the valley beyond, before the dawn. Avelyn had described the general layout to them all, had told of the valley and of the lone mountain that maps named Aida. In that description, the monk had noted often and hopefully that the barrier mountain range, though tall and ominous, was not wide.

So it was with some hope that Elbryan and Pony ran on, and though they could not possibly match the pace of the galloping centaur, they found many occasions when they could cross over a blocking outcropping of stone that Bradwarden would have had to circumvent. Perhaps with the dawn, they would sight their friends again and would be able to link up.

Even the pursuit seemed left behind, the fumbling giants not keeping pace. Elbryan’s one fear, though, was that the behemoths knew the region and thus knew a quicker way.

That fear came to fruition when Elbryan and Pony entered one long narrow pass, a jumble of boulders and scraggly trees sheltered from the strong winds, but, the pair both silently noted, without any obvious escape routes. Halfway along the trail through the gully, an ominous and familiar orange glow appeared—ahead of the pair.

Out stepped the giant, Togul Dek, still wearing no helm, its huge features twisted with rage. Roaring at the two humans—and all the louder when Elbryan banged an arrow off its tremendous breastplate—the behemoth jabbed its glowing spike first into the tree at its left, then in the one at its right, sending both up instantly as towering candles. Between the trees stepped the brute, outlined by fire, not bothered by fire; and Elbryan and Pony noted the dark silhouettes of another pair of giants behind it.

“Take him head-on,” the ranger instructed, and he dove to the muddy ground, wrapping his cloak tightly about him. He came up in a dash, to the side and not straight ahead, and Pony, trusting him, charged out from his wake, waving her sword menacingly, drawing the spike wielder’s attention.

The giant set its huge feet wide apart and slapped the demon-created spear across its open palm. It paid no heed to the ranger, for it knew he had nowhere to flee, and concentrated instead on the woman, brave and foolish, walking steadily to her doom.

Each step came more difficult to Pony. She heard a commotion far behind and understood that the other giants—probably three or four more, if her count at the previous fight was accurate—had sealed off that end of the gully. Where had Elbryan gone, she wondered, and why? Why hadn’t he just put Hawkwing to use, shooting arrow after arrow at the spike wielder’s unarmored head until the thing fell over dead? Then they could fight two against two, and try to break out into the night.

Pony shook the confusing possibilities from her thoughts. This was Elbryan, she reminded herself: the Nightbird, the ranger, elven trained.

Even as her resolve began to mount once more, she saw him, running right through the fires, along a low branch on the tree to the giant’s right. Flames licked at him, at his soggy muddy cloak, but he scampered along, buried by the blaze, bearing down on his unsuspecting enemy.

Pony howled and charged, drawing the monster’s full attention. She skidded up quickly and loosed a forked bolt of crackling lightning, striking hard the leader and both of the giants behind it.

Then, before Togul Dek had recovered from the lightning, Elbryan was upon the brute, the ranger running full out to the end of the branch, leaping high and hard, sword extended, throwing his arms wide to thrust the smoldering cape behind him. Tempest dove right into the giant’s face, while Elbryan’s booted feet were planted hard against the behemoth’s massive chest.

He had only one quick strike; he had to be perfect. And so he was, mighty Tempest blasting through bone and flesh, diving into the giant’s brain.

Togul Dek tried to respond, tried to lift the spike and bring it to bear, but the weapon flew from the suddenly weak hands, drawing a bright line in the dark air. It landed far to the side, upon a stone it fast reduced to flowing, molten lava, rolling down the side of the mountain, taking the spike with it, and that, in turn, melting all subsequent stone, the fiery avalanche gaining momentum.

Elbryan viciously wrenched his blade free, but held his footing as the giant fell backward, the ranger riding the behemoth like some felled tree. The two giants behind their leader did not know what to make of the scene, had not even noticed Elbryan until Togul Dek began that backward fall. And then, it was too late.

Elbryan hit the ground in a graceful forward roll, rushing up and stabbing hard, finding the crease between one giant’s huge breastplate and its pelvic armor. Throwing his momentum firmly behind the sword, the ranger drove it in to its hilt, then scrambled past, right between the brutes, drawing Tempest back out as he went. He cut a sudden, sharp turn, diving into yet another roll, this one aimed at the second giant as it swung its club. The weapon swished high of the mark, harmlessly—for Elbryan, at least. The wounded giant, clutching its torn guts, bent right into the weapon’s path and got clipped across the forehead. It went down hard, groaning, trying to shake the dizziness, growling against the searing pain.

Elbryan got in a fast strike on the still-standing brute, then darted out into the night. He didn’t think himself quick enough, though, thought the giant would get in one hit, but then the monster inexplicably dropped its club and howled, grasping at its visor.

Pony ran by, stabbing the standing giant hard in the back of the leg, then rushing out to join Elbryan.

“What did you do to its eyes?” the ranger asked, but Pony had no answer, only shrugged and kept on running.

Pursuit was close and fast, forcing the tired companions to stay at full speed. They came to a wall of stone, climbable, but Elbryan feared the giants would have an easier time than he and Pony, that the brutes would close in and simply pluck them off the wall before they got over.

No other options, the ranger decided, and so he scrambled ahead, hoping to get a firm handhold, that he might propel Pony over him, over the stone, out to freedom in the dark night. He neared the top when he heard Pony, just a few feet below him, cry out in surprise.

Elbryan turned and screamed, seeing a giant reaching for his lover. Pony had no weapon in hand—no weapon that Elbryan saw, at least—though she had her arm extended out toward the giant.

She yelled again, and something flew out from her grasp, rocketed into the giant’s visor with a resounding ring, and though the missile did not penetrate the helm, but rather bounced off, it hit with tremendous force, bending and creasing the metal into the giant’s face, and the brute fell away. Pony was quick to retrieve the stone, not willing to abandon such a powerful weapon.

Elbryan grabbed Pony by the shoulder and hauled her up, pulling her right past him, then pushing hard until she went over the lip of the ridge. The ranger dug in and scrambled for all his life, and got over the rim just ahead of reaching fingers, a second giant coming in for him.

Pony was fast to those fingers, her sword slashing hard, taking a couple from the hand, and then the pair were running again; and this time no pursuit was close behind.

“What did you do to the first at the base of the wall?” the ranger asked her.

“Lodestone,” Pony replied. “The gem rushes to targeted metal. I wish I had a hundred more like it!”

Elbryan looked back in the direction of the ridge and shuddered at the sheer power of the stone. He had thought his sword impressive, had thought himself a marvelous warrior, and so he was, but how did that measure against the power of the stones?

Elbryan was glad that Pony was on his side and that Avelyn, much more powerful than the woman, was on his side. That thought gave him hope that his monk friend would indeed defeat the demon that had come to Corona.

Though she didn’t understand its source, Tuntun watched the growing spectacle of the fiery avalanche with satisfaction. The elf had played only a minor role in the battle, fired only a single arrow. But such a shot! Tuntun had put her arrow right against a giant’s visor, right through the slit! In her mind, she replayed again its howl and saw again the sight of Elbryan and Jilseponie running out to the safety of the dark night.

Convinced that they were safe for the time being, the elf had then circled back, down below the scene of the fight, to rejoin her precious companion.

“I’ll take you no farther,” she said to Symphony, patting the muzzle of this animal that had served her so well. Even though the trails seemed easy for at least a short distance, Tuntun decided that it would be better for her to use stealth. Alone, the elf could run full out without any fear of detection.

“I know that you are smart enough to get away,” Tuntun whispered, and the great horse snorted as if he understood. The elf took her pack and her weapons—bow and a long dagger—and with a final look Symphony’s way, a final nod of appreciation, she ran off into the night.

CHAPTER 51

Aida

Elbryan and Pony were coming down the northwestern face of the mountainous barrier when dawn broke over the Barbacan. Only then was the size of the dactyl’s gathered army revealed, a swarming black mass that filled the whole valley between the long arms of a lone, smoking mountain, some ten miles or so to the north.

“How many?” Pony breathed.

“Too many,” the ranger said helplessly, having no better answer.

“And how are we to get to the mountain?” Pony asked. “How many thousands must we defeat even to reach its black rocky base?”

Elbryan shook his head determinedly, somehow sure his companion’s assessment was not correct. “A few sentries, perhaps,” he replied. “Nothing more.”

Pony eyed him skeptically.

“The demon is confident,” Elbryan explained, “inviting us in. The dactyl fears no mortal man and no monster, and it has no reason to believe that we would ever dare to move against it in such small numbers, small enough to enter the Barbacan unnoticed.”

“That has been our hope since the beginning,” Pony agreed.

“And that is our only hope now,” Elbryan said, “a hope to which we must hold fast. If the demon sets its army to block us, then so we shall be blocked, and not my sword, nor Avelyn’s magic, not Bradwarden’s strength, nor your own assortment of weapons, will possibly get us through so many swarming monsters.

“But it will not come to that,” the ranger went on. “Even if the demon dactyl thinks that some enemies have come to its home, as the armored giants and that terrible spear might indicate, it remains supremely confident that none in all the world can stand against it.”

“How do you know this?”

The simple question seemed to catch Elbryan off his guard. Indeed, how did he know so much about this enemy that he had never seen and had never battled before? In the end, the ranger realized that he did not know, that he was guessing, and hoping. He answered Pony only with a shrug, and that seemed enough. They had come too far to worry about things they couldn’t control, and so they started along once more, quickly picking a path down the side of the mountain. They were both weary after the long night of running, but neither entertained any thoughts of stopping to rest, not with so many monsters before them—and perhaps more than a few chasing them.

An hour later, moving across an open expanse of bare rock—the two friends feeling very exposed indeed!—Elbryan stopped suddenly and dropped to a crouch. Thinking danger at hand, Pony crouched as well, and reached her hand into a pocket, fingering her few stones.

“There!” the ranger said excitedly, pointing down across the valley to his left, toward the western arm of Aida. Beyond that black line of stone, a black dot, a solitary figure, moved steadily across the green carpet, making fast for a thick copse of trees.

No, Pony realized, not one figure, but two, a man atop a horse . . . a man atop a centaur!

“Avelyn and Bradwarden!” she whispered.

“Running hard for Aida,” Elbryan agreed. He looked back at Pony, his smile wide. “And with none chasing them, and none standing before them.”

Pony nodded grimly. Perhaps her love was right, perhaps the dactyl was indeed inviting them in. She had to wonder, though she said nothing aloud, was that a good thing?

The pair were off the mountain within the hour, making their way along its base, weaving in and out of boulders and patches of trees. They easily avoided the few bored goblin sentries that were about, and every so often came upon tracks that told them they were following the exact route Avelyn and Bradwarden had taken.

Finally they crossed over the mountain’s long arm and were surprised to find the ground very warm under their feet. Only then did the pair realize that this line of stone was not a solid ridge, but rather, like a living thing, was growing and changing. Most of the ridge was hard, but every so often, the pair caught a sudden glimpse of fiery orange, the lava flow bubbling up to the surface, then meandering across the hardened black stone like a crawling orange slug. Within a few minutes, each of these movements would cease, the lava gradually rolling over itself or gathering in a depression, and then quickly cooling, its glow fading to blackness.

“Like a living thing,” Pony remarked, taking more care where she subsequently stepped.

“Like the dactyl,” Elbryan replied. “Flowing out from Aida, encompassing all the world under its blackness.”

It was not a pleasant thought.

They were several hours behind their friends, Elbryan and Pony realized when they at last came upon the same expanse they had seen their friends traversing. There was no apparent resistance; behind this arm of Aida, this blocking ridge of black stone some twenty to thirty feet high, no monsters moved about and no sentries were visible.

They went into a copse of trees, such a stark contrast of teeming life next to the black wall of stone, and found again the centaur’s tracks. Soon a second set—the tracks of a heavy human, of Brother Avelyn—were visible beside those of Bradwarden, and it was not hard for the pair to surmise that the centaur might be getting tired.

But Bradwarden continued on, and so did Avelyn; and so did Pony and Elbryan, increasing their pace in the hope that they might catch up to their friends before they entered the caverns of the mountain. Perhaps, Elbryan pondered, if Avelyn and Bradwarden were scrambling about, looking for some way into the mountain . . .

It didn’t happen that way. The ranger and Pony exited the copse of trees, then crossed through a second and then a third, climbing to the lower reaches of Aida. As soon as they cleared that last copse, they saw an entrance, a great gaping hole, defying the slanting rays of the westering sun. If the appearance proved true, if this was indeed a way into the heart of Aida, then Avelyn and Bradwarden had long ago gone into the mountain and might even now be standing before the demon dactyl as Elbryan and Pony stood staring at the entrance. The anxious couple went back into the last copse and cut sticks, wrapping them with cloth to make torches.

Then, fearful that they would be too late, the pair split, left and right, and moved quickly and stealthily right up to the edge of the cavern entrance. Elbryan peeked around the stone and into the gloom; Pony did likewise from across the way; and they were somewhat relieved to find that this was indeed a deep cavern and that it was apparently empty.

Just inside, Elbryan noted the hooflike depression of the centaur’s track.

Keeping near the side wall, not daring to light a torch, the pair moved in tentatively, allowing their eyes to adjust to the rapidly diminishing light. All too soon, they were faced with a dilemma: light the torch or walk on in near-complete darkness.

Elbryan winced as the fire flared to life, as if expecting all the minions of the dactyl to descend upon him. After a few tense but uneventful moments, he motioned to Pony, and the pair crept along, coming to a place where the tunnel forked: one branch going right and level, the other left and down. Looking down the right-hand side, Pony noted that the tunnel forked again just a short way in, and the tunnel continuing to the right beyond that second fork showed yet another side passage.

“A veritable maze,” Elbryan moaned. He fell to his knees and moved the torch low, searching for some sign of his friends’ passing, but the ground was bare, unmarked stone.

“Straight ahead,” Pony declared a moment later, seeing her companion’s frustration. “Deeper into the mountain, and then down and to the left at the next fork.”

She spoke with determination, though it was only a guess—a guess that seemed as good to Elbryan as any he might make. They moved in deeper, then began a descent along a smooth and angled passageway. Elbryan gave up any thoughts of continuing his scan for tracks, knowing that to do so would only slow their progress. Avelyn and Bradwarden were wandering in here, probably as lost as were Elbryan and Pony. Sooner or later, one of the pairs, or perhaps both, would stumble upon the dactyl or some of its deadly minions.

It was a desperate situation, and both Elbryan and Pony had to remind themselves often that they had known it would be like this from the moment they had set out from Dundalis.

Bestesbulzibar was outraged, and yet the demon was somewhat amused as well as it stood with Quintall and a pair of very nervous giants, looking down the ruined slope of a mountain. How powerful indeed was the demon-forged spike! To cause such devastation as this, simply because it left the hand of its dying wielder and fell across the stone!

One of the giants continued to stammer on about bad luck and other such nonsense, trying hard to concoct some excuse that might keep its skin attached to its body. Bestesbulzibar wasn’t listening.

“Have they made the mountain?” the dactyl asked Quintall, indicating Aida.

The rockman scrutinized the terrain ahead and considered the distance. He put a hand to his chin, an oddly human gesture. And indeed, Quintall now seemed physically human. The rough edges of his rocky body had smoothed and rounded, shaping more and more to the exact human form the spirit had left behind. The rockman was recognizable again as Quintall; the features, the size, and the body dimensions were all the same, as if the man’s spirit were somehow determining the shape of this new stone coil. Of course, his “skin” was now obsidian in consistency as well as hue, and red lines of molten stone still striped his joints; his eyes, too, were red pits of liquid stone. But he looked like Quintall, and the rockman could hardly wait until the moment that Brother Avelyn saw his new and superior body.

“Have they?” Bestesbulzibar prompted.

Quintall nodded. “If they ran on through the night,” he answered, “and if no others rose up against them.”

“Perhaps they will be seated upon my throne when I return to it.” The dactyl sneered, eyeing the pair of giants wickedly.

“B-bad luck,” one of the behemoths stammered.

“We will—” the other began to promise, but the dactyl cut it short.

“You will go and take your places with the army,” Bestesbulzibar instructed. The demon badly wanted to rip the hide from these two, and from any others of the hunting party who had survived their encounter with the intruders and who were now hiding nearby, fearing the demon’s wrath. Or perhaps Bestesbulzibar could take them back to Aida and throw them in the path of the deadly Nightbird. Or, the demon mused, perhaps it would give the job of punishment to Quintall, that Bestesbulzibar might witness the power of its newest weapon. But the dactyl was not a stupid creature and could control its impulses, even those bent upon destruction, which the demon loved above all else. Bestesbulzibar had lost too many of its elite giant guardsmen already, considering the effort he had taken to outfit the giants with armor, but, in truth, the demon figured that it had lost little by the failure of the giants. So Brother Avelyn and the one called Nightbird may have entered Aida; that only meant that Bestesbulzibar might enjoy a bit of the fun of killing them.

“Come along,” the dactyl instructed Quintall. The rockman moved closer and Bestesbulzibar lifted from the ground, hooking its powerful legs about Quintall, and then speeding the instrument of its wrath across the valley, above the heads of the cowering minions, and back to Aida.

Quintall, possessed of heightened senses, whose glowing eyes could light the way along dark tunnels, was sent to find the trail.

“We are too low,” Avelyn complained, leaning against a wall of the stuffy, tight cavern. He kept the light of his enchanted diamond low, hoping that it would be less conspicuous and not attract any more guards like the two powries Avelyn and Bradwarden had just overwhelmed. That thought in mind, Avelyn kicked aside the bloody leg of one of the dwarves and shifted himself so that he was looking back the way they had come.

“Now wouldn’t the demon thing be at the heart?” Bradwarden asked casually, tearing at the second powrie as he spoke. “And wouldn’t a mountain’s heart be below?”

Avelyn shook his head immediately; he just didn’t feel right about the path. They had gone down and to the left at the first fork, too soon perhaps, to be heading into the lower chambers of this tunnel-crossed mountain. “Our enemy might be higher,” he said, “near the smoking cone, where the winged demon might quickly fly out among its minions.”

He looked back at Bradwarden as he finished his argument, and he was sorry that he did.

“Bah, ‘tis a guess and nothing more,” the centaur replied, taking a huge bite out of a powrie leg.

Avelyn closed his eyes.

“We go along, I say,” the centaur continued, talking through its full mouth, “choosing trails as we find them. It’s all a guess, yer knowing as well as I’m knowing.”

The monk sighed and didn’t disagree. Whatever course they chose, Avelyn would second-guess. Too much was at stake here; the monk was too much on the edge of his nerves.

“Now why’re ye here?” Bradwarden asked simply. “Ye’ve come to face yer destiny, so ye said, and so ye shall. We’ll get there, me friend, and if that’s what’s scaring ye, then I’m not for blaming ye. But turning back won’t put us any closer to anything, and every lost step gives more of our enemies the chance to stumble upon us.” He spat at that last thought and tossed the tough powrie leg to the ground. “And the damned things aren’t even good eating!”

Avelyn managed a smile and walked by the centaur, taking great care to avoid stepping on the discarded meal. They started off again, side by side, their bulky forms filling the narrow passageway.

“I am not pleased by the sight,” Elbryan whispered, looking down the long, narrow descent, a ledge bordered on the left by an uneven wall and on the right by a long drop of more than two hundred feet from where the ledge began and only gradually diminishing as the trail moved lower. Height hardly seemed to matter when considering the danger, though, for the drop ended in a pool of red fire, a swirling lake of molten stone. Even from this great height, Elbryan and Pony could feel the intense heat, and the sulfuric stench was nearly overwhelming.

“And I am not pleased at the prospect of backtracking all the way,” Pony replied. “Down we decided to go, and down this goes!”

“The fumes . . .” the ranger protested, and his fears were not lost on the woman. Pony fumbled in her pack and took out a strip of cloth, an intended bandage. She tore it in half and wetted both strips thoroughly from her waterskin, then tied one about her face after she handed the other to Elbryan.

The ranger, though, had a better idea. He took the green armband from his right arm, the one the elves said would defeat any poison, and tore it in two, handing one strip to Pony. With a trusting nod, the woman donned the mask, as did Elbryan, the ranger eyeing Pony all the while, admiring her gumption. The brave woman was not easily deterred.

They needed no torch in this place, because of the glow of the lava, and so their hands were free as they started down, at first hugging the wall tightly—the ledge was not narrow, but the prospects of slipping over were far too grim. Gradually, they eased out from the wall, their pace increasing, and soon they had put a couple hundred feet behind them, nearing the halfway point of the descent.

Pony, holding the lead, grew hopeful when she spotted a dark shadow along the wall far below, a side passage, running into the mountain and away from this place. So intent was she that she never noticed the crack running right across the ledge in front of her.

She stepped over it, and as she brought her weight down, the stone beneath her foot gave way.

Pony screamed; Elbryan grabbed her and pulled her back to safety, the pair falling to the ledge in a jumble. The ranger scrambled to the very lip and watched the eight-foot stone slab falling. It bounced off a jag in the wall, then spun over and out, tumbling into the magma, where it was swallowed, disappearing with hardly a splash.

Pony, horrified and breathing deeply, had to slow herself down consciously. She managed it, but the deep breaths had taken their toll, the sulfuric fumes overwhelming her, for in the fall, she had dislodged the elven mask. She rolled to the lip of the ledge, pulled her mask further down, and vomited.

“We must go back,” Elbryan said, putting a hand on the woman’s shoulder, trying to comfort her.

“Shorter down than up,” Pony said stubbornly, and she retched again. Then she sat up quickly, determinedly, pulled out her waterskin and washed her face briskly, replacing the mask and standing firm.

“A long jump,” Elbryan remarked, eyeing the break in the trail.

“An easy leap,” Pony corrected, and to prove her point, the woman took a single running stride and sprang across the gap, landing easily and skidding down defensively, on the lower level.

Elbryan stared at her long and hard, admiring again that stubborn determination but honestly wondering if she wasn’t being foolhardy just to prove a point. They had no idea if that passage down below led anywhere, after all, and the eight-foot leap would be decidedly more difficult coming up the angled walkway.

“Easy leap,” Pony said again. The ranger managed a smile; they were going to face a demon, after all, so how could he berate the woman for what he considered recklessness?

Pony’s eyes widened, and Elbryan realized that she was about to scream.

The ranger spun, drawing Tempest as he went, but the danger was not behind him, but to the side, coming out of the solid wall. Stones burst outward; Elbryan skipped back up the slope a few scrambling steps and dove to the ground. He turned about, confused, and when he saw the source, he was even more confused.

Quintall walked out onto the ledge.

Elbryan was up in a defensive crouch, Tempest defensively before him, though he knew not what to make of this moving rockman, this obsidian image of Brother Justice.

Quintall’s intentions were easy enough to discern. The rockman looked at Pony, then turned back fully upon Elbryan, red-striped fingers clenching the air menacingly. “Do you think you can win this time, Nightbird?” the demon’s lackey asked, his voice grating like stone rubbing stone.

“What are you?” Elbryan asked breathlessly. “What manner of being, what tormented soul?”

“Tormented?” Quintall scoffed. “I am free, mortal fool, and shall live forever, while your life is forfeit!” On came the rockman, stalking straight in.

Elbryan slashed his sword across, scoring a scraping hit that didn’t even slow Quintall. The ranger jumped back a step, then lunged forward, Tempest squealing as it deflected off Quintall’s face. This hit was more substantial, Elbryan was glad to realize, for the fine elven-forged sword cracked through the rockman’s hard skin, drawing a slight orange line.

But the line cooled to black almost immediately, and if Quintall was hurt, he did not show it. He came on furiously then, and launched a roundhouse left hook.

Elbryan ducked the blow, just barely, and scampered back as Quintall’s hand thundered against the wall. The ranger glanced at that impact spot and his respect for this enemy heightened, for where Quintall’s hand had struck, the stone was cracked and smoking.

“Will you run away, then, and leave the woman to me?” the rockman taunted. “I can get to her, do not doubt.”

The words made Elbryan glance down at Pony, and he saw, to his horror, that she was readying for a jump back across the gap. “Stay down!” the ranger yelled to her. “I will come to you!”

“You will never get past me,” Quintall remarked, accentuating his point by slamming the stone wall again, even harder.

That movement left an opening that the ranger could not resist. He came forward in a rush, Tempest driving in hard and straight, striking hard, cracking through the black shell and diving into the monster’s magma interior.

Quintall howled and launched a series of blows, but Elbryan was the quicker, already retracting his glowing sword—and the ranger was glad to know that the fine weapon had survived the immersion in the obviously hot interior of this wicked foe—and snapping Tempest up left, up right, up left, in three quick parties, then straight ahead to poke the rockman in the face once again.

But even the great wound in the monster’s belly fast closed, while Quintall’s movements became more cautious, more dangerous.

From down below, Pony was shouting out, but Elbryan hardly took the time to consider her words. He had to find some way to hurt this thing, and though his sword might inflict some sting, it seemed that the wound could only be so deep.

The answer seemed obvious, and so the ranger spent no time considering the problems with such a course, plotting out the appropriate attack. He darted ahead again, stabbing hard, then turned as if to run by the monster on its left, on the outside of the ledge.

Pure instinct dropped Elbryan to one knee, Quintall’s heavy arm swishing above his head—a blow that would have launched the ranger over the edge! Then Elbryan came up in a reverse spin, turning in front of the rockman, going hard against the wall, and angling to get in between Quintall and the stone.

The monster’s other arm shot out hard, slamming the wall in front of Elbryan, preventing him from running past. He had no intention of such a course, anyway, for he stopped short of the barrier, braced himself against the wall, and shoved back with all his great strength.

He hardly moved; Quintall, so solid, so strong, laughed at him. Then Elbryan felt the press and the heat, intense and burning from those points on the rockman that were not hardened stone. Elbryan punched and twisted, but the press grew ever tighter. He heard Pony scream out, but her voice seemed to come from far away.

Then came a sudden rush of air above the slumping ranger, and the rockman cried out, and the grip was lessened.

Elbryan stumbled back up the slope, wriggling away, and turned to see Quintall clutching at his molten eyes, drops of hot magma glowing on his cheek. A second puzzle faced the ranger when he noticed a cord, thin but strong, strung to his left, along the wall, going past him and past Quintall. A quick tug showed Elbryan that it was tied off a short distance up the ledge.

The ranger had no time to stop and figure it out, for Quintall’s eyes, like his other wounds, quickly healed. On came the Nightbird, having no answers but to attack fiercely and hope his sword would find a weakness. He slashed left, back right, straight ahead, back to the right again, the sword ringing loudly and throwing sparks with each impact upon the rockman.

Despite the fact that Tempest offered no real threat, Quintall instinctively reacted, using his solid arms to parry, using the same martial routines he had learned long ago at St.-Mere-Abelle.

Elbryan pressed on, Tempest hitting so often that the ringing song never paused. He drew crack after crack in the rock man, and entertained the fleeting hope that Quintall would simply split apart.

“Tie it off, there!” Tuntun instructed, tossing the strong elvish cord to a stunned Pony and pointing to a large, loose boulder, a dozen feet further down the slope. “And be quick!” the elf demanded.

Pony was already running, not really knowing what Tuntun had in mind, but not daring to waste the moment in questioning. Any plan, however desperate, was better than nothing, and nothing was exactly what Pony could figure to do. As the woman began looping the rope, she felt the tension from the other end and, considering that it was on the inside of the rockman, she began to figure things out.

Tuntun flew away, back up toward the combatants, her slender daggers in hand, both dripping magma from Quintall’s eyes.

Elbryan was still on the offensive when the elf buzzed in, the ranger’s heavy blows whacking repeatedly against the rockman’s blocking arms or every so often slipping through to smack the monster about the torso or even across the head. He didn’t know how long he could keep it up, though, and understood that if he did no real damage soon, his momentum would be lost, and then it would be Quintall’s turn.

But then, suddenly, the rockman howled again, as Tuntun’s arms came about his head, tiny daggers finding their way to glowing eyes. Quintall threw his arms up mightily, connecting a glancing blow that sent the elf fluttering way up high, one dagger flying free, spinning down to disappear in the magma.

Elbryan grabbed up Tempest in both hands and surged ahead, swinging an over-the-shoulder chop with every ounce of strength he could muster. Quintall’s arm got down to block, and Tempest blasted right through it, severing the limb halfway between wrist and elbow.

The rockman howled again, hot magma pouring from the wound, though it, too, like all the others, hardened fast and cooled to black, leaving a stump below the monster’s red-striped elbow joint.

Quintall continued to roar, coming on with sheer outrage. Up above, Tuntun was screaming at the top of her melodic voice, “Now! Now!”

Elbryan had no idea of what the elf could mean, but Pony did. The woman put her back to the roped boulder, squeezed in between it and the wall and braced her feet, then pushed out with all her strength. The strong muscles in Pony’s legs corded taut; she groaned with the great effort, and the boulder slid only a fraction of an inch.

Pony heard the renewed fighting, the ringing blade, the roaring monster. Strength alone would not dislodge this heavy stone; she had to be smart. She turned her shoulders, shifting the angle a bit upward, and pushed out again. She felt the closest edge of the stone lift from the ledge, knew that she only had to go a bit more to get over that back edge.

Tuntun dove for the combatants, but veered at the last second as Quintall spun, not surprised this time. The turn cost the rockman another sting as Elbryan seized the moment and thrust ahead, Tempest cutting hard.

“Over the cord!” Tuntun yelled to the ranger. “Over the cord.” The meaning came clear to Elbryan even as Pony overturned the boulder, the heavy rock rolling off the ledge. The ranger started to leap over the suddenly taut, suddenly moving, cord, but only made it halfway. He dropped Tempest to the ledge and grabbed on for all his life as the boulder plummeted, its fall pulling the elven cord from the wall, swinging it, and Quintall and Elbryan, over the ledge.

Down they went, screaming. They came to a sudden, jarring stop as the rope played out to its length, the boulder jolting free of Pony’s knot and spinning down, down, to plop into the magma, where it was swallowed.

Elbryan held on, and some five feet below him, so did Quintall, the rockman clenching his one impossibly strong hand about the rope so powerfully that his hold was more solid than that of the two-handed man above him.

“Climb!” Pony cried to her love, and so Elbryan did, driving on with all speed and all strength.

Faster still was Quintall, the rockman, heaving mightily, launching himself up a foot or more, then grabbing tight again. Heaving and grabbing, he was closing fast on Elbryan, who had at least twenty feet of scrambling still ahead of him.

Pony continued to call out encouragement. She ran up and leaped the eight-foot gap, slamming her shin hard against the higher lip, but driving on, running to her love.

Hand over hand went the ranger; Pony thought he might make it. He threw one arm and shoulder over the ledge and the woman dove to him, tugging hard. But then, Quintall gave a great heave and caught the rope again, barely inches below Elbryan’s feet. One more leap and the ranger would be caught.

In swooped Tuntun. Elbryan saw the desperate move and cried out for the elf to go back. He let go with one hand, trusting in Pony to brace him, and even tried to catch the elf as she swept below him.

Elven cord was fine and strong, but Tuntun’s dagger, too, was of elvish make, and a quick flick of her wrist snapped the stretched rope tight below Elbryan’s feet.

Elbryan caught the elf’s forearm; Quintall caught her by the foot. Then they hung, twisting and turning, Pony looping the rope about her as a firmer brace and tugging Elbryan’s tunic desperately. The ranger’s hand tightened on poor Tuntun’s forearm, his muscles bulging from the strain, but down below, heavy Quintall’s grip was even stronger.

“Pull!” Elbryan begged Pony, for though they were working with all their might, the ranger was slipping back over the lip.

Tuntun, stretched, fearing that she would simply be ripped in half, recognized the dilemma, understanding that her friends could not hoist her and the heavy rockman. Her free hand, holding the dagger, moved upward, and she looked into Elbryan’s shining eyes.

“No,” the man pleaded, his voice barely a whisper for the lump in his throat. He shook his head.

Tuntun stabbed him hard in the wrist, and then she and Quintall, were falling fast. The stubborn rockman did not let go, would not let the elf, this wretched creature who had doomed him, use those wings to save herself! Tuntun tried to turn, tried to use her dagger . . .

Elbryan and Pony looked away, could not watch the final drop into the molten pool, could not witness the end of Tuntun.

They lay in a heap on the ledge for a long while, until the continuing fumes began to overwhelm them.

“We have to press on,” the ranger said.

“For Tuntun,” Pony agreed.

They leaped the gap and hurried along, relieved indeed to find that the side passage at the bottom was no dead end, but long and fairly straight.

They relit the torch and rushed ahead, glad to put the sickening fumes and the terrible sight behind them. Soon after, however, they came to a quick stop, spotting a distant glow far ahead in the tunnel. Elbryan looked helplessly to the torch in his hand; if he could see the glow . . .

Suddenly, the light far ahead intensified, and then narrowed, shooting down the corridor, falling over Elbryan and Pony, who had to throw up their arms to shield their eyes.

Images of demonic monsters filled their thoughts, images fast shattered by a cry of “Ho, ho, what!” from the other end of the beacon.

CHAPTER 52

Through the Maze

Avelyn and Bradwarden were thrilled to see their companions again, but their smiles could not hold against the tears running down Pony’s cheeks and the unmistakable mist in Elbryan’s eyes.

“Tuntun,” Elbryan explained, rubbing at one eye. “She came to our aid and saved my life, but the cost was her own.”

“Perhaps she is not quite dead,” Avelyn replied, fumbling with his stone sack. “Perhaps the hematite—”

“Into the magma,” the ranger explained grimly, putting a hand on the monk and shaking his head.

“A brave lass to the end,” Bradwarden noted. “Such is the way of the Touel’alfar—finer folk I’ve never known.” The centaur paused, letting the eulogy hang in the air for a moment. “And what of Paulson and the little one?” he asked.

“I do not know that they escaped the giant fight,” the ranger said.

“And why did ye not go back and look for them?” the centaur went on, and all three glanced Bradwarden’s way with stunned expressions. How dare he accuse Elbryan and Pony, if that was indeed what he was doing.

“Our goal was Aida, our mission to deliver Avelyn, to destroy the dactyl,” Elbryan said firmly, and even as he spoke the words, he understood Bradwarden’s cunning verbal maneuver. In so pointedly reminding Elbryan and the others of the higher goal, the centaur helped them to put Tuntun’s demise in proper perspective. She was gone, but because of her, they might move on and their higher purpose might be achieved.

That thought driving them, the four companions pushed hard along the corridors, looking for some sign as to which direction would get them to the demon. The passages forked many times, and they had to choose, without any guidance other than their own perceptions of where they might be and where the demon’s lair was likely situated.

But then, at one such fork, Avelyn stopped suddenly, and held his arm out to prevent Elbryan from moving down to the left.

“Right,” the monk insisted.

Elbryan looked at him carefully. “What do you know?” the ranger asked, surmising from the monk’s firm tone that this was no blind guess.

Avelyn had no practical answer for his friends; it was a feeling, nothing more, but a definite feeling, as if he were sensing the magical radiations of the otherworldly monster. Whatever the source, Avelyn knew in his heart that he was correct, and so he started down the right-hand corridor.

The others followed without delay, and their hopes mounted when they came to a heavy grate, bars set floor to ceiling, blocking the passage.

All went well in the south, the dactyl knew. Its armies, led by Maiyer Dek and Kos-kosio Begulne, were pressing fast for Palmaris, while Ubba Banrock’s northern force had crossed the breadth of Alpinador, tight to the coast, cutting the northern kingdom in half. Banrock’s powries had linked up tight on schedule with the great powrie fleet that sailed from the Julianthes, and now that fleet had put out once more, sailing south for the Gulf of Corona.

Despite the promising events, the demon now paced about its obsidian throne anxiously. It felt the intrusion, the powerful magic; it knew that Quintall had been destroyed.

The dactyl would no longer underestimate these foes that had come to Aida. If any of them got through the final defenses . . .

The demon creature narrowed its eyes and grinned wickedly at the thought, at the pleasures it would take in personally killing these intruders. For all the misery its army caused, for all the death and agony, Bestesbulzibar had not truly participated, other than the murders of a few upstarts or incompetents within its own ranks.

The dactyl, anxious as it was, hoped that some of these intruders, at least, would survive to get to the throne room.

“Stand far from it,” Avelyn instructed, fumbling with his pouch, but Elbryan had another idea.

“No,” the ranger said. “Your magic will be too loud, I fear. There is another way.” Elbryan pulled off his pack and sorted through it, finally producing the red gel the elves had given him, the same substance Belli’mar Juraviel had put upon the darkfern those years ago in Andur’Blough Inninness, allowing Elbryan to fell the sturdy plant with ease. Elbryan knew how strong and resilient his bow was, and so he figured that if the softening gel would work on darkfern, it might even defeat the metal.

He striped the center bar, near the corridor’s low ceiling. Then he took out Tempest and called Bradwarden to him, climbing up on the centaur that his cut would be flat across. Hoping his instincts were true, hoping that he would not damage his marvelous sword, Elbryan drew back and swung mightily for the spot, both his hands clenched tightly on the hilt.

Tempest sliced right through the metal bar, then banged with a ring off the next in line. Elbryan hopped down from the centaur and pulled the sword blade near his face, sighing with relief when he noted it was not damaged, not even nicked.

Mighty Bradwarden reached to the cut bar and pulled it far to the side, enough so that the others, at least, could easily slip through.

“Well done,” Pony congratulated.

“Aye,” Bradwarden agreed, “but I’ll not be getting me bulky body through that narrow hole.”

Elbryan gave the centaur a wink. “I’ve more gel,” he assured them, and soon the next bar in line was free on the top end, as well.

So they went on, even more urgently, accepting the grate as a sure sign that they were in an important area, probably the dactyl’s own.

The passage went on and on, widening at times so that all four could move abreast, and then narrowing so that only Elbryan and Pony could remain in front, Avelyn behind them, the bulky centaur at the rear of the line. They passed several side tunnels, but this one they were traveling seemed the finest, the smoothest, and certainly the widest, and so they continued along their chosen course. Avelyn took care to modulate the diamond light; he cupped the gem so that the beam would shoot out more toward the front, while he, with the cat’s eye chrysoberyl, continually glanced into the gloom behind them.

And so it was Avelyn who first noticed the large shadowy forms slipping into the main corridor from a side passage far behind.

“Company,” the monk whispered, and even as he spoke, the telltale flickers of a torch bounced across the wall from around a bend in the tunnel some three dozen paces ahead of Elbryan.

The ranger quickly surveyed the area, then moved the group to a narrow point—if they were to be attacked both front and back, better that they fight in an area too narrow to allow more than one or two enemies to come at them from either end of the line.

The light came around the bend, another flared behind them, showing their foes to be fomorian giants, four in front, four in back, and all armored, as had been the ones chasing them at the mountainous entrance to the Barbacan.

Elbryan was glad indeed that they were not in an open field, for then they would each have been fighting two at a time—and would have had little chance indeed. In these tight quarters, the giants had to come in, front and back, in two ranks of two.

“Pony and I have the front,” the ranger called.

“And I’ve the back!” Bradwarden responded, clumsily turning his bulky frame about in the narrow tunnel.

“Not alone,” Avelyn assured him, the monk moving as far up beside the centaur as his own bulky frame would allow. Avelyn reached into a smaller pouch and took out a handful of small prismatic celestite crystals, pale blue in color, and began calling forth their enchantment.

“We cannot give them the offensive edge,” the ranger said to Pony. Then, suddenly, the pair charged ahead, temporarily confusing the giants, who were certainly not used to little people rushing at them!

Elbryan started furiously, slapping his sword many times against the blade of the giant’s sword, finally pushing the weapon out wide enough for the ranger to get in a solid, screeching slice that dented the monster’s breastplate.

Pony went in with equal ferocity, though her attacks were not quite as effective and she scored only a minor hit.

It was Elbryan, though, and not Pony, who first lost momentum, the ranger involuntarily glancing at the side, looking at his love nearly as often as he studied his opponent. Soon, he was dodging frantically, barely parrying a swipe of a giant sword that would have easily lopped off his puny head.

“I wish ye might get up here,” the centaur grumbled, eyeing the leading giants. The huge brutes couldn’t quite stand side by side in the narrow corridor, but they really didn’t have to, for one of them, the trailing giant, carried a long spear. “Oh, they’ll get me two to one,” the centaur groaned, swinging his cudgel back and forth, loosening up his joints.

“We shall see,” Brother Avelyn promised sneakily, continuing his magical summoning.

In came the giants at full charge; Bradwarden braced and set his hind legs firmly. And then Avelyn threw, and the corridor before the centaur erupted in a shower of popping, stinging explosions, snapping bursts, a dozen or more, that stopped the charge fully and had the giants scrambling, crying out in pain.

Bradwarden recovered his wits and seized the moment, charging straight ahead, ramming the lead giant and knocking it back and to the floor, then turning out the spear with his free hand, launching a heavy swing with his cudgel that connected on the side of the second giant’s helmet, knocking the protective armor clear off the brute’s head and knocking the giant against the passage wall.

Bradwarden’s second swing was even harder, all the centaur’s great strength behind it connecting solidly with the giant’s vulnerable head, which was still braced against the stone. The massive skull cracked with a tremendous sound and the giant slumped to the floor.

But the other fomorians were back and ready, though one seemed to be partially blinded from the celestite explosions, and Bradwarden’s momentum came to a swift halt.

Pony saw what was happening here, and she was not pleased. She knew Elbryan trusted her—how could he not after all their fights together?—and yet, fighting in such proximity had him on the defensive for her sake.

That the young woman could not tolerate, more for the practical reason that they could not hope to win with such a posture than for any reason of pride. Pony had to hit fast and hard, to remind her love of her prowess. She slipped the graphite rod into her sword hand, clutching it tightly against the weapon’s hilt, and wondered if her plan would work.

Elbryan ducked another swing, a clear opening to score a wicked hit, but he went to the side instead, picking off a sword strike aimed for Pony—and one she could easily have avoided on her own.

The ranger’s move did leave an opening, though, the surprised giant glancing to regard Elbryan, and Pony rushed ahead, jabbing hard into the brute’s belly. Her sword found a bit of a crease in the armor but couldn’t sink in far enough to score a decisive hit.

No need for that, the giant—and Elbryan—discovered a moment later, when Pony released the stone’s magical energy. A crackling black arc raced up the weapon and leaped from its tip, right into the fomorian’s belly. The giant jolted violently, again and again, and then, when the electrical barrage finally ended, fell back off the sword to the floor, stunned, if not dead.

The lesson was not lost on Elbryan, who marveled at the powerful combination of sword and stone, even as he berated himself for thinking that Pony might need his help. Not to be outdone—and with another giant ready to take the fallen one’s place—the ranger leaped ahead and launched a series of furious attacks, right and left and straight ahead, Tempest moving too quickly for the fomorian’s heavy sword to keep up. The mighty elvish weapon scored bit after hit, sparks flying as it banged hard against metal armor. Finally, Elbryan found that crease between breastplate and girdle, mentally marking the spot.

The ranger let up for an instant, and as he expected, the giant roared and cut mightily. Elbryan was down in a low squat before the blade ever got close to hitting him, and he skittered under as it swooshed past. The ranger came up hard, his aim perfect for that slight crease.

In slipped Tempest, past the armor, tearing guts and diving deep. Elbryan moved ahead again, wanting to be well within the arc of that monstrous sword, pushing his blade in to the hilt. The giant reached across his back with its free hand, but there was little strength in that grip. Elbryan jerked fiercely, once and then again, the tearing jolts straightening the agonized fomorian. Then, seeing his work with this one finished; the ranger tore free the blade and let the brute fall.

The last in line was quick to join in, swinging its huge torch as a weapon.

Pony, thick into it with the third giant, took out a stone for yet another trick. But then she heard more clearly the situation at the back of the line, Bradwarden grunting, taking hits.

“Avelyn!” the woman called, and she tossed the stone, one she knew that the monk could put to much more deadly effect than she, over her shoulder.

It bounced off the monk’s back, catching his attention, for he was falling into the magic of yet another gem. He noted the gift Pony had offered, though, and halted his spell, quickly retrieving the fallen stone, the lodestone.

“Ho, ho, what!” the monk bellowed happily, bringing the deadly gem in line. “This is going to hurt!”

“Well, be quick about it!” Bradwarden pleaded and then grunted, accepting a heavy club hit on his left flank, for he was too busy keeping his other opponent’s sword at bay. The centaur had already taken a hit from that sword, and had a huge gash on the side of his human torso to prove it.

Avelyn called forth the energy of the stone and let it fly, swifter than any crossbow quarrel, more powerful than any ballista bolt. It hit the sword-wielding giant towering right in front of Bradwarden square in the chest, blasting a huge hole, lifting the brute clear of its feet and hurling it backward, crashing past the club wielder to slam heavily into the last in line, the pair going down in a heap.

Bradwarden used the moment of distraction to spin completely about, and as the club wielder regained its balance, the centaur launched a mighty double kick against its breastplate, knocking it back into the jumble.

“Forward!” Avelyn cried to the group.

Elbryan agreed wholeheartedly, and he leaped back to get beyond the swishing torch, then rushed ahead, angling to dive between the two remaining giants at the front, thrusting Tempest at Pony’s foe as he went. The one battling Pony had to turn to meet the attack, and took a hit from the woman even as it parried the ranger’s blade. Then, even worse for the fomorian, it got a swishing torch across the face as its partner tried to catch up to the scrambling ranger.

Pony rushed ahead and struck hard, sinking in her sword, calling forth the jolting energy of the graphite once again. Though her lightning was much weaker this time, her magical energies taxed, the giant slumped back, stunned.

Then came a series of popping explosions in the air ahead of Pony, another celestite barrage from Avelyn, singeing and confusing the fomorian pair.

Pony stared curiously at the behemoth that had been battling Elbryan, at its suddenly too-straight posture, hips forward, shoulders back. She understood as the torch dropped away, as the brute toppled forward, sliding off the blood-dripping Tempest.

Avelyn flattened himself against the wall and instructed Bradwarden to run by, for only one of the four giants that had come in at the back had any fight left in it. Bradwarden, wounded more seriously than he had at first believed, didn’t argue, but slipped past the bulky monk, moving beside Pony, stubbornly bearing down on the last giant in front.

The last in the pile at the rear finally extracted itself and, seeing Avelyn standing alone, no weapon visible, it came on wildly.

Avelyn waited until the last possible second, then loosed the magic of his latest stone, the malachite, into the corridor.

Suddenly, the giant was off balance, feet barely scraping the stone. Every movement forced a countermovement from the weightless behemoth, and so, when the stupid thing brought its club high overhead for a mighty chop, the energy lifted the giant from the ground and turned it right over in midair, a slow-motion somersault. The giant tried desperately to get at the trickster monk, but each twist and turn only made its predicament even worse, and soon it was tumbling, floating helplessly back down the corridor. As soon as it cleared its fallen companions, Avelyn was upon them, reaching into the chest of one to retrieve his deadly magnetite. He looked up to see that last giant upside down, flailing wildly, futilely, floating even farther away.

Avelyn snorted at the sight and turned to watch his three friends finishing the last of that group. Then, with an almost apologetic shrug, when he noted that the giant was far enough from his friends, the monk ran toward it, enacting a serpentine shield and then pulling forth his powerful ruby.

Elbryan winced as he noted the centaur’s wicked wound, a bleeding gash that was fast draining the life from poor Bradwarden.

“We need the hematite,” Pony remarked, looking back toward Avelyn.

“Try this instead,” Elbryan offered, taking off his other armband, the red one, the one the elves had soaked in permanent healing salves.

Pony took it and went to work, while Elbryan ran ahead, both pausing, nearly tumbling, when they heard the tremendous blast of Avelyn’s fireball.

Avelyn trotted back down the corridor, the charred giant, still floating head-down, far behind him.

The tunnel continued straight for a dozen paces, then turned sharply to the right, where Elbryan had run.

“Move along,” Avelyn instructed his weary friends, and they nodded, understanding that their task was far from finished. Pony looked at Bradwarden, but the centaur was smiling widely, the healing salves already at work under the red bandage.

So on they went, Avelyn in the lead. All three stopped suddenly as Elbryan came rushing back around the corner. The ranger hit the wall hard, using it to turn himself so he could dive back down the corridor, and when he came up out of the roll, the others looked past him curiously to see glowing stones fast hardening on the floor.

“A great red man!” the ranger explained, “with the black wings of a bat—”

“No man,” Avelyn interrupted, knowing the truth of this newest foe, knowing that they had at last met with the demon dactyl.

CHAPTER 53

Destiny

A wave of molten stone splashed around the corner, driving the group back, the heat nearly overwhelming them. A second wave, and then more—a river of the magma—coursed around the bend, and three of the group turned in full flight. Avelyn stood his ground, though, and went quickly to work, calling upon his stone magic to enact a shield, constructing a magical wall, floor to ceiling across the corridor.

The demon fires rolled on, bearing down on the praying monk. Pony skidded to a halt, realizing that Avelyn was not with her. She turned and screamed out to him, even took a running step back toward the monk, but Elbryan held her fast.

Avelyn’s faith was put to the test as the magma flow approached, as the heat intensified. He had used this gem, serpentine, to survive in the midst of a fireball, but he had no real knowledge of how it would work against the demon magma. It might defeat the heat, he supposed, but what of the sheer weight of the flowing stone?

Avelyn had no room for such doubts. He fell deeper into his prayers, into the depths of the stone magic. The magma was only a couple of feet away, rolling, bubbling.

The monk felt no heat, then, felt no hot wash from the molten stone. As the leading edge passed through the serpentine barrier, it cooled suddenly, turning black and solid, and the magma behind it began to flow over it, until it, too, cooled and hardened.

Now Avelyn saw a new problem brewing: if the lava continued to pile up, it would rise too high and block the corridor, the only way they knew to get at the demon dactyl. Boldly the monk strode forward, stepped up on the leading wall of obsidian, and forward, too, went his magical shield, stealing the demon’s heat.

Seeing the spectacle, realizing that their friend had beaten the dactyl’s attack, the other three were quick to join him, Elbryan, Hawkwing in hand, moving right to the side of the praying monk. They went around the bend, Avelyn stopping the magma river fully, the demon dactyl coming in sight.

Elbryan lifted his bow and let fly, and the dactyl, so obviously surprised to see its enemies, took the hit squarely in the chest between its humanlike arms.

Bestesbulzibar’s eyes flared, and the demon opened wide its mouth, vomiting a stream of magma at the group, and while the serpentine shield blocked the heat, the sheer force of the missile-like spew knocked Avelyn and Elbryan back against the wall. The ranger recovered quickly, growling and sending a second arrow after the first, again with perfect aim.

The dactyl howled, more in rage than pain, for Elbryan’s arrows were but a minor inconvenience to the mighty creature.

Avelyn, though . . . that one presented a more troubling power. The demon’s arms shot forward, fingers extended, and black tendrils of crackling electricity spouted from them, biting against the wall and running the length of the straight passage, nipping and snapping at Elbryan and Avelyn, at Pony and Bradwarden as they followed their friends around the bend. Avelyn had no counter ready and the demon’s magic caught him and Elbryan, holding them fast in its sparking grasp for a long painful moment, and then hurled them both backward to crash hard against the wall. Smoke wafting from various parts of their clothing, the pair darted in a quick retreat around the bend, pushing Pony and Bradwarden back the way they had come.

Avelyn desperately searched his magical repertoire, but it was Pony who struck next, thrusting forth the graphite rod and letting loose a bolt of streaking lightning, bouncing it off the wall, angled perfectly to skip around the bend and bear down on the demon. Her aim was true, it seemed from the howl that came back at them, but that howl was followed closely by a second crackling black bolt, this one hitting with a thunderclap that launched Pony and Avelyn—and would have sent Elbryan, as well, except that he was holding to the sturdy centaur—flying to the floor.

“Time for running!” Bradwarden cried.

“Take it!” Pony called to the monk, tossing him the graphite, knowing that he could put it to more powerful use.

“Forward, I say!” Avelyn corrected the centaur, catching the stone and pulling Pony to her feet. He paused for just a moment, considering the fact that his hands were full of a confusing jumble of gems, and none of them were the particular stone he now desired. He quickly handed two stones, the malachite and the lighted diamond, back to Pony, then he scrambled on, taking the lead toward the bend once more. “Now the darkness is before us, so forward, I say!” Avelyn reached into his pouch and retrieved yet another gem, a stone he had used to defeat dactyl-inspired magic before, in a fight with a powrie general.

Avelyn focused the energy of the sunstone, building a wall before him, shaping it and thrusting it forward, taking some comfort in the fact that Pony, who was behind him, kept the diamond glowing brightly.

The dactyl loosed another tremendous bolt as Avelyn rounded the bend, but the crackling magic fell away to nothingness as it entered the disenchanted zone.

“Ho, ho, what!” Avelyn roared, and all the friends came on in full charge.

Bestesbulzibar was confused, had not seen such a display of antimagic in all its millennia of life. It narrowed its gaze upon Avelyn, upon the gemstone the monk held tightly in his extended hand, and, ignoring the charge, thinking nothing of the next stinging arrow that soared its way, the dactyl gathered all its magical energy.

They were barely thirty feet away.

Twenty—another arrow zipped in, deflecting off the dactyl’s bone-hard forehead.

Ten feet away, Avelyn roaring wildly, the ranger hooking his bow over his shoulder and drawing forth his sword—an elvish sword!

The dactyl’s shriek echoed all through the tunnel maze of Aida, deafened the four friends, and made them reach for their ears. The demon, recognizing the power of Elbryan’s silverel blade and wanting nothing to do with an elven-forged weapon—Dinoniel had wielded such a weapon!—loosed a stream of its purest magical force, a green line of sizzling, tingling energy aimed directly at Avelyn, at the monk’s extended hand.

The beam stopped right before the monk, wavered there, holding Avelyn in his place, crackling sparks flying wide, forcing Elbryan to slow and shield his eyes.

Avelyn screamed, and the dactyl shrieked again, throwing all its magical strength, every ounce, behind the beam.

On came the green line, engulfing Avelyn’s hand, the sunstone glowing fiercely. They held for a long moment, the monk’s will against the demon’s hellish strength.

The sunstone absorbed the dactyl energy, stole the line from the demon’s hand. But Avelyn’s expression of joy, of victory, was short-lived, for the stone could not contain such energy, and it threw it out, dispersed as green smoke into the air, the sheer force of the expulsion throwing Elbryan and Avelyn backward into Pony and Bradwarden, the resulting smoke filling the corridor.

None of the group was hurt, but the momentary distraction gave the drained dactyl the time to retreat.

“Ho, ho, what!” Avelyn bellowed when he saw the creature half running, half flying down the corridor, and the roaring monk was the first in pursuit.

Elbryan scrambled to untangle himself from Pony, and charged off behind the monk, the woman coming next, and bulky Bradwarden bringing up the rear.

They sped past several side passages, around turns in the corridor, Avelyn leading boldly, trying to keep the demon in sight, ready but without fear in case the creature was waiting for him around each bend.

They raced up some stairs, pounded fast down a long, narrow descending slope, and came at last into a long, straight corridor, the demon visible before them. Elbryan tried hard to get past his monk friend, then, to take up the lead and close the distance to the monster. But Avelyn was too focused even to notice the ranger’s attempt, even to consider letting the faster Elbryan squeeze by him.

The monk was trying furiously to bring up the magic of the sunstone again, but even if he couldn’t manage it, Avelyn meant to get to the dactyl, to tackle the damned thing and beat it with his bare hands if he had to!

Up ahead, the corridor widened, like the top half of an hourglass, and then ended in a wall, broken only by a large archway, through which the demon dactyl scrambled. Beyond this portal, Avelyn saw a huge room, braced by columns and lit by the orange flow of molten stone.

This was the throne room, he knew, the very heart of the demon’s power. That notion only spurred the furious monk on even more, Avelyn lowering his head and running full out, with his telltale cry of “Ho, ho, what!” He charged through the archway with no consideration that it might be trapped, and Elbryan, though he slowed a bit for caution, was but two running strides behind.

The dactyl, back on its obsidian throne, was ready for them. As Avelyn passed into the room, he was hit full force with more demonic magic: a great gust of wind that held the monk in his tracks, that sent the huge bronze doors to the side of Avelyn swinging mightily.

Elbryan, too, felt the wind and saw the doors. He screamed out and tried to buck the force and dive ahead, arm extended, Tempest leading.

The doors swung closed, brushing Avelyn, spinning him about, and then slamming together on Elbryan’s forearm, smashing his bones, tearing his flesh. Tempest fell to the floor; the doors pushed on, threatening to rip the ranger’s arm off.

Bradwarden threw Pony aside and barreled into the doors full force, but even the centaur’s great weight and strength could only move them slightly, just enough for Elbryan to extract his arm and fall back, semiconscious, into the corridor. Bradwarden caught him and scrambled back with him, and the bronze doors slammed closed, leaving Avelyn alone in the throne room with Bestesbulzibar.

Or so the monk thought. Bestesbulzibar kept his concentration on the door, using his magic to hold it closed against the repeated slams of stubborn Bradwarden. But then the demon’s second trick became apparent as a grinding sound filled the room and the massive stone columns began to twist and shift.

Avelyn, grasping at the opening, was quick to retrieve Tempest, but he was no swordsman. He felt the power of the weapon’s gemstone, but it was a magic to strengthen and enhance the blade, he believed, and nothing that the monk could access beyond that.

The closest two columns stretched out their stony arms, broke through the inanimate stone holding fast their legs, and started the monk’s way. With a yelp, Avelyn skipped to the side, bringing the puny sword up defensively. These two behemoths weren’t going for him, however, but for the bronze doors.

Avelyn held his breath, thinking that the pair would throw wide the doors and fall over his friends. To his relief, they did not, but rather they fell against the metal, using their bulk to seal off any chance of entry. The fact that the maneuver put those two obsidian giants out of the fighting did little to bolster Avelyn, for eighteen of the gigantic black animations remained, all stepping forth now, and with the doors thus barricaded, the dactyl was free to deal with this one intruder.

The demon leered down at the monk from its obsidian throne. “Destroy him,” Bestesbulzibar commanded, and all the stone monsters started Avelyn’s way, except for the two holding the doors.

Avelyn took a careful measure of their approach; they were not fast-moving things, and the monk believed that he could keep his distance, for a while at least. He meant to do just that, and loose whatever magic he could muster against Bestesbulzibar, but to his surprise, the demon did not remain, leaping up from the throne, moving to the side of the dais, and diving headlong into the lava flow, disappearing through the floor.

Avelyn growled in frustration and entertained the thought of using his serpentine shield and chasing after Bestesbulzibar. He found that he had more immediate problems, though, as two of the massive columns bore down on him. He thought to use the sunstone, to counter the magic and disenchant the obsidian, but he feared that the stone itself had not yet recovered from the strain in the corridor. Up came the graphite instead, and Avelyn let loose a tremendous blast of lightning, a thundering forked bolt that slammed both the columns and knocked them back a step, sending cracks running up and down their length.

Avelyn ran between the pair, easily avoiding their lumbering attempts to grab him. The monk lashed out with Tempest as he passed, for good measure, and the sword took a slice of stone from the back of a giant leg. Avelyn hardly took comfort in that successful strike, though, realizing by the extent of the damage that he would have to hit the thing a hundred times, at least, to destroy it, and probably a score of times on the same spot on the leg to topple it!

So it became a game of cat and mouse, and Avelyn was the mouse. He ran all about the great hall, igniting a fireball, and then, when that proved ineffective, resorting to the graphite, falling into its magic again and again, stinging giant, cracking the black stone.

After a few minutes, the monk amazingly had three of the behemoths down, no more than great piles of broken rubble, but Avelyn couldn’t possibly maintain the pace, he realized, for he was huffing and puffing and his magical energies were fast depleting.

He took a different tack then, rushing to the dais and scrambling up the steps. How simple the evasion proved, for the giants could not maneuver their great bodies to follow!

Now Avelyn focused his energy on the pair holding the door, thinking to clear the path for his friends.

He didn’t know it, but his friends were long gone.

Elbryan was hardly conscious, with Pony holding him up and holding his smashed arm out from his body, trying to keep it steady. Waves of pain assaulted the ranger with every slight shift, turned his stomach and dulled his vision. He did see Bradwarden, slamming repeatedly, stubbornly, at the doors, not budging them in the least.

How helpless the ranger felt then! He had come all this way, and now was denied. Was denied!

Summoning every ounce of his remaining strength, Elbryan managed to pull away from Pony, taking two unsteady steps toward Bradwarden, meaning to help with the door.

“Hit it with a bolt o’ yer lightning!” the centaur bade Pony.

“I gave that stone to Avelyn,” she replied, holding up her hands, showing only the glowing diamond and the green-ringed malachite.

That news seemed to take the resolve from the centaur. “Then it’s Avelyn and the demon,” Bradwarden said, “as the monk knew it should be.”

Elbryan swooned and tumbled to the floor. His friends were beside him in an instant, Pony propping up his head.

“Might that ye give him this,” the centaur offered, indicating the red bandage.

Pony considered it for just a moment, but when she pulled the bandage down a bit, she realized that Bradwarden’s garish wound wasn’t nearly healed, and that if she took the bandage away, it would only open once more. Elbryan’s arm was agonizing, but not life threatening, and Pony knew her love well enough to realize that he would be angry indeed if she risked the centaur’s life to alleviate his pain.

The woman shook her head and looked back at Elbryan.

“Side passages,” the ranger mumbled.

Pony turned to Bradwarden, who glanced back helplessly at the great bronze doors. “Got nothing better,” the centaur agreed, and so the three were off, Pony supporting Elbryan and Bradwarden leading the way back down the tunnels, up the slope and down the stairs, searching for a side passage that would get them into the throne room from a different entrance.

Their hopes were bolstered shortly thereafter when they heard a voice—Avelyn’s voice—cursing the demon, then crying out in pain. On they ran with all speed; Elbryan was so strengthened by the indication that his friend might be in trouble that he pulled away from Pony and made his own unsteady way, stumbling often, but using Hawkwing as a crutch and moving faster than the woman could have ushered him.

They went down the next side passage, a narrow, winding affair, and the talking continued, spurring them on.

Around a bend, they saw their folly, for it was not the throne room that loomed before them, not Avelyn at all, but the demon dactyl, standing tall across a wider expanse of the corridor, leering at them.

“Welcome,” the beast said in a voice that sounded like Avelyn’s.

Pony looked helplessly at her diamond, then wondered if she could make the light shine so brightly that this creature of darkness could not withstand it. Bradwarden’s method was more straightforward, however, the centaur charging straight ahead, singing at the top of his lungs. Elbryan moved to follow, but could not hope to keep up.

The dactyl’s laughter mocked them. The beast lifted its arms, summoning its hellish magic. Pony cried out, thinking they would all be destroyed.

Bestesbulzibar did not aim the strike at them but rather at the floor beneath their feet, a blast of explosive energy that shattered the stone, dropping the corridor’s floor out from beneath them.

The demon cackled and turned away, its work finished.

And so it seemed to be, as the stones and the three friends fell far away—a hundred feet, at least, two hundred—toward a floor of jagged stalagmites.

It came up fast through the hole in the floor at the side of the dais, rushed past the flowing lava quickly, spewing the red stone all about. Up the demon soared, and then it dropped, landing heavily on its muscular legs.

The monk refused to be distracted, though this demon dactyl, the darkness of all the world, was but a few strides away. Avelyn growled and fell deeper into the stone, grabbed up all the power the graphite would give him, and hurled it in three rapid blasts at the pair of stone giants guarding the door.

They blew apart into rubble; the way was clear for Avelyn’s friends, except that Avelyn’s friends were nowhere near the door.

“Well done!” Bestesbulzibar congratulated, clapping his human hands together. “But all for what end?”

“Nightbird!” Avelyn cried. The monk thought to run for the doors, but there remained too many animated columns, crowding around the dais, waiting for him to come down.

Avelyn called out again, but the dactyl’s laughter stole his voice. “They cannot hear you, fool,” Bestesbulzibar explained. “They are already dead!”

The words nearly knocked Avelyn from his feet, assaulted his mind and tore at his heart. His lips moved in denial, but he suspected Bestesbulzibar would not lie to him; given the demon’s awful power, he suspected the demon wouldn’t have to lie to him!

So that left Avelyn against the fiend, just them, facing off from five paces. Avelyn was past grief suddenly, and without fear. He had come here to Aida, into this very room, to battle Bestesbulzibar, to pit his God against the hellish power of the demon. And now he was here, the best scenario he could rationally have hoped to find. If he won now, then his friends, all of them, would not have died in vain.

That thought sobered the monk and calmed his nerves. He considered his repertoire, wondered what stone magic would prove most effective against the beast, then went with what he had in hand, his graphite.

“Wretched beast!” Avelyn boomed, his voice resonating throughout the room. “I deny you!”

He thrust out his arm and loosed a tremendous bolt of sizzling blue lightning, a sharp, crackling flash that slammed Bestesbulzibar right in the chest and drove the demon back a couple of steps.

“You are strong, Avelyn Desbris,” the fiend growled, all its body quivering from the continuing grasp of the electricity. The demon spread wide its black wings and reached back with one humanlike arm, claws extended toward the flowing lava, grabbing the power and channeling it.

Then the demon’s arms clutched tight at its chest, right where Avelyn’s bolt was holding fast, and red crackles shot forth from Bestesbulzibar’s clawed hands, red to meet Avelyn’s blue bolt, joining together end to end in a showering display.

Avelyn growled low and called to God, begging for more energy, channeling it, as pure a conduit of godly might as ever had stood upon Corona. And that power staggered Bestesbulzibar, nearly threw the demon to the floor.

Nearly—for Bestesbulzibar was no conduit of power, but a source of power, and the red bolts fought back terrifically, grabbing the ends of Avelyn’s lightning and pushing the bolt back toward the monk. Red extended to cover half the distance between the pair, and continued to close. Avelyn shut his eyes and growled louder, throwing every bit of himself behind the energy, and the blue bolt gained again, drove on toward the demon.

But then the red bolt strengthened and pushed the blue back, pushed the sizzling point of joining inexorably back, toward Avelyn. The monk opened wide his eyes, straining, straining, but it would not be enough, he knew then.

The demonic red lightning inched closer.

She shouldn’t have been able to do it; none of Avelyn’s training nor her own experiences with the stones should have allowed Pony to bring forth such energy. But sheer terror, sheer instinct, and an unselfishness that bordered on foolhardiness, allowed for nothing less.

Pony took up the malachite and reached out with it, somehow lending its magic not only to Elbryan, who was within her reach, but to Bradwarden, who was far ahead of the pair, and all three, tumbling with the broken corridor floor, were suddenly floating more gently, drifting down as a feather might, and it took little effort for each of them to step aside from the stalagmite teeth as they lighted on the lower level.

“I’m not for knowing how ye did it, girl,” a thoroughly shaken Bradwarden congratulated, “but suren I’m glad that ye did it!”

But for all their joy, for all the centaur’s gratitude toward Pony, the three found themselves in a precarious position. Pony knew that she might fall into the malachite once more and become nearly weightless, but the prospects of getting anyone back up to the broken ledge seemed remote indeed, for they had no rope to hang from such a height.

“One way’s as good as another,” the centaur was quick to point out, motioning toward a tunnel that led out of the stalagmite-filled chamber and wound its way along the deeper tunnels of Aida.

So on they went, with Pony holding the diamond light steady and holding poor Elbryan steady; and Bradwarden, cudgel in hand, taking up the lead. To their dismay, this tunnel complex proved no less a maze than the higher passageways, and most of these corridors seemed to be leading further down and not up.

“One way’s as good as another,” Bradwarden kept repeating, but it seemed to the others that the centaur was trying to convince himself more than them.

Avelyn could not hold it at bay. The demon’s red lightning hit him with the force of a giant’s punch, launching the monk to the very edge of the raised dais. One of the stone behemoths was at the spot almost immediately, leaning over the helpless man, its huge hand chopping down to squash Avelyn flat.

Avelyn cried out, thinking himself doomed, thinking that he had failed and that all the quest was ended.

But the stone behemoth creaked and twisted, arm moving back against its massive chest, legs shifting together. In a few seconds, it was no more than a column again, leaning over, and then falling.

Avelyn rolled out of the way; the inanimate stone crashed down and rolled from the dais.

“He is mine!” the dactyl shrieked at the impertinent behemoth, at the giant-turned-column that had almost stolen the fiend’s most savored kill.

All the other columns retreated then, going back near the door, dispelling any of Avelyn’s thoughts of escape.

The monk stubbornly pulled himself up to his knees, then struggled to stand tall before the monster. The dactyl, eyes narrowed, showing respect for Avelyn but no fear of the monk, stalked in.

Perhaps this would not be a battle of magic, the monk thought suddenly. He had Elbryan’s sword after all, that most powerful of weapons. Perhaps this was to be a test of his body against the dactyl’s, a contest of physical strength.

In one fluid movement, Avelyn lifted Tempest high and darted ahead at his foe, slashing wildly.

He missed, the cunning dactyl easily sidestepping and then countering with a beat of its leathery wing, slamming the rushing Avelyn on the shoulder and launching him head over heels to the other edge of the dais.

“You are no swordsman,” the fiend remarked, and Avelyn could hardly disagree. Still the monk stubbornly climbed back to his feet and stalked toward the monster more cautiously this time, prodding Tempest with shortened, measured thrusts.

Bestesbulzibar began to slowly circle to Avelyn’s right.

Avelyn’s free hand came up, launching a handful of celestite crystals that popped in minor explosions all about Bestesbulzibar’s face. Thinking that he had his opening, the monk charged ahead.

Bestesbulzibar was gone in a puff of smoke, in the blink of a surprised monk’s eye. Avelyn skidded to a stop, then understood his sudden dilemma and swung about hard.

The demon, standing right behind him, battered him with its wing again, knocking him to the ground before the swinging sword ever got close.

Avelyn struggled to his feet once more, stumbling toward the rear of the raised platform.

Bestesbulzibar, cackling with laughter, walked around him, putting Avelyn squarely between itself and the solid wall, cutting off the one route of escape.

Avelyn had no ideas, no plan at all. He came forward a step and began waving Tempest, again in shortened strikes, more to buy time, to keep the fiend at bay, than with any hope of winning.

But the demon’s patience was at its end, and Bestesbulzibar came forward in a sudden, terrifying rush.

Out went Tempest, a quicker thrust, aimed for the dactyl’s heart, but Avelyn, for all his training in those years at St.-MereAbelle, was no Terranen Dinoniel, and the dactyl accepted a minor hit and swept aside the awkward attack with one forearm, then quick-stepped into the opening.

Always ready to improvise, Avelyn launched a heavy punch with his free hand and connected solidly with the powerful beast’s chest.

Before the monk could begin to congratulate himself, he found Bestesbulzibar’s free hand around his throat, lifting him from the ground. Avelyn tried to whack with Tempest, but the demon understood the power of the ranger sword and would not allow the monk to bring it to bear.

“Fool,” Bestesbulzibar thundered, squeezing harder—and Avelyn feared his head would simply pop off! “Did you think that you could even hurt me? Hurt me, Bestesbulzibar, who has lived for centuries, for millennia? Every day I destroy creatures ten times your worth!”

“I deny you!” Avelyn gasped.

“Deny?” Bestesbulzibar echoed. “Tell me that I am beautiful.”

Avelyn stared incredulously at the demon’s angular face, at the fiery eyes, the white, pointed canines. Something about Bestesbulzibar, the sheen of the demon’s skin, the strong angles of its features, struck Avelyn profoundly as beautiful indeed. The monk felt an overwhelming urge then to do as the demon had asked, to admit Bestesbulzibar’s beauty.

But Avelyn saw the lie, the temptation, for what it was. He stared Bestesbulzibar right in the eye. “I deny you,” he said evenly.

The dactyl heaved Avelyn across the dais, to slam hard into the back wall.

Avelyn slumped low, his vision blurred, sharp explosions going off in the back of his head. He tried to stand but slumped again, and the room at the edges of his vision began to grow dark.

The monk tried to get to his sunstone, thought to kill the magic in this area as he had done in the hallway. But to what end? his reeling thoughts screamed back, for Bestesbulzibar needed no magic to destroy him.

The dactyl paced in, towered over him.

Avelyn swooned; his thoughts went flying back to the glories of his life, back to Pimaninicuit, the closest he had ever felt to his God. He saw again the island at the start of the blessed showers, saw Brother Thagraine, poor Thagraine, running desperately, reaching out toward the cave, toward Avelyn.

Then falling dead, and Avelyn remembered rushing to him, remembered his horror, fast turned to curiosity . . .

Avelyn reached into his second pouch and pulled forth the giant amethyst crystal, the mysterious stone humming with magical energy.

The dactyl hesitated at the sight, at the stone aglow with teeming magic.

“What have you?” it demanded.

In all truth, Avelyn didn’t know the answer to that question. Growling with every inch, all pain vanished, Avelyn Desbris forced his legs under him and slid back up the wall to stand before the hellish fiend.

The dactyl growled and came on.

Following instincts that he could only hope were from God, Avelyn tossed the stone into the air, and then he and the dactyl both hesitated, surprised, for the heavy crystal did not fall but hovered in place.

Again, with no logical basis for the movement, Avelyn exploded into action, grabbing Tempest in both bands and swinging mightily even as Bestesbulzibar reached for the tantalizing stone.

Mighty Tempest sheared right through the crystal, and the whole of it blew into dust, shattered a thousand times.

The demon stared dumbfoundedly at the dusty cloud, at Avelyn, as if to ask what the man had done, and again, Avelyn had no answers.

From within that dust cloud came a low humming noise, a growling almost, and, like a ripple in a pond, a purplish ring emanated, rolling through Avelyn and the dactyl, rolling out to the edges of the room, deflecting off the stone again and again, crossing back in on itself.

More rings, rolling, humming, mounting.

“What have you done?” Bestesbulzibar demanded.

Avelyn, his head throbbing once more, clutched desperately at his sunstone, though he thought the thing a pitiful counter to the mounting strength.

The ominous growling increased tenfold, a hundredfold, deafening Avelyn, blocking the sounds of the dactyl’s shrieks. The creature watched in amazement as its stone columns crumbled to dust, as if the very vibrations had shattered the obsidian.

Bestesbulzibar turned on Avelyn, murder in its flaming eyes.

The dais lurched; a great crack opened in the floor and a gout of steam hissed through.

“Fool!” the dactyl shrieked wildly. “Fool! What have you done?”

“Not I,” Avelyn answered under his breath, though he knew that the demon could not possibly hear him. “Not I.” The monk understood then, knew his fate and willingly accepted it.

He hooked the bag of stones, all but the sunstone which he still clutched tightly, over Tempest’s blade. He noticed then the stone in Tempest’s pommel, and recognized it for the first time as some sort of sunstone, an accessible gem. It was too late for him, though, and so he grabbed the sword at mid-blade, and thrust it straight up above his head.

The left-hand wall of the throne room crumbled; the twin lava flows intensified, spurting molten stone across the room.

The dactyl shrieked and loosed a bolt of black lightning at Avelyn, but the monk was fully into the sunstone shield then, and the magic was stolen before it ever got to him.

Bestesbulzibar leaped away, flew all about the room, looking for an escape. Then, with none evident, the fiend came straight for Avelyn, thinking to punish, to tear and to kill.

But then the demon was tumbling, the resounding, deafening roar overcoming it in mid-flight, stealing its concentration, stealing its strength. Bestesbulzibar crawled across the dais, away from Avelyn—who was standing tall, shining, praying—and toward one of the lava flows.

The hundreds of purplish rings converged in the middle of the room.

Aida, the very mountain itself, exploded.

Far below the jolt sent all three of the friends, even sturdy Bradwarden, flying wildly about the tunnel. Elbryan slammed hard into the wall of the narrow passageway with his already broken arm. Waves of agony assaulted him, and despite all the courage and determination he could possibly muster, he found himself slumping down into blackness.

Pony, too, was dazed but not so much that she couldn’t hold fast to her diamond and keep the precious light glowing, though in the sudden burst of dust, it seemed a meager beacon indeed. She struggled back to her feet as the rumbling continued, as the walls and the floor beneath her feet shifted and bounced. She somehow got to Elbryan and propped him up, hugged him tightly, thinking it fitting that they die in each others’ arms.

But then, after what seemed like an hour but was in fact no more than a few minutes, the rumbling stopped, and the ceiling did not fall in on them.

Pony’s relief lasted only until she managed to locate Bradwarden through the dust; the centaur was by far the worst off. He stood braced against the corridor’s right-hand wall, wedged in tight, his human torso bent far back, arms widespread with muscles bulging, to hold back the largest slab of stone imaginable, to hold up the very mountain itself!

Pony gently eased Elbryan down, then ran for the centaur, crying out his name. She pulled out the malachite as she went, thinking to levitate the block that the centaur might escape.

She couldn’t begin to move it; Avelyn himself, with a piece of malachite ten times this one’s strength, would not have budged so huge a slab. To Pony’s surprise, Elbryan came up then, groggily, barely conscious, Hawkwing in hand. With great effort, the battered man wedged the bow in tight against the wall, trying to use it as a lever to relieve some of the pressure on the centaur.

“Ah, me boy, ye’ll not be moving this one,” the doomed centaur groaned. “She’s got me stuck, and got me dead, don’t be doubting!”

Elbryan fell back against the wall, dizzy, defeated, with no answers.

“Bradwarden,” Pony breathed helplessly. “Oh, my friend, all the mountain would have fallen on us but for your great strength.”

“And all the mountain’ll be falling soon enough,” the centaur replied. “Run to the outside and yer freedom.”

Pony’s horrified expression was all the reply Bradwarden was going to get.

“Go on!” the centaur yelled, and the exertion cost him an inch, the huge slab sliding ever lower, bending him backward. “Go on,” he said again, more calmly. “Ye cannot move the damned mountain! Don’t ye make me death a meaningless thing, me friends. I beg ye, get out!”

Pony looked at Elbryan for guidance, but the man was past reasoning, slumping once again into blackness. She stared hard at the centaur then, thinking this to be the cruelest play of all. How could she leave so gallant a friend? How could that be expected of her?

And yet Pony realized the sincerity of the centaur, saw it clearly in his calm features. She imagined herself in his position and knew what she would expect of her friends.

Pony moved up very close to Bradwarden, bent over to him, and kissed him on the cheek. “My friend,” she said.

“Always,” the centaur replied, and then his visage and his voice hardened. “Now run. Ye owe me that!”

Pony nodded. It was the most difficult thing she’d ever had to do, and yet she did not hesitate. She pulled Elbryan up to his feet, hooked her arm under his shoulder, and started off without looking back. The pair had barely left the corridor when they heard the rock shift once again, heard the resigned groan of the breaking centaur.

Pony wandered for hours in the twisting darkness, with only the diamond light to guide her, and that growing ever dimmer as exhaustion sapped her energy. She found tunnels blocked by flowing lava, others by thick concentrations of sulfurous fumes, and still others that simply ended in a solid wall or in a deep chasm that she could not cross.

Elbryan tried hard to keep up with her, to be less of a burden, but his legs were too wobbly, the pain too intense. Several times, he whispered for Pony to leave him behind, but that, of course, she could not do. Another idea came to her, then, and she took out the malachite, lending some of its levitational magic to Elbryan’s body, greatly lessening her load.

And then finally, as hope began to fade to empty despair, as her magical energies at last began to fade to nothingness, the woman felt a breeze, and it was cool and soft, not like the hot wash of flowing lava.

Pony concentrated hard. The diamond was all but out, a pinprick of light that showed her nothing in the heavy air. The malachite’s power was no more, Elbryan leaning heavily against her. She stumbled on, following the current, backtracking the gentle breeze. She stumbled and fell, crawled back to her knees and tugged Elbryan along, and then she stumbled again. It wasn’t until, exhausted beyond her limits, she rolled onto her back, that she realized that she was out of the mountain, under a sky darkened by smoke.

Just before Pony drifted off to sleep, one patch of that sky cleared, showing a single, shining star, then a second, then a third.

“Avelyn, Bradwarden, and Tuntun,” the woman whispered, and merciful sleep took her.

Epilogue

It was Elbryan and not Pony who was the first to wake, the sky still dark before the dawn and still heavy with billowing smoke. The ranger tried hard to remember what had happened, then he did, and he sat, head bowed, fighting away despair.

Worst of all, Elbryan did not know Avelyn’s fate, though he suspected the monk was dead. What of the dactyl? Had the creature been consumed, or had it merely flown away before the blast?

Elbryan lifted his eyes at that unsettling notion, looked at the sky as if he expected the dactyl demon to be swooping upon him even then.

What he saw was a glow, coming from higher up on what remained of the mountain, a soft white light atop the blasted peak.

Pony awakened shortly thereafter, the dulled dawn just beginning, but still the glow from atop the mountain was faintly visible. Without saying a word, the battered pair gathered up their things and started off, up the mountain trails, supporting each other through every step. Only when the dawn broke fully—dimmed by the huge smoke cloud—could they appreciate the absolute devastation that had come to the mountain and to the valley before it.

Nothing lived down there, they both knew. Nothing could possibly have survived. All the trees that had been on Aida’s slopes were laid out flat, leafless, most of their branches blown away. Empty logs, gray with ash, stretched away in the gloom. Nothing moved across that gray sea, save the occasional flutter of ash, caught by a swirl of wind. No birds flew above it, no sounds at all broke the eerie stillness of the devastated morning.

Neither did Elbryan or Pony speak out, too overwhelmed by the sight. They continued on their way, struggling past broken stones and through patches of warm ash hip deep, hoping for some answer.

They came over the edge of the now flat-topped mountain, in sight of a huge plateau of empty grayness—except for one tiny spot of light. Toward it they went, trudging on, plowing through the heavy ash. They could not discern the source until they were very close, within a dozen strides, and then they hesitated.

An arm, Avelyn’s arm, protruded from the ash, holding fast Tempest at mid-blade and with a bag hanging below that.

Elbryan rushed ahead, thinking to dig his friend from the ground, thinking that Avelyn had somehow survived, had enacted a magical shield to protect himself even from this level of destruction.

When he reached the spot, he found his folly, found that the ground around Avelyn’s arm was solid and only lightly covered in ash, and the monk was surely dead, his arm and hand withered, dried out, as if the great heat of the explosion had taken all the fluid from his body.

“The dactyl is destroyed,” Pony said firmly when she arrived beside Elbryan. “Avelyn killed it.”

Elbryan looked at her.

“Else his gift to us would have been stolen away by the demon,” the woman reasoned, and she reached over and worked the sword and bag free of the withered hand. The glow went away instantly, but the arm remained, extended.

Pony handed Tempest to the ranger, and she was not surprised when she opened the bag to find all of Avelyn’s stones, except the amethyst and the sunstone, within.

“It is a message,” she said with confidence. “He gave this to us as a message that the dactyl is defeated.”

“A message and a responsibility,” Elbryan replied, looking from Pony’s eyes to the bag of gemstones. “Avelyn saved us, saved us all, but the friar is demanding repayment.”

The woman nodded and looked, too, at the precious bag, at Avelyn’s choice, at her responsibility. “There may already be another Brother Justice on our trail,” Pony remarked.

Elbryan lifted Tempest with his healthy arm. “Then I must mend my arm,” he replied. “Or learn to fight left-handed.”

Thus, Elbryan and Pony walked away from Avelyn’s chosen grave, from Tuntun’s last breath, from Bradwarden’s tomb. They crossed the ash-filled valley with great difficulty, having to stop often from weariness, and that only making things worse since they had no food or water.

Finally, they made the mountains bordering the Barbacan, and just over the ridges, they found life again and water to drink. They spent more than a day at rest, and when she felt strong again, Pony used the hematite to relieve much of Elbryan’s pain and to set his bones fast on the mend.

And so it was with strides much stronger that the pair continued on their way down the southern slopes of the Barbacan. Near the bottom, wary for any goblins or other monsters that might be about, they found another friend.

Elbryan sensed Symphony’s approach long before the horse came in sight. The ranger didn’t know how the stallion had gotten out there, but then he thought of a certain elf, a stubborn and mischievous elf that had never learned to accept an order.

“Tuntun,” Pony remarked, figuring the riddle.

Elbryan managed a smile. He slid Tempest into its sheath, looped Hawkwing over his back, then climbed up, offering his hand to Pony.

They rode easily that day, picking their careful way, wary of enemies. That night, they camped on a high plateau, which they agreed to be the most defensible position in the area. No monsters presented themselves, no threat at all, but the choice of the high plateau proved a good one, for in the southern sky, reaching about the horizon like the arms of God, shone the blessed Halo.

Pony and Elbryan rode fast with the break of dawn, south along the wild trails, the weary and grieving victors, the new protectors of the holy stones.

To Owen Lock, for having faith in me
and reminding me to have faith in myself.

To Veronica Chapman, for her open mind and sharp eye.

To Kuo-yu Liang—energy is infectious.

And to one other, privately, who found me in a dark place
at a dark time, and lit a candle.

And, of course, as with everything I do, to Diane and the kids.

A Del Rey® Book

Published by The Ballantine Publishing Group

Copyright © 1996 by R. A. Salvatore

Maps by Laura Maestro

FORGOTTEN REALMS® is a registered trademark of TSR, Inc.,a subsidiary of Wizards of the Coast.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by The Ballantine Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.

www.randomhouse.com

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 97-80362

eISBN 0-345-45426-X
v1.0

THE
DEMON
SPIRIT

R. A. Salvatore

A Del Rey® Book

BALLANTINE BOOKS  •  NEW YORK

This one’s for Scott Siegel and Jim Cegeilski, two guys who have made this business such a pleasure for me.

PART ONE

WILDERLANDS

I am afraid, Uncle Mather, not for myself but for all the goodly people of all the world. Pony and I rode south from the Barbacan with our hearts heavy in grief but with hope. Avelyn, Tuntun, and Bradwarden gave their lives, but in destroying the dactyl we had, I believed taken the darkness from the world.

I was wrong.

Every running stride Symphony carried us south would bring us to more hospitable lands, so I thought, and so I told Pony, whose doubts were ever greater than mine. I cannot count the numbers of goblins we have seen! Thousands, Uncle Mather, tens of thousands, and with scores of fomorian giants and hundreds of cruel powries as well. It took Pony and me two weeks and a dozen fights to reach the area near Dundalis, and there we found only more enemies, firmly entrenched and using the remnants of the three towns as base camps for furthering their mischief. Belster O’Comely and the raiding band we set up before we went to the Barbacan are gone—to the south as we discussed, I pray. But so vast is the darkness encompassing the land that I fear nowhere will be safe.

I am afraid, Uncle Mather, but I vow to you now that no matter how bleak the situation becomes, I will not surrender my hope. That is something not the demon dactyl, not the goblins, not all the evil in all the world can take from me. Hope brings strength to my sword arm, that Tempest may cut true. Hope allows me to keep fashioning arrows as score after score are lost to goblin hearts—a line of monsters that seems not at all diminished by my efforts.

Hope, Uncle Mather, that is the secret. I think that my enemies are not possessed of it. They are too selfish to understand sacrifice in the hope that it will bring better things for those who come after them. And without such foresight and optimism, they are often easily disheartened and chased from battle.

Hope, I have learned, is a prerequisite for altruism.

I will hope and I will fight on, and with every battle I am reminded that my attitude is not folly. Pony grows strong with the stones, and the magical forces she conjures are indeed incredible. Also, our enemies, for all their numbers, no longer fight in any coordinated fashion. Their binding force, the demon dactyl, is gone, and I have seen signs that goblin battles goblin.

The day is dark Uncle Mather, but there may yet be a break in the clouds.

—ELBRYAN WYNDON

CHAPTER 1

Another Day

Elbryan Wyndon collected his wooden chair and his precious mirror and moved to the mouth of the small cave. He blinked as he pulled the blanket aside, surprised to see that the dawn was long past. Climbing out of the hole seemed no easy task for a man of Elbryan’s size, with his six-foot-three-inch muscular frame, but with the agility given him in years of training with the lithe elves of Caer’alfar, he had little trouble navigating the course.

He found his companion Jilseponie, Pony, awake and about, gathering up their bedrolls and utensils. Not so far away, the great horse Symphony nickered and stomped at sight of Elbryan, and that image of the stallion would have given most men pause. Symphony was tall, but not the least bit lanky, with a powerful, muscled chest, a coat so black and smooth over those rippling muscles that it glistened in the slightest light, and eyes that projected profound intelligence. A white diamond-shaped patch showed on the horse’s head, above the intelligent eyes, but other than that and a bit of white on the legs, the only thing that marred the perfect black coat was a turquoise gemstone, the link between Symphony and Elbryan, magically set in the middle of the horse’s chest.

For all the splendor, though, the ranger hardly paid Symphony any heed, for, as was so often the case, his gaze was locked on Pony. She was a few months younger than Elbryan, his childhood friend, his adult wife. Her hair, thick and golden, was just below her shoulders now, longer than Elbryan’s own light brown mop for the first time in years. The day was lightly overcast, the sky gray, but that did little to dim the shine of Pony’s huge blue eyes. She was his strength, the ranger knew, the bright spot in a dark world. Her energy seemed limitless, as did her ability to smile. No odds frightened her, no sight daunted her; she pressed on methodically, determinedly.

“Do we look for the camp north of End-o’-the-World?” she asked, the question shattering Elbryan’s contemplation.

He considered the thought. They had discerned that there were satellite camps in the region, clusters of goblins, mostly, supplied by the larger encampments set up in what used to be the three towns of Dundalis, Weedy Meadow, and End-o’-the-World. Because the towns were each separated by a day’s walk, Dundalis west to Weedy Meadow, and Weedy Meadow west to End-o’-the-World, these smaller outposts would be key to regaining the region—if ever an army from Honce-the-Bear made its way to the borders of the Wilderlands. If Elbryan and Pony could clear the monsters from the dense woods, there would remain little contact between the three towns.

“It seems as good a place as any to start,” the ranger replied.

“Start?” Pony asked incredulously, to which Elbryan could only shrug. Indeed, both were weary of battle now, though both knew that many, many more fights lay before them.

“Did you speak with Uncle Mather?” Pony asked, nodding toward the mirror. Elbryan had explained Oracle to her, that mysterious elven ceremony in which someone might converse with the dead.

“I spoke at him,” the ranger replied, his olive-green eyes flashing as a shiver coursed his spine—as always happened when he considered the ghost of the great man who had gone before him.

“Does he ever answer?”

Elbryan snorted, trying to figure out how he might better explain Oracle. “I answer myself,” he started. “Uncle Mather guides my thoughts, I believe, but in truth, he does not give me the answers.”

Pony’s nod showed that she understood perfectly what the young man was trying to say to her. Elbryan had not known his uncle Mather in life; the man had been lost to the family at a young age, before Olwan Wyndon—Mather’s brother, Elbryan’s father—had taken his wife and children to the wild Timberlands. But Mather, like Elbryan, had been taken in and trained by the Touel’alfar, the elves, to be a ranger. Now, in Oracle, Elbryan conjured his image of the man, an image of a perfect ranger, and when speaking to that image, Elbryan was forcing himself to uphold his own highest ideals.

“If I taught you Oracle, perhaps you could speak with Avelyn,” the ranger said, and it wasn’t the first time he had suggested as much. He had been hinting that Pony might try to contact their lost friend for several days now, ever since he himself tried, and failed, to reach Avelyn’s spirit at Oracle two days after they had started south from the blasted Barbacan.

“I do not need it,” Pony said softly, turning away, and for the first time Elbryan realized how disheveled she appeared.

“You do not believe in the ceremony,” he started to say, more to prompt than to accuse.

“Oh, but I do,” was her quick and sharp retort, but she lost momentum just as abruptly, as if fearing the turn in the conversation. “I . . . I might be experiencing much the same thing.”

Elbryan stared at her calmly, giving her the time to sort out her response.

As the seconds passed into minutes, he prompted, “You have learned Oracle?”

“No,” she answered, turning to look at the man. “Not quite the same as your own. I do not seek it. Rather, it seeks me.”

“It?”

“It is Avelyn,” Pony said with conviction. “He is with me, I feel, somehow a part of me, guiding me and strengthening me.”

“As I feel about my father,” Elbryan reasoned. “And you about yours. I do not doubt that Olwan is watching over . . .” His voice trailed away as he looked at her, for Pony was shaking her head before he finished.

“Stronger than that,” she explained. “When Avelyn first taught me to use the stones, he was badly injured. We joined, spirit to spirit, through use of the hematite, the soul stone. The result was so enlightening, for both of us, that Avelyn continued that joining over the weeks, as he showed me the secrets of the gemstones. In a mere month my understanding and capabilities with the stones progressed far beyond what a monk at St.-Mere-Abelle might learn in five years of training.”

“And you believe that he is still connecting with you in that spiritual manner?” Elbryan asked, and there was no skepticism in the question. The young ranger had seen too much, both enchanting and diabolical, to doubt such a possibility—or any possibility.

“He is,” Pony replied. “And every morning, I wake up to find that I know a bit more about the stones. Perhaps I dream about them, and in those dreams see new uses for any given stone, or new combinations between them.”

“Then it is not Avelyn, but Pony,” the ranger reasoned.

“It is Avelyn,” she said firmly. “He is with me, in me, a part of who I have become.”

She went quiet, and Elbryan did not respond, the two of them standing in silence, digesting the revelation—one that Pony had not made even to herself until this very moment. Then a smile spread across Elbryan’s face, and Pony gradually joined him, both taking comfort that their friend, the Mad Friar, the runaway monk from St.-Mere-Abelle, might still be with them.

“If your insight is true, then our business becomes easier,” Elbryan reasoned. He held his smile and offered a wink, then turned, moving to pack Symphony’s saddlebags.

Pony didn’t reply, just methodically went about closing down the campsite. They never stayed in a place more than a single night—often not more than half the night if Elbryan determined there were goblin patrols in the area. The ranger finished his task first, and with a look to the woman, to which she responded with an assenting nod, he took his sword belt and wandered away.

Pony hurriedly finished her task, then silently stalked after him. She knew his destination to be a clearing they had passed right before they set camp, and knew, too, that she would find ample cover in the thick blueberry bushes on its northeastern end. Stalking quietly, as Elbryan had taught her, she finally settled into place.

The ranger was well into the dance by then. He was naked, except for a green armband set about his left biceps, and was holding his great sword Tempest, which had been given by the Touel’alfar to his uncle, Mather Wyndon. Gracefully, Elbryan went through the precise movements, muscles flowing in perfect harmony, legs turning, body shifting, keeping him always in balance.

Pony watched, mesmerized by the sheer beauty of the dance, which the elves called bi’nelle dasada, and her love’s perfection of form. As always when she spied on Elbryan’s dance—no, not Elbryan, for in this fighting form he was the one the elves had named Nightbird, and not Elbryan Wyndon—Pony had pangs of guilt, feeling quite the voyeur. But there was nothing sexual or prurient here, just appreciation of the art and beauty of the interplay between her love’s powerful muscles. More than anything, she wanted to learn that dance, to weave her own sword in graceful circles, to feel her bare feet become so attuned to the moist grass below them that they could feel every blade and every contour in the ground.

Pony was no minor warrior herself, having served with distinction in the Coastpoint Guards. She had battled many goblins and powries, even giants, and few could outfight her. But in looking at Elbryan, the Nightbird, she felt herself to be a mere amateur.

That dance, bi’nelle dasada, was perfection of the art form, and her lover was perfection of bi’nelle dasada. The ranger continued his slashing, weaving maneuvers, feet turning, stepping to the side, front, back, body going down low and then rising in graceful sequences. This was the traditional fighting style of the day, the slashing routines of the heavy, edged swords.

But then, abruptly, the ranger shifted his stance, heels together, feet perpendicular to each other. He stepped ahead, toe-heel, and went into a balanced crouch, his knees bending out over his toes, front arm cocked, elbow down, and rear arm similarly bent except that his upper arm was level with his shoulder, his hand up high and hanging loose. He went forward then retreated in short, measured, but impossibly quick and balanced steps, and then suddenly, right from one such retreat, his front arm extended and seemed to pull him. It happened in the blink of Pony’s eye, and this morning, as with every such strike, it stunned her. So suddenly, Nightbird had come forward, the tip of Tempest covering at least two feet of ground, his back arm turning down so he made one long and balanced line.

A shudder coursed down Pony’s spine as she pictured an enemy impaled on that deadly blade, staring wide-eyed in disbelief at the suddenness of the attack.

And then the ranger retracted, again quickly and in balance—no opening in his defenses throughout the move—and went back to his weaving dance.

With a sigh of both appreciation and frustration, Pony snuck away, back to finish closing down the camp. Elbryan returned to her soon after, showing sweat on his exposed arms but looking revitalized and ready for the trials of another day on the road.

They set out soon after, both astride the great stallion, with Symphony easily carrying them along. Elbryan guided them north, away from the line of the three towns, and then west, toward End-o’-the-World, and before midday they had found the smaller goblin encampment. A quick survey of the area provided the information they needed, and they retreated to the deeper woods to unlade Symphony and prepare their assault.

By early afternoon the ranger was creeping through the woods with Hawkwing, his elven-crafted bow, in hand. He came upon a group of three goblin perimeter guards soon enough, and, as was usually the case, the slovenly creatures were not on their best guarding posture. They were clustered about a wide elm, one leaning on the tree, one pacing before it and grumbling about something, and the third sitting at the base, back against the trunk, apparently asleep. The ranger was somewhat surprised to see that one of these guards carried a bow. Goblins usually fought with club, sword, or spear, and the sight of the bow tipped him off that there might well be powries in the vicinity.

The ranger did a silent circuit of the area, ensuring that no others were about, then found his best angle of attack. Up came Hawkwing, so named for the three feathers set on its top end, which separated like the feathered “fingers” on the end of a hawk’s extended wing when he drew back the bowstring. Those feathers went widely apart now as Elbryan lined up his shot.

Hawkwing hummed; the ranger had a second arrow up and away almost immediately. He was the Nightbird now, the elven trained warrior, and the mere mention of his name sent trembles through the hearts of even the sturdiest powries.

The first arrow nailed the leaning goblin to the tree. The second took out its pacing companion before the creature had time to cry out its surprise.

“Duh?” the third asked, coming from its slumber when Nightbird prodded it. The goblin looked up just in time to see Tempest’s descent, the mighty sword cleaving its head in half.

The ranger retrieved his arrows, then took a couple from the goblin’s quiver. They weren’t well-crafted, hardly straight, but would suit his purposes well enough.

On he went, drawing a complete perimeter of the encampment. He encountered two more guard positions, and dispatched the guards with equal efficiency. Then he went back to Pony and Symphony, better detailing the layout, his attack plans already formulated. The goblin camp itself was well-placed on a low bluff amidst a tumble of boulders. There were only two apparent approaches: one on the southeast up a trail between shoulder-high walls of stone, a path that turned in from a thirty-foot sheer drop; the second up the gentler-sloping western side of the hillock, a wide track of empty grass.

Nightbird positioned himself in a copse of trees on the western side, where he could find clearer shooting, while Pony made her tentative way along the top of the cliff face.

The ranger moved to a higher position, climbing from Symphony’s back to one of the lower branches of an oak. That still left him below the level of the goblin camp, but with more than half of it exposed. Pony would wait for him, he trusted, and so he took his time in selecting his first target, trying to get a feel for the hierarchy of this patrol. No two groups of goblins were alike, the ranger had learned, for the smallish, yellow-green creatures were purely selfish and not devoted to any greater cause than fulfillment of their present desires. The demon dactyl had changed that—that sudden coordination of the monsters was the element that had made the darkness so complete—but now the dactyl was gone and the wretched creatures were fast reverting to their previous, chaotic nature.

This encampment reflected that clearly. All the place was a tumult, pushing and shoving, shouting and grumbling.

“We goes south for killing!” Nightbird heard one creature shout.

“We goes the way I says we goes!” replied one especially weasely little runt, a spindly-armed and bowlegged wretch, short even by goblin standards—which meant that it barely topped four feet—and with a nose and chin so narrow that they appeared to be arrow shafts protruding from its ugly face.

The ranger saw the larger goblin standing before the runt clench its hands in rage, saw the group of three goblins closest him—all carrying bows, he noted with disdain—put hands near their quivers. The tension held, silent for many seconds, just below an explosive level, and then another form rose up, a giant form, fifteen feet tall and more, two thousand pounds of muscle and bone.

The fomorian stretched away its sleepiness and ambled over to join the conversation. The giant beast said not a word, but stood right behind the weasely goblin—and how that creature puffed its skinny chest with its bodyguard so near!

“South,” the other said again, but in a calm and unthreatening manner. “Peoples to kill to the south.”

“We was told to stay here and guard,” the weasely goblin insisted.

“Guard from what?” the other whined. “From bears or boars?”

“Me bored,” offered another, from the side, drawing a few halfhearted snickers—laughter that died away quickly when the weasely goblin put an unrelenting stare on the jokester.

It was all taking shape perfectly from Nightbird’s perspective, except of course for the appearance of a fomorian giant. His first instinct told him to put an arrow into that behemoth’s face, but as he considered the general dynamics of the group, another, more insightful plan began to unfold.

The arguing continued, followed by more than a few loud threats by the weasely goblin, the creature gaining in confidence with the giant standing right behind it. The goblin ended by promising a cruel death to any that defied its commands, and then it turned about, walking away.

Nightbird, using one of the arrows he had taken from the goblins, nailed it in the back, at an angle that sent the missile right between two of the archers at the camp’s edge. The goblin went down hard, squirming and screaming, trying to reach about to grab the painful bolt, and all the gathering erupted in pushing and shoving, in accusations and cries of murder.

The three archers were the most confused, each yelling at the other two, each counting the arrows in their counterparts’ quivers. One cried for a check of the shaft of the arrow in their leader’s back, claiming that its own arrows had specific markings.

The enraged fomorian had no such patience for any investigation, though. The giant stalked over and slugged the protesting archer in the face, launching it head over heels down the grassy slope. The giant grabbed a second archer as the third scrambled away, lifting the unfortunate creature and squeezing the life out of it. All the rest of the camp fell upon the third, taking its flight as an admission of guilt. Their blood lust in full, they pounded and stomped long after the poor creature had stopped squirming.

For the ranger, watching the brutal spectacle was a confirmation of his belief in the absolutely irredeemable nature of the wretched beasts. The killing was over quickly, but the pushing and shoving and accusations did not relent. He had seen enough, though. There were perhaps a dozen goblins left in the camp, not counting the leader, who wouldn’t be up for any fighting anytime soon, and, of course, the one fomorian. Thirteen against three, counting Symphony.

The ranger liked the odds.

He hopped down from the tree, onto the back of waiting Symphony. The great stallion gave a snort and rushed away, out the back side of the copse. The last thing Nightbird wanted was to bring the goblins charging down the slope, where they could scatter. He went west, and then south, and then turned back to the east, coming in sight of Pony, who was in position at the end of the long and narrow trail. They shared a wave, and the ranger searched out a new vantage point. Now came his turn in wait.

The goblin camp remained astir, with accusations flying. The creatures seemed perfectly oblivious to the notion that an outsider might have shot down their leader, until Pony struck hard.

A goblin appeared at the end of the trail, leaning on one wall of stone. It removed its metal helmet—another oddity for the crude creatures—and scratched at its hair, then replaced the cap, talking all the while with another who remained out of Pony’s line of sight. She focused on the one goblin, on its helmet, as she held before her a black, rough-edged stone, magnetite, or lodestone, by name. Pony fell into the stone, saw through it, down the trail. Everything blurred and fogged over—everything except for that one helmet, the image of it sharpening to crystal clarity. Pony felt the energy building within the stone, energy she lent to it, combined with its own magical properties. She felt the attraction to that helmet growing, growing, the stone beginning to pull against her grasp.

As she reached the pinnacle, as it seemed the stone would verily explode with tingling magic, she let it go. In the blink of an eye it covered the distance and smashed against then through the helmet, and the goblin flipped over once and lay dead.

How its companion shrieked!

Pony was not surprised when the fomorian giant turned down the narrow trail, running full out and bellowing with rage. She held forth another stone, malachite, the stone of levitation, and before the behemoth had gone three strides, it found that its feet were no longer touching the ground. It was moving, though, its momentum propelling its suddenly weightless form in a straight line.

The trail curved slightly and the giant brushed the wall. It tried to reach down and find a hold, but the movement came too late and only sent the creature tumbling head over heels, twisting and turning, reaching desperately for any potential handhold.

Pony could hardly believe the effort needed to keep the behemoth aloft, and knew she would not be able to hold it there for long. She didn’t have to, though. She ducked very low—the giant spinning over more quickly as it grabbed for her—and let the creature soar past her. Then, as soon as the giant moved out over the cliff, she dropped her concentration, releasing the stone’s magical energy, and let the brute drop.

Looking back the other way, she saw a handful of goblins at the far end of the trail, gaping at her but not yet daring to approach. Quickly she went for her third stone, the graphite, and reached deep inside herself to find some more magical energy. Already she had done more magic in rapid succession than ever before, and she had little faith that her next casting, a bolt of lightning, would have much power behind it.

She took hope, then, in the commotion that sprang up on the hillock behind the goblins, at the screams and cries of agony, at the sound of charging Symphony off to the side and the thrum of the ranger’s deadly bow.

But her love could not get there in time to help her, she knew. A line of five goblins came on, rushing down the narrow trail, howling. One let fly an arrow that barely missed the young woman.

Pony stood resolute. She dismissed her fears and focused on the graphite, only the graphite. The bolt came forth more quickly than she had intended, wrung from her by sheer urgency as the nearest goblin closed to within three running strides.

Pony staggered as if hit; the expenditure of energy was more than she could tolerate. Her knees wobbled and she instinctively ambled away, her eyes hardly open as she glanced back, with some relief, to see that the lightning had pushed the goblins back. Three of the five were down, jerking spasmodically, while the other two fought hard to hold their balance, their muscles trembling violently.

Up on the hillock, Nightbird shot one last arrow, catching a nearby goblin right through its skinny nose, then turned the bow over in one hand, whipping it like a club as Symphony pounded past another creature. That creature dispatched, he dropped the bow altogether, drawing out Tempest, the elven blade, light and strong, forged of precious silverel and crackling with energy, from both elven magic and the gemstone set in the sword’s pommel. The ranger turned Symphony in line and let the great stallion run down the next goblin, and as Symphony passed, hardly stumbling, Nightbird swung out with his sword at the next. This goblin held a metal shield and had it up to block, but the gemstone in Tempest’s ball hilt, a blue stone clouded with white and gray, flared with power and the fine blade smashed right through the shield, snapping the straps that fastened it to the goblin’s arm, then charged on past the turning metal to crease the creature’s face.

The hillock was clear, the only goblin in sight in fast flight down the grassy slope. The ranger, his blood lust high, thought to pursue, but changed his mind when he heard Pony’s lightning bolt behind him, a sparking crackle and not a thunderous blast, and then heard the groans of goblins still very much alive.

He rolled backward off the saddle, landing lightly on his feet. Symphony skidded to a stop and turned about to regard him, and Nightbird couldn’t help but pause and do likewise. The horse’s black coat glistened with sweat, accentuating the powerful muscles. Symphony looked hard at his companion and stamped the ground, ready, eager for more battle.

The ranger looked from the horse’s intelligent eyes to the turquoise set in his breast, the gift of Avelyn, the telepathic bond between Nightbird and Symphony. Elbryan used that bond now to instruct the horse.

With an agreeing snort, Symphony wheeled and charged away, and the ranger went fast for his bow, in full run on his way to the narrow trail.

He came to its lip, sliding to one knee, Hawkwing up and drawn. Only one goblin remained down now, with two starting off after Pony and two others still struggling to secure their balance. Off went the arrow, zipping between the two standing nearby and over the head of the third, to strike the lead goblin in the back. The creature went into a weird hop then, seeming to fly for several feet before falling facedown. Its running companion, fearing a similar fate, howled and dove to the ground.

Elbryan’s second shot got the closest goblin in the chest, and then he was up, Tempest in hand. He came in hard, sword flashing back and forth, maneuvers designed more to put the goblin off-balance than to score a hit. The creature struggled to keep up with the flashing blade, its own crude sword ringing against Tempest only a couple of times in the ten-stroke routine. In short order the goblin was staggering again, nearly tripping on its own feet as it tried to twist and turn in tune with the darting blade. Tempest went left, then right, then right again, then Nightbird started back for the left but cut short the swing, and then came that signature lunge. Suddenly, immediately, he was simply there, fully extended, his sword tip two feet farther ahead than it had been, stabbing the goblin hard through the shoulder.

Down went the goblin’s arm, its sword falling uselessly to the ground. One step brought the ranger to the side, where he chopped down hard on the head of the remaining goblin even as it struggled to stand. Then he came back in, ignoring the last goblin’s cry for mercy, driving his blade through the creature’s ribs and into its lungs.

The ranger glanced down the trail, to see that Pony, no unskilled fighter in her own right, had come back in, with sword this time and not gems, to finish off the goblin who had dived for cover. The woman looked up at Nightbird and nodded, then opened wide her eyes as the ranger let out a startled shout and launched himself toward her.

He went right by Pony as she turned, throwing her sword up defensively in fear that something had come in at her back. Indeed, the giant had returned, stubbornly climbing the cliff face. It had both hands and one shoulder over the lip when Nightbird met it, Tempest flashing. The ranger slashed one arm, then the other, then again and again, all the while dodging the behemoth’s futile attempts to grab at him. Finally the beating opened wide the giant’s defenses and its grasp on the ledge weakened, and Nightbird calmly strode ahead and kicked the creature in the face.

Down it went again, bouncing along the thirty-foot descent. Stubbornly, it shook its head and rolled to its knees, intent on climbing once again.

Pony was beside Elbryan in a moment. “You might be needing this,” she remarked, handing Hawkwing over.

His fourth arrow slew the giant, while Pony walked back along the trail and encampment, finishing the wounded goblins. Symphony returned during that time, the horse’s rear hooves splattered with fresh goblin blood.

The three friends regrouped shortly after.

“Just another day,” Pony said dryly, to which the ranger only nodded.

He noted that there was an almost dispirited edge to her tone, as though the battle, as smoothly as it had gone, had been somehow unsatisfying.

CHAPTER 2

St.-Mere-Abelle

His wrinkles seemed even deeper now, shadowed by the torchlight. Deep grooves in that old and weathered face, the visage of a man who had seen too much. By Master Jojonah’s estimation, Dalebert Markwart, the Father Abbot of St.-Mere-Abelle, the highest-ranking person in the Abellican Order, had aged tremendously over the last couple of years. The portly Jojonah, no young man himself, studied Markwart carefully as the pair stood atop the seaward wall of the great abbey, staring out into All Saints Bay. He tried to compare this image of the Father Abbot, unshaven, with eyes sunken deep into sockets, against the memory of the man just a few years previous, in God’s Year 821 when they had all waited eagerly for the return of the Windrunner, the ship that had delivered four of St.-Mere-Abelle’s brothers to the equatorial island of Pimaninicuit, that they might collect the sacred stones.

Things had changed much since those days of hope aond wonderment.

The mission had been successful, with a tremendous haul of gemstones taken and properly prepared. And three of the brothers, with the exception of poor Thagraine who was stricken in the meteor shower, had returned alive, though Brother Pellimar had died a short time later.

“A pity that it had not been Avelyn who was hit in the head by a falling stone,” Father Abbot Markwart had often said in the years hence, for Avelyn, after achieving the greatest success in the history of the Church as a Preparer of the sacred gems, had returned a changed man, and in Markwart’s eyes had committed the highest heresy possible in the Order. Avelyn had taken some of the gemstones and run off, and in that flight, Master Siherton, a peer of Jojonah’s and a friend of Markwart’s, had been killed.

The Father Abbot had not let the theft pass. Indeed, he had guided the training of the remaining brother from the party of four, a stocky and brutish man named Quintall. Under Markwart’s strictest orders, Quintall had become Brother Justice and gone after Avelyn, with orders to bring back the man or his broken body.

Word had come back to the library only the month before that Quintall had failed and was dead.

Still, Markwart had no intention of letting Avelyn run free. He had set De’Unnero, the finest fighter at the abbey—and, by Jojonah’s estimation, the most vicious human being alive—to training not one, but two Brothers Justice as replacement for Quintall. Jojonah didn’t like De’Unnero at all, considered the man’s temperament unbefitting a brother of the Abellican Church, and so he had not been pleased when the still-young man had been named to the rank of master as a replacement for Master Siherton. And the choice of hunters, too, had bothered Jojonah, for he suspected that the two young monks, Brothers Youseff and Dandelion, had only been admitted to St.-Mere-Abelle for this purpose. Surely neither of them qualified above others who had been refused their appointment.

But both could fight.

So even that choice of admission to the Order, the greatest responsibility of abbots and masters, had fallen victim to Markwart’s desire to clear his own reputation. The Father Abbot wanted those stones back.

Desperately, Master Jojonah thought as he looked upon the old Father Abbot’s haggard visage. Dalebert Markwart was a man possessed now, a snarling, vicious thing. If at first Markwart had wanted Avelyn captured and tried, he merely wanted the man dead now—and painfully killed, tortured, rended, his heart torn out and put on a stake before the front gate of St.-Mere-Abelle. Markwart hardly talked of dead Siherton these days; his focus was purely the stones, the precious stones, and he meant to get them back.

All of that had been put aside for the moment, though, out of necessity even greater than Markwart’s obsession, for the war had at last come to St.-Mere-Abelle.

“There they are,” Father Abbot Markwart remarked, pointing out across the bay.

Jojonah leaned on the low wall, squinting into the darkness, and there, rounding a bend along the northern spur of the rocky seacoast, came the lights of a vessel, obviously sitting very low in the water.

“Powrie barrelboat,” Markwart said distastefully as more and more lights came into view. “A thousand of them out there!”

And so confident that they approach in full view with lights burning, Jojonah silently added. And that wasn’t even the extent of their problems, though the master saw no need to remark on the potentially greater troubles facing the abbey.

“And how many by land?” the Father Abbot demanded, as though he had read Jojonah’s mind. “Twenty thousand? Fifty? The whole powrie nation is upon us, as if all the Weathered Isles had been dumped at our gate!”

Again the portly Jojonah had no practical response. According to the reports of trusted sources, a vast army of the four-foot-tall dwarves, the cruel powries, had landed less than ten miles down the coast from St.-Mere-Abelle. The brutal creatures had wasted no time in laying waste to the nearby villages, slaughtering any humans who could not escape. The image of that brought a shiver along Jojonah’s spine. Powries were also called “bloody caps” for their practice of dipping their specially treated berets—caps made of human skin—into the blood of their slain enemies. The more blood one of those berets soaked, the brighter its crimson stain, a sign of rank among the barrel-bodied, spindly limbed dwarves.

“We have the stones,” Jojonah offered.

Markwart snorted derisively. “And we’ll tire our magics long before we diminish the ranks of the wretched powries—and of the goblin army that’s said to be moving south of here.”

“There is the report of the explosion far to the north,” Jojonah offered hopefully, trying in any way possible to improve Markwart’s surly mood.

The Father Abbot didn’t disagree; whispers from reliable sources spoke of a tremendous eruption in the northern land known as the Barbacan, reputedly the land of the demon dactyl who had gathered this invading army. But while those rumors offered some distant hope that war had been brought to the dactyl’s doorstep, they offered little in the face of the force now moving against St.-Mere-Abelle, something Markwart emphasized with his next derisive snort.

“Our walls are thick, our brothers well-trained in the fighting arts, and our catapult crews second to none in all Corona,” Jojonah went on, gaining momentum with every word. “And St.-Mere-Abelle is better suited to withstand a siege than any structure in Honce-the-Bear,” he added, preempting Markwart’s next glum statement.

“Better suited with not so many mouths to feed,” Markwart snapped at him, and Jojonah winced as if slapped. “I wish that the powries had been quicker!”

Master Jojonah sighed and moved a few steps to the side then, unable to tolerate his superior’s grating pessimism and that last remark; obviously aimed at the multitude of pitiful refugees who had recently come swarming into St.-Mere-Abelle, it had, in Jojonah’s estimation, been on the very edge of blasphemy. They were the Church, after all, supposedly the salvation of the common man, and yet here was their Father Abbot, their spiritual leader, complaining about giving shelter to people who had lost almost everything. The Father Abbot’s first response to the influx of refugees had been to order everything valuable, books, gold leaf, even inkwells, locked away.

“Avelyn started all of this,” Markwart rambled. “The thief weakened us, in heart and soul, and gave hope to our enemies!”

Jojonah tuned out the Father Abbot’s ranting. He had heard it all before—indeed, it had by now been disseminated to all the abbeys of Corona that Avelyn Desbris was responsible for awakening the demon dactyl, and thus setting into motion all the subsequent tragedies that had befallen the land.

Master Jojonah, who had been Avelyn’s mentor and chief supporter through the man’s years at St.-Mere-Abelle, couldn’t, in his heart, believe a word of it. Jojonah had studied at the abbey for four decades, and had never in all that time met a man as singularly holy as Avelyn Desbris. While he had not yet come to terms with Avelyn’s last actions at the abbey—the theft of the stones and the murder, if it was a murder, of Master Siherton—Jojonah suspected there was more to the story than the Father Abbot’s version would indicate. More than anything, Master Jojonah wanted to speak at length with his former student, to discover the man’s motivations, to find out why he had run and why he had taken the gemstones.

More lights appeared in the dark harbor, a reminder to Jojonah to stay focused on the grim situation at hand. Avelyn was an issue for another day; the morning light would bring the full fury of war to St.-Mere-Abelle.

The two monks retired then, seeking to gather all of their strength.

“Sleep well in God’s bosom,” Master Jojonah said to Markwart, the proper and traditional nighttime parting.

Markwart waved a hand absently over his shoulder and walked away, grumbling something about the wretch Avelyn under his breath.

Master Jojonah recognized a growing problem here, an obsession that could only bring ill to St.-Mere-Abelle and all the Order. But there was little he could do about it, he reminded himself, and he went to his private room. He added many lines about Avelyn Desbris, words of hope for the man’s soul, and of forgiveness, to his evening prayers, then rolled onto his bed, knowing he would not sleep well.

Father Abbot Markwart, too, was speaking words about Avelyn when he entered his lavish quarters, four rooms sectioned off near the middle of the massive abbey’s ground-level floor. The old man, consumed with anger, muttered curse after curse, spat Avelyn’s name in succession with the names of the greatest traitors and heretics in the history of the Church, and vowed again to see the man tortured to death before he, himself, went to view the face of God.

His reign at St.-Mere-Abelle had been unblemished, and having been fortunate enough to preside over the Order in the generation of the stone showers, the tremendous haul of stones—the greatest ever taken from Pimaninicuit—seemed to solidify his place among the most revered Father Abbots of history. But then the wretch Avelyn changed that, brought a black mark to his reputation: as the first father abbot to ever suffer the absolute indignity of losing some of the sacred stones.

It was with these dark thoughts, and none for the invasion fleet that had entered All Saints Bay, that Father Abbot Markwart at last drifted off to sleep.

His dreams were as razor-edged as his anger, showing stark, clear images of a faraway land that he did not know. He saw Avelyn, thick and fat and haggard, snarling orders to goblins and powries. He saw the man fell a giant with a streak of searing lightning, not out of any hatred for the evil race, but because this one had not obeyed him without question.

In the background an angelic figure appeared, a winged man, large and terrible. The personification of the wrath of God.

Then Markwart understood.

A demon dactyl had been the source of the war? No, this disaster had been caused by something greater even than that dark power. The true guiding force of evil was Avelyn, the heretic!

The Father Abbot sat bolt upright in bed, sweating and trembling. It was only a dream, he reminded himself.

But had there not been some shred of truth buried within those visions? It came as a great epiphany to the tired old man, an awakening call as clear as the loudest bell ever chimed. For years he had been proclaiming Avelyn as the root source of all the problems, but much of that had been merely a self-defense technique aimed at deflecting his own errors. He had always known that hidden truth . . . until now.

Now Markwart realized that it had indeed been Avelyn, beyond any doubt. He knew that the man had unraveled all that was holy, perverted the stones to his own wicked use, worked against the Church and all of Mankind.

Markwart knew, without doubt, and in that profound knowledge he was at last able to dismiss all of his own guilt.

The old man pulled himself from his bed and ambled over to his desk, lighting a lamp. He fell into his chair, exhausted, overcome, and absently took a key from a secret compartment in one drawer and used it to open the lock on a secret compartment in yet another, revealing his private cache of stones: ruby, graphite, malachite, serpentine, a tiger’s paw, a lodestone, and his most precious of all, the strongest hematite, the soul stone, at St.-Mere-Abelle. With this heavy gray stone Markwart could send his spirit across the miles, could even contact associates though they were separated by half a continent. He had used this stone to make contact with Brother Justice—no easy task since Quintall was not proficient in use of the stones, and since his single-minded training had given him a level of mental discipline that was hard to penetrate.

Markwart had used this stone to contact a friend in Amvoy, across the Masur Delaval from Palmaris, and that friend had discovered the truth of Brother Justice’s failed quest.

How precious these sacred stones were—to the monks of St.-Mere-Abelle, there was no greater treasure—and it was more than Markwart could stand to know that he had let some get away.

He looked at the handful of stones now as if they were his children, then sat up straighter, blinking quizzically. For he saw them now more clearly than ever before, as if a great truth had been revealed to him. He saw the powers buried within each stone, and knew he could reach them with a mere thought, hardly an effort at all. And some of them seemed almost to blend together, as the old man recognized new and more powerful combinations for various stones.

The Father Abbot fell back and even cried out, tears of joy dripping from his eyes. He was free of Avelyn’s dark grip, he suddenly believed, for now he understood, beyond doubt. And with his revelations had come a greater knowledge, a deeper understanding. It was always a sharp thorn in Markwart’s side that Avelyn, this supposed heretic, had been the most powerful stone user in the history of the Church. If the stones came from God, it followed that their power was a blessing, yet how could that be so if Avelyn Desbris, the thief, was so proficient with them?

The demon dactyl had given Avelyn the power! The demon dactyl had perverted the stones in Avelyn’s hands, allowing him the insight to use them.

Markwart clutched his stones tightly and moved back to his bed, thinking that God had answered the dactyl by showing him equal—no, greater—insights. This time he would find no sleep, too consumed with anticipation for the morning’s fight.

Dalebert Markwart, the Father Abbot, the highest-ranking member of the Abellican Church, had it all exactly backward, a thought that pleased the spirit of the demon dactyl immensely. How easily Bestesbulzibar had linked with this craven old man, how easily it had perverted Markwart’s assumed truths!

Nearly all of St.-Mere-Abelle’s more than seven hundred monks turned out on the seawall before the dawn, preparing for the approach of the powrie fleet. With two notable exceptions, Master Jojonah realized, for Brothers Youseff and Dandelion were nowhere to be found. Markwart had put them safely away for what he considered their more important task.

Most of the monks manned the abbey’s long parapets, but others moved to their strategic positions in rooms below the level of the wall top. Two dozen catapults were readied as the vast powrie fleet made its way in toward the rocky cliff. Even more deadly, the older and more powerful monks, the masters and immaculates, monks who had studied for ten years and more, prepared their respective stones, and among them was the Father Abbot, with his new insights and heightened power.

Markwart kept most of the monks in position on the seaward side of the structure, though he had to place more than a score of brothers on the opposite wall, watching the many approaches for the expected land attack. Then all of St.-Mere-Abelle hushed and waited as score after score of powrie vessels rounded the rocky spur and moved in line with the great abbey, most resembling a nearly submerged barrel, but others with flat, open decks set with catapults.

A catapult let fly from one of the rooms just below the Father Abbot’s position, its pitch ball sailing high and far, but well short of the nearest vessel.

“Hold!” Markwart yelled down angrily. “Would you show them our range, then?”

Master Jojonah put a hand on the Father Abbot’s shoulder. “They are nervous,” he offered as an excuse for the premature firing.

“They are foolish!” the Father Abbot snapped back at him, pulling from his gentle grasp. “Find the one who fired that catapult and replace him on the line—and bring him up to me.”

Jojonah started to protest, but quickly realized that to be a fool’s course. If he angered the Father Abbot any more—and he saw no way he could even speak with the man without doing that—then Markwart’s punishment of the young monk would only be more severe. With one of his customary sighs, a helpless expression that he thought he seemed to be making far too often these days, the portly master moved off to find the errant artillerist, taking with him a second-year student to replace the man.

More and more powrie ships came into view, but those closest did not move into catapult range, or stone magic range.

“They await the ground assault,” remarked Brother Francis Dellacourt, a ninth-year monk known for his sharp tongue and severe discipline of the younger students, attributes that had made him a favorite with Markwart.

“What news from the western walls?” Markwart asked.

Francis immediately motioned for two younger monks to run off for information. “They will hit us harder from the ground at first,” Francis then offered to Markwart.

“The reasoning that led you to such a conclusion?”

“The sea cliff is a hundred feet, at least, and that at its shortest juncture,” Francis reasoned. “Those powries in the boats will have little chance of gaining our walls unless we are sorely taxed in the west. They will hit us hard by ground, and then, with our numbers thinned on this wall, their fleet will strike.”

“What do you know of powrie tactics?” Markwart said loudly, drawing all of those nearby, including the returning Master Jojonah and the errant artillerist, into the conversation. Markwart knew what Francis would say, for he, like all of the older monks, had studied the records of previous powrie assaults, but he thought that a dissertation by the efficient Francis would be a prudent reminder.

“We have few examples of a powrie dual strike,” Francis admitted. “They usually attack primarily from the sea, with incredible speed and ferocity. But I suspect that St.-Mere-Abelle is too formidable for that, and they know it. They will thin our line by attacking from the west, by ground, and then their catapults will put their strong lines up over our wall.”

“How high will any climb with us standing defense at the top of those ropes?” one monk asked impertinently. “We’ll cut them down, or shoot arrows or magics at the climbing powries.”

Master Jojonah started to respond, but Markwart, preferring to hear from Francis on this matter, stopped him with an upraised hand, then motioned for the ninth-year monk to proceed.

“Do not underestimate them!” Francis fumed, and Jojonah noted that Markwart cracked his first smile in many weeks. “Only months ago the powries struck at Pireth Tulme, a fortress on a cliff no less high than our own. In this manner they gained the courtyard before the majority of the garrison had even arrived at the walls to offer defense. And as for those who were in place along Pireth Tulme’s seemingly defensible walls . . .”

Francis let the thought hang. It was common knowledge that no survivors had been found among Pireth Tulme’s elite Coastpoint Guards, and also that those remains found had been horribly mutilated.

“Do not underestimate them!” Francis yelled again, turning as he spoke to ensure that every monk in the area was paying attention.

Master Jojonah watched Francis closely. He didn’t like the man, not at all. Brother Francis’ ambition was obviously large, as was his ability to take every word muttered by Father Abbot Markwart as though it had come straight from God. Jojonah did not believe that piety was the guiding force behind Brother Francis’ devotion to Markwart, though, but rather, pragmatic ambition. Watching the man reveling in the attention now only reinforced that belief.

The two monks returned from the western wall, trotting, but with no apparent sense of urgency. “Nothing,” each reported. “No signs of any gathering army.”

“Several villagers came in just minutes ago,” one of them added, “reporting that a large force of powries was spotted moving west of St.-Mere-Abelle village, heading west.”

Jojonah and Markwart exchanged curious looks.

“A ruse,” Brother Francis warned. “Moving west, away from us, that we might not be prepared for the sudden assault over land.”

“Your reasoning is sound,” Master Jojonah offered. “But I wonder if we might not turn their ruse, if that is what it is, back against them.”

“Explain,” said an intrigued Markwart.

“The fleet might indeed be waiting for the ground assault,” Jojonah said. “And that assault might indeed be delayed so that we might lower our guard. But our powrie friends in the harbor cannot see St.-Mere-Abelle’s western walls, nor the grounds beyond them.”

“They will hear the sounds of battle,” another monk reasoned.

“Or they will hear what they believe to be the sounds of battle,” Master Jojonah replied slyly.

“I will see to it!” cried Brother Francis, running off even before the Father Abbot gave his consent.

Markwart ordered every second man off the wall and out of sight.

Moments later the commotion began, with cries of “Attack! Attack!” and the swooshing sound of ballistae firing. Then a tremendous explosion shook the ground and a fireball rose into the air, the magical blast of a ruby.

“Authentic,” Master Jojonah said dryly. “But our exuberant Francis should conserve his magical energy.”

“He has powries to convince,” Markwart retorted sharply.

“Here they come,” came a call before Jojonah could reply, and sure enough the powrie craft began gliding across the bay, right on schedule. The tumult continued in the west, the cries, the ballistae firing, even another fireball from excited Francis. The powries, spurred on by the sight and sound, came in hard, their barrelboats bobbing.

Markwart passed the word to let them in close, though more than one catapult let fly its payload prematurely. But the ships came on fast and were soon in range, and with the Father Abbot’s eager blessing, the monastery’s two dozen seaward catapults began their barrage, throwing stones and pitch. One powrie catapult barge went up in flames; a barrelboat got hit on its rounded side, the force of the boulder rolling the craft right over in the water. Another barrelboat took a hit squarely on its prow, the heavy stone driving the front of the craft under the water, its stern reaching skyward, its pedal-driven propeller spinning uselessly in the empty air. Soon many of the evil dwarves were in the water, screaming, thrashing.

But the cheering on the abbey’s wall did not hold, for soon enough the lead powrie ships were right below the Father Abbot’s position, right at the base of the seawall, and now their catapults went into action, launching dozens of weighted, knotted ropes tipped with cunning, many-pronged grapnels. The hooked instruments came down on targeted areas as thick as hail, sending the monks scrambling. Several monks were caught by a hooked tip, then pulled in screaming to the wall, the grapnel digging right through an arm or shoulder.

A group of seven immaculates stood in a circle to Jojonah’s right, chanting in unison, joining their power, six with their hands locked, the seventh in their center, holding forth a piece of graphite. A sheet of blue electricity crackled over the bay, sparking off the metallic cranks of powrie catapults, laying low the dozens of exposed powries on the barge decks.

But the burst lasted only a split second, and dozens more powries rushed to take the places of the fallen. Up the ropes they came, hanging under, climbing hand over hand with tremendous speed.

Monks attacked with conventional bows and with gemstones, loosing lightning bolts, springing fire from their fingertips to burn the ropes, while others went at the grapnels with heavy hammers or at the ropes with swords. Dozens of ropes went down, sending powries diving into the bay, but scores more came flying up as more craft crowded into the base of the cliff.

With still no sign of any approaching ground force, all of the monks came to the seawall, all of St.-Mere-Abelle’s power focused on the thousand powrie vessels that had swarmed into All Saints Bay. The air came alive with the tingling of magical energy, with the stench of burning pitch, with the screams of freezing, drowning powries. And with the screams of dying monks, for as soon as all the ropes were up, the powrie catapult barges began hurling huge baskets of pinballs, wooden balls an inch in diameter set with a multitude of metal, often poison-tipped needles.

Despite all the talk of Pireth Tulme, all the warnings of the older, more studied monks, the defenders of St.-Mere-Abelle were indeed taken aback at the sheer ferocity and boldness of the assault. And of the skill, for the powries were as efficient and disciplined a fighting army as any in all the world. Not a monk, not even stubborn Brother Francis, doubted for a moment that if the enemy ground force had made its appearance then, St.-Mere-Abelle, the most ancient and defensible bastion in all of Honce-the-Bear, would have fallen.

Even without that ground force, Father Abbot Markwart appreciated the danger of the situation.

“You!” he called to the monk who had fired the first catapult shot. “Now is the chance to redeem yourself!”

The young brother, eager to regain the Father Abbot’s favor, rushed to Markwart’s side and was presented with three stones: a malachite, a ruby, and a serpentine.

“Do not use the malachite until you descend near to the ship,” the Father Abbot explained hastily.

The young monk’s eyes went wide as he discerned the intent. The Father Abbot wanted him to leap from the cliff, plummet to one particularly large tangle of powrie ships, enact the levitational malachite and the fire-shield serpentine, and then loose a fireball across the vessels.

“He’ll not get close,” Jojonah started to protest, but Markwart turned on him with such ferocity that the portly master abruptly backed away. Markwart was wrong in sending this young monk, Jojonah maintained privately, for the three-stone usage was more suited to an older and more experienced monk, an immaculate at least, or even a master. Even if the young man managed the difficult feat, the explosion would not be extreme, a puff of flame, perhaps, and nothing to deter the powries.

“We have no options,” Markwart said to the young monk. “That group of ships must be dealt with, and immediately, or our walls will be lost!”

Even as he spoke, a pair of powries came over the wall to the side. The immaculates fell over them at once, beating them down before they could get in defensive posture and then cutting free the ropes in the area. But still, Markwart’s point had been clearly reinforced.

“They’ll not notice you coming, except to think you were thrown over by one of their own,” he explained. “By the time they realize the truth, they will be burning and you will be ascending.”

The monk nodded, clutched the stones tightly and leaped up to the top of the wall. With a look back he jumped far and high, plummeting down the cliff face. Markwart, Jojonah, and several others rushed to the wall to watch his descent, and the Father Abbot cursed loudly when the malachite turned that plummet into the gentle fall of a feather in a stiff breeze—with the monk still many yards above the deck level.

“Fool!” Markwart roared as the powries focused on the man, throwing spears and hammers, raising their small crossbows. To the young monk’s credit—or perhaps because of his sudden terror, or perhaps because he simply did not possess the magical knowledge and strength—he did not reverse direction and begin floating back up the cliff, but continued down, down.

A crossbow bolt dove into his arm, a stone tumbled from his hand.

“The serpentine!” Jojonah cried.

The young monk, clutching his arm, twitching and turning in a futile effort to dodge the growing barrage, was obviously trying to float back up.

“No!” Markwart yelled at him.

“He has no shield against the fireball!” Jojonah yelled at the Father Abbot.

The young monk jerked spasmodically, hit by a crossbow bolt, then another, then a third, in rapid succession. His magical energy left him along with his life force, and his limp body dropped the rest of the way, bouncing off a powrie barge and into the dark waters of All Saints Bay.

“Fetch me one of our peasant guests!” Markwart yelled at Brother Francis.

“He was not strong enough,” Jojonah said to the Father Abbot. “That was no task for a mere novice. An immaculate might not complete such a feat!”

“I would send you, and be glad to be rid of you,” Markwart screamed in his face, stunning him into silence. “But you are needed.”

Brother Francis returned with a young villager, a man of about twenty, looking sheepish. “I can use a bow,” the man said, trying to appear brave. “I have hunted deer—”

“Take this instead,” Father Abbot Markwart instructed, handing him a ruby.

The man’s eyes widened at the sight and smooth feel of the sacred stone. “I cannot . . .” he stammered, not understanding.

“But I can,” snarled Markwart, and he held forth another stone, his mighty hematite, the soul stone.

The man looked at him blankly; Brother Francis, understanding enough to know that he should distract the peasant, smacked him hard across the face, knocking him to the ground.

Master Jojonah looked away.

Francis closed on the man, meaning to strike him again.

“It is done,” the man announced, and Francis held back the blow and reverently helped him to his feet.

“Possession,” Jojonah spat distastefully. He could hardly believe that Markwart had done this wicked thing, which was normally considered the absolute darkest side of the hematite. By all edicts, possessing another’s body was an act to be avoided—indeed, an act that monks spirit-walking with hematite often guarded against by preparing other protective stones. And when he thought about what he had just seen, Jojonah could hardly believe that the possession, perhaps the most difficult of any known task for the gemstones, had been completed so easily!

The Father Abbot in the peasant’s body walked calmly to the wall, glanced out over the edge to locate the greatest tangle of powrie vessels, then, without a moment’s hesitation, calmly leaped over the side. No malachite this time, no screaming, no fear. The Father Abbot focused on the ruby as he plunged the hundred feet, bringing the stone’s energy to a peak and loosing a tremendous, concussive fireball just before he slammed the deck. His spirit deserted the peasant body immediately, flying through the flames, away from the agony and back to his own waiting form atop the seawall.

He blinked his tired old eyes open, acclimating to his own body and fighting past that instant of sheer terror when he had neared the powrie decks, when he consumed his own borrowed form in magical fires. All the monks around him, with the notable exception of Master Jojonah, were cheering wildly, many looking over the wall at the burning mass of powrie vessels, uttering praises of disbelief that anyone could ignite so tremendous a fireball.

“It had to be done,” Markwart said curtly to Jojonah.

The master didn’t blink.

“To sacrifice one for the sake of others is the highest precept of our Order,” Markwart reminded.

“To sacrifice oneself,” Master Jojonah corrected.

“Go from this place, to the catapult crews,” a disgusted Markwart ordered dismissively.

Though Jojonah realized that his stone skills were still needed up on the roof, he was glad to comply. He glanced back at Markwart many times as he departed, for while others were purely awestruck by the magical display, Jojonah, who had known Markwart for more than forty years, was simply confused, and more than a little suspicious.

There was one entrance to St.-Mere-Abelle from the wharf area at the level of All Saints Bay, but so great were the doors down there—oak wood, two feet thick and reinforced with metal banding, backed by a portcullis with pegs as thick as a man’s thigh, and that backed by another falling wall, as thick and strong as the outer doors—that no powries, not even the huge fomorian giants, could have broken through them if they had spent a week at it.

That was assuming, however, that the doors were closed.

If they could have seen over the cliff well enough to spot the doors, neither Father Abbot Markwart nor Master Jojonah would have been surprised to see those great portals swing open in invitation to the groups of powries that had managed to escape the blast and drag themselves onto the rocky shore. In fact, both men had expected this very thing when Master De’Unnero had volunteered, indeed insisted, that he be the one heading the contingent of twelve at the low station guard post. That group had two ballistae, one on either side of the great doors, but their firing range was severely limited by the narrow scope of their shooting slits, and Markwart had known full well that De’Unnero would never be satisfied with launching a few, usually ineffective bolts.

So the young and fiery master had opened the doors, and now he stood exposed in the corridor just inside, laughing hysterically, daring the powries to enter.

A group of nearly a score of the bloody caps, battered already but never afraid, did come roaring in, brandishing hammers and axes and cruel short swords.

As the last of them passed under the portcullis, it fell with a resounding crash, its vibrations reaching all through the abbey, all the way up to the seawall.

Startled but not stopped, the bloody caps yelled all the louder and charged on. A dozen crossbow bolts whipped out into their ranks, taking down a few but hardly slowing the charge.

There stood De’Unnero, alone, laughing, his honed muscles straining so tightly against his skin that it seemed they might tear right through. Other monks, principally Master Jojonah, had often voiced their belief that De’Unnero’s heart would simply explode, for the young master was too intense for the wrappings of any human coil. He seemed to fit that image now, verily trembling with inner energy. He held no weapon that the powries could see, only a single stone, a tiger’s paw, smooth brown and with black streaks.

Now he brought forth the magic of that stone, and as the first powrie neared, De’Unnero’s arms were transformed, taking the shape of the mighty forelegs of a tiger.

“Yach!” the lead powrie cried, lifting its weapon defensively.

De’Unnero was too quick for that, springing ahead like a hunting cat, slashing his right arm down across the powrie’s face, tearing away its features.

The master seemed to go into a frenzy then, but in truth, he was in perfect control, springing from side to side to prevent any powries from getting past him, though a dozen other monks stood in the corridor to meet their charge. The stone had stayed with his transformed paw, melding to the skin, and De’Unnero fell deeper into its grasp now, and though his outward appearance changed no more, his inner muscles became those of the cat.

A swipe of his tiger arm sent one of the powries flying; with a flick of his leg muscles, he darted to the side, avoiding a smash from a hammer. Then a second muscular twitch brought him back in front of the attacking powrie before the startled dwarf had even lifted its hammer.

The claws raked viciously, and that powrie’s face disappeared, too.

Those powries behind were giving ground now, but De’Unnero’s battle lust was far from sated. His legs twitched, launching him fully twenty-five feet ahead, landing in the midst of the dwarves. He became a whirlwind of flailing claws and kicking feet. Powries were no minor enemy, but though they outnumbered this creature nine to one, they wanted nothing to do with him. They scrambled and rushed. Two went back for the portcullis, crying to their comrades who were still outside, while several others staggered past the fighting De’Unnero, stumbling down the corridor, where they were met by a second volley of crossbow quarrels.

All but one of the monks dropped their crossbows and drew weapons for close melee, though a handful rushed forward to finish the dwarves with only their bare hands.

Farther down the corridor, De’Unnero held the last powrie standing before him by the head, between his great paws. His claws had dug right through the powrie’s skull, and he whipped the creature back and forth now as easily as if it was a down-filled child’s doll. Then he threw it aside and started an advance on the two at the portcullis.

Beyond them, a powrie leveled a blowgun and let fly, scoring a hit on De’Unnero’s belly, just below his rib cage.

The monk roared, a tiger’s roar, and tore the dart free, along with a considerable amount of flesh, continuing his determined advance. The powrie gunner popped another dart into place; the two dwarves at the portcullis screamed and tried to squeeze through.

Then the inner sliding door fell, snapping the blowgun and squashing the two powries flat.

De’Unnero skidded to a stop as a spray of blood washed over him. He turned about and roared again, a battle cry that became a call of frustration as he realized that his soldiers had efficiently dealt with the remaining dwarves. The fight was over.

The fierce master came back fully to his human form, exhausted by the effort both physical and magical. He felt the profound sting in his belly then, a burning, washing sensation, and realized he had been poisoned. Most of that poison, a paralyzing and painful concoction, had been defeated by the sheer energy of the magical transformations, but enough remained to bring such a fit of trembling to the monk that he was soon down on one knee.

His soldiers crowded around him, concerned.

“Man the ballistae!” he growled at them, and though De’Unnero was fully human once more, his voice was as ferocious as the roar of the hunting tiger. The younger monks obeyed, and by sheer determination Master De’Unnero soon joined them, directing their shots.

With the main tangle of powrie vessels burning and out of the fight, the watching monks dispersed from that area, running to bolster the wall defenses wherever necessary. Many powries gained the wall through that long and vicious morning, but none found a lasting hold, and by midday, with still no sign of any approaching ground force, the outcome was no longer in doubt. The powries fought on, as powries always will, and more than fifty monks were slain, and several times that number injured, but the powrie losses were staggering, with more than half the thousand vessel fleet going to the bottom of All Saints Bay, and the hundreds that escaped slipping out into deeper waters, manned by only skeleton crews.

By mid-afternoon Master Jojonah had joined with the other older monks proficient in stone use in tending the many wounded, while younger brothers had already organized burial detail for those beyond the help of the soul stones. The battle had slipped into its last stage, the cleanup, as the chaos of fighting died away. Soon the discipline of the brothers put the duties into order, pragmatic and efficient. One thing did strike Master Jojonah as curious, though. The Father Abbot, who had in his possession, Jojonah knew, the most powerful soul stone in all St.-Mere-Abelle, walked among the wounded and offered hopeful words, but seemed to be tending none. The concussive fireball, and a couple of other lightning blasts that Markwart had screeched along the wall top, were hours old now, and so Markwart’s remarks that he had no magical energy left made little sense.

The portly master could only shrug helplessly and shake his head, then, when Master De’Unnero arrived at the wall, his side torn open wide, though the fierce man was hardly limping or showing any sign that he felt any pain at all. Still, Markwart moved near and promptly sealed the wound with the soul stone. Jojonah had known that the bond between these two was tight, as tight as the one between the Father Abbot and Brother Francis.

He went about his work quietly, digesting it all, filing it away until he could find enough private time to properly reason it through.

“You insist upon thrusting yourself in danger’s way,” Markwart scolded De’Unnero as the gaping wound sealed under the influence of the hematite.

“A man must find his enjoyment,” the master replied with a mischievous grin. “Enjoyment you continue to deny me.”

Markwart stepped back and looked harshly at him, understanding the complaint all too well. “How goes the training?” he asked sharply.

“Youseff shows promise,” De’Unnero admitted. “He is cunning and will use any weapon and any tactic to find victory.”

“And Brother Dandelion?”

“A mighty bear, strong of arm but weak of mind,” said De’Unnero. “He will serve our purposes well, as long as Youseff guides his actions.”

The Father Abbot nodded, seeming pleased.

“I could defeat them both together,” De’Unnero asserted, stealing his superior’s smug look. “They will hold the title of Brothers Justice, yet I could crush them both, and easily. And I could go and retrieve Avelyn and the gemstones.”

Markwart had no practical argument against the claim. “You are a master, and have other duties,” he said.

“More important than the hunt for Avelyn?”

“Equally important,” Markwart said with a tone of finality. “Youseff and Dandelion will serve this purpose, if Master Marcalo De’Unnero properly trains them.”

De’Unnero’s face crinkled severely, his eyes narrowing, throwing imaginary daggers at the Father Abbot. He did not like to be questioned, not at all.

Markwart recognized the look, for he had seen it often. He knew, though, that De’Unnero would not cross him, and given that, such intensity could be put to good use.

“Let me go hunting,” De’Unnero said plainly.

“You train the hunters,” Markwart shot back. “Trust me, you will find rewards for your efforts.” With that, the Father Abbot walked away.

“We were valiant this day,” Master De’Unnero proudly offered to Markwart and the other masters at their summary meeting after vespers.

“But also fortunate,” Master Jojonah reminded them all. “For neither the powrie ground force nor the goblin army that has been oft sighted in the region made its appearance.”

“More than luck, I would reason,” Francis piped in, though it was not the man’s place to speak at such a meeting. Francis wasn’t even an immaculate yet, after all, and was only at the meeting as an attendant of the Father Abbot. Still, Markwart made no move to silence him, and the other masters afforded him the floor. “This is uncharacteristic of our enemy,” Francis went on. “Every tale from the battle lines north of Palmaris indicate that our monstrous foes fight with cohesion and guidance, and it is obvious from the success of our ruse that those powrie ships were indeed waiting for the ground army to engage.”

“Where, then, were—are—the enemy ground armies?” Markwart asked impatiently. “Will we awake on the morrow to find that we are besieged once again?”

“The fleet will not return,” another master responded immediately. “And if the monsters come at us from the ground, they will find our fortifications even more formidable than those that protected us by sea.”

Master Jojonah happened to be looking at De’Unnero when these words were spoken, and was disgusted to see the man’s almost feral smile, a grin truly unbefitting a master of the Abellican Order.

“Triple the guard along the walls this night, land and sea,” the Father Abbot decided.

“Many are weary from the fighting,” said Master Engress, a gentle man and a friend of Jojonah’s.

“Then use the peasants,” Markwart snapped at him abruptly. “They have come in to eat our food and hide behind the shelter of abbey walls and brother flesh. Let them earn their keep at watch, this night and every night.”

Engress looked at Jojonah and at several other masters, but none dared question Markwart’s tone. “It will be done, Father Abbot,” Master Engress said humbly.

The Father Abbot pushed his chair back forcefully, the legs screeching on the wooden floor. He rose and waved his hand dismissively, then walked out of the room, the meeting at its end.

By Markwart’s reasoning, all important business had been concluded. The man wanted to be alone with his thoughts, and with his emotions, some of which were troubling indeed. He had sent a man flying to his death this day, an act that still required a bit of rationalization, and he was also conscious of the fact that he had not been greatly involved in the healing process after the fight. There had remained magical energy within him—he had known that even as he spoke falsely to excuse himself—but he simply hadn’t felt like helping out. He had gone to one injured monk, a man sitting against the seawall, his arm badly torn from a sliding powrie grapnel, but when he moved to heal the man with the hematite, an action that required an intimate connection, he recoiled, feeling . . . what?

Loathing? Repulsion?

Markwart had no practical answers, but he trusted in his instincts completely. There was a perversion, a weakness, growing within the Order, he realized. Avelyn—always it was that foul Avelyn!—had begun the rot, and now, it seemed, it was a more general thing than even he had believed.

Yes, that was it, the Father Abbot understood. They were growing weak and so full of compassion that they could no longer recognize and properly deal with true evil. Like Jojonah and his foolish sympathy for the peasant whose sacrifice had saved so many lives.

But not De’Unnero, Markwart thought, and he managed a smile. The man was strong, and brilliant. Perhaps he should concede to the man’s wishes and let him be the one to hunt down Avelyn and the gemstones; with Marcalo De’Unnero set to the task, success would almost be assured.

The Father Abbot shook his head, reminding himself that he had other plans for the master. De’Unnero would be moved high in line as his successor, the Father Abbot silently vowed. As soon as he had seen De’Unnero’s wounds, Markwart had desired to heal them, as though the sacred soul stone had called to him to act, had shown him the truth.

It was all sorting out neatly for Father Abbot Markwart. He made a mental note to properly eulogize the fireballing peasant, perhaps even to erect a statue in the man’s honor, and then he went to bed.

He slept soundly.

Scouts went out from St.-Mere-Abelle the next day, scouring the countryside and then returning to report that no sign of monsters was to be found anywhere near the abbey. Within a week the situation was made clear: the powrie invasion force had gone back to their ships and departed—for where, no one knew. The goblin army, and indeed there was a huge force in the region, had fractured, with rogue bands running haphazard, sacking towns.

The Kingsmen, Honce-the-Bear’s army, were tracking down the rogue bands one at a time and destroying them.

At St.-Mere-Abelle, the implications of this seemingly good news went far deeper.

“We must look to the source of our enemy’s disarray,” Father Abbot Markwart told his senior monks. “To the Barbacan and this rumored explosion.”

“You believe that the demon dactyl has been destroyed,” Master Jojonah reasoned.

“I believe that our enemy has been decapitated,” Markwart replied. “But we must know the truth of it.”

“An expedition,” Master Engress stated plainly.

Brother Francis was the first out of the room, eager to put together the plans for a trip to the Barbacan, eager, as always, to please the Father Abbot.

CHAPTER 3

Roger Lockless

“He’s in there,” the old woman groaned. “I know he be! Oh, the poor child.”

“Might be that he’s dead already,” said another, a man of about thirty winters. “That would be the most merciful. Poor child.”

A group of a dozen villagers crouched on a bluff a quarter mile north of their old home, Caer Tinella, watching the powries and the goblins. A pair of fomorian giants had also been in the town earlier that day, but were out now, probably hunting refugees.

“He should not have gone down there, and I told him so,” the old woman asserted. “Too many, too many.”

Off to the side, Tomas Gingerwart gave a knowing smile. These people didn’t understand the lad named Roger. To them he was Roger Billingsbury, an orphan boy who had been taken in by the town. When Roger’s parents had both died, the common thinking was to send him south to Palmaris, perhaps to the monks of St. Precious. But the folk of Caer Tinella, truly a bonded community, decided to keep Roger with them, with all of them helping him get through the trials of grief and sickness.

For Roger was a poor, skinny waif, so obviously frail. His physical development had been stunted at the age of eleven, stolen by the same fever that killed his parents, and his two sisters, as well.

That was several years ago, but to these worried townsfolk, Roger, who looked much the same, was still that little lost boy.

Tomas knew better. The lad’s name was no longer Billingsbury, but Lockless, Roger Lockless, a tag given him for good reason indeed. There was nothing Roger couldn’t open, or slip through, or sneak around. Tomas reminded himself of that often as he looked to Caer Tinella, for in truth, he was also a bit worried. But only a bit.

“A line o’ them,” the old woman cackled, pointing emphatically toward the town. Her eyes were sharp, for indeed a group of goblins moved across the town square, escorting a line of ragged-looking human prisoners—those people of Caer Tinella and the neighboring community of Landsdown who had not been quick enough or hidden deep enough in the woods. Now the monsters were using the towns as encampments, and the captured humans as slaves.

All of the refugees understood what grim fate would befall those captives when they were no longer useful to the powries and goblins.

“You should not be looking upon them,” came a voice, and the group turned as one to see the approach of a portly man, Belster O’Comely. “And we are all too close to the towns, I fear. Would you have us all captured?” Despite his best efforts, Belster, the jovial innkeeper who used to run the very respectable Howling Sheila in Dundalis, could not manage too sharp an edge to his voice. He had come south with the refugees from the three towns of the Timberlands: Dundalis, Weedy Meadow, and End-o’-the-World. Belster’s companions from the northland were a far different group, though, quite unlike the more recently displaced people of Caer Tinella and Landsdown, and those of the handful of other smaller communities along the road south to the great port city of Palmaris. Belster’s group, trained by the mysterious ranger known as Nightbird, were far from pitiful and far from afraid. They hid from the goblins, to be sure, but when they found the terms favorable, they became the hunters, with goblins, powries, even giants, their prey.

“We will make a try for them, as I promised,” Belster continued. “But not so soon. Oh no. We’ll be no good to our fellows dead! Now come along.”

“Is there nothing to be done?” the old woman said angrily.

“Pray, dear lady,” Belster replied in all sincerity. “Pray for them all”

Tomas Gingerwart nodded his agreement. And pray for the goblins, he silently added, thinking that Roger must be having a grand time of it by now.

Belster didn’t miss the smirk, and moved to speak with Tomas alone.

“You wish that I would do more,” the portly innkeeper said quietly, misinterpreting Tomas’ look. “And so do I, my friend. But I have a hundred and fifty under my care.”

“Closer to a hundred and eighty, counting those from Caer Tinella and about,” Tomas corrected.

“And only two score and ten fit for fighting, to guard them all with,” Belster remarked. “How might I risk my warriors on a raid against the town with so many lives at stake?”

“I do not doubt your wisdom, Master O’Comely,” Tomas said sincerely. “You vow to raid the town when the time is right, but I fear that you will find no such time. The goblins are lax, but the powries not so. A cunning lot, well trained for war. Their guard will not drop.”

“Then what am I to do?” asked a distressed Belster.

“Keep to your duty,” Tomas replied. “And that duty is to the hundred and eighty, not to those already in powrie clutches.”

Belster eyed the man unblinkingly for a long while, and Tomas could see the pain in the gentle man’s eyes. The innkeeper did not want to let a single human slip through his protective web.

“You cannot save them all,” Tomas said simply.

“But I must try.”

Tomas was shaking his head before Belster finished. “Do not play the fool’s game,” he scolded, and Belster realized for the first time that Tomas’ earlier smirk was not derisive, was not in response to his hesitance in going into Caer Tinella. “If you attack openly,” Tomas continued, “then expect to be routed. And I fear that our powrie and goblin friends would not be satisfied with that, but would expand their search of the forest until all of us were hunted down and taken prisoner—or slain, in the case of many, the older folk and children too young to be of any use.”

“So you agree with my decision to hold? Even to retreat our line?”

“Reluctantly,” Tomas replied. “As reluctantly as do you. You are a man of conscience, Belster O’Comely, and fortunate are we of Caer Tinella that you and yours have come south.”

Belster took the compliment in stride, needing the support. He couldn’t help another glance in the direction of the occupied town, though, his heart breaking at the thought of the torment those poor prisoners must now be experiencing.

Another curious onlooker was watching the procession of slaves as the goblins led them to the dark forest on the edge of Caer Tinella. Roger Lockless knew the workings of the town better than any other. Ever since the invasion, he had been in Caer Tinella nearly every night, moving from shadow to shadow, listening to the goblins and powries lay their plans for the area, or overhearing talk of the greater war being waged not so far to the south. More than anything else, the crafty Roger Lockless knew his enemy, and knew where they were vulnerable. When he left the town before dawn each day, his slight frame was usually laden with goods for the refugees in the nearby woods. And so careful was he in his stealing that the monsters rarely realized they were being robbed.

His work three nights previous remained his shining achievement to date. He had stolen a pony, the boss powrie’s favorite mount, and taken it in such a way as to implicate a pair of goblin sentries, who, as Roger had previously discovered through some fine spying, happened by coincidence to be feasting that very night on a horse.

Both were hanged in the town square the next morning—Roger watched that, too.

The young man, barely more than a boy, knew that today was different. Today the goblins meant to kill one of their prisoners; he had heard them talking about it before dawn, which prompted him to stay around as the day brightened. The goblins had caught Mrs. Kelso stuffing her mouth with an extra biscuit, and the powrie boss, a thoroughly disagreeable fellow named Kos-kosio Begulne, ordered her slain in the morning as an example to the others.

She was out there, chopping at the trees with the rest of the poor prisoners, oblivious to the fact that she had only hours left to live.

Roger had witnessed much cruelty in the last few weeks, had seen several people butchered for no better reason than the fact that a goblin or powrie didn’t like the way they looked. Always, the pragmatic young thief would shake his head and look the other way. “Not my business,” he often reminded himself.

This was different. Mrs. Kelso was a friend, a dear friend who had often fed him when he was younger, an orphaned waif running the streets of Caer Tinella. He had spent years sleeping in her barn, for though her husband had little use for him and kept telling him to get away, gentle Mrs. Kelso usually ushered the man aside, glancing back and winking at Roger, then nodding toward the barn.

She was a good lady, and Roger found it hard this day to shake his head and say, “Not my business.”

But what could he do? He was no fighter, and even if he were, there were a pair of huge fomorians in or about Caer Tinella, more than a hundred goblins, half that number of powries, and probably ten times that number of monsters running around in the forest and the neighboring villages. He had hoped to get Mrs. Kelso out of town before the dawn, but by the time he heard the grim plans for her, the prisoners had already been roused, lined up, and placed under heavy guard.

One problem at a time, Roger repeatedly told himself. The prisoners were chained to each other ankle-to-ankle, separated by five-foot lengths of chain, each person chained to two others. For added security, the shackles on each prisoner were not a matching pair and were finely made, with one chained to the shackle on the leg of a slave to the right, the other chained to a slave on the left. Roger estimated he would need nearly a full minute to get through both locks, and that only if Mrs. Kelso and the two prisoners chained to her kept still and cooperated.

A minute was a long time with powrie crossbowmen nearby.

“Diversion, diversion, diversion,” the young thief muttered repeatedly, slipping from shadow to shadow about the occupied town. “A call to arms? No no no. A fire?”

Roger paused, focusing his thoughts on a pair of goblins taking some rest on the piles of last season’s hay just inside Yosi Hoosier’s barn. One of them had a pipe stuck in its mouth and was blowing gigantic rings of noxious smoke.

“Oh, but I love fire,” Roger whispered. Off he went, silent and quick as a hunting cat, taking a wide circuit of the barn, slipping into the structure—as he had so often in the last few years—through a broken board far in the back. Soon he was crouched behind the hay within a few feet of the oblivious goblins. He waited patiently for nearly ten minutes, until the smoker tapped out his pipe and began loading fresh weed.

Roger was good at making fires—another of his many talents. He moved back so he wouldn’t be heard, then struck flint to steel over a few pieces of straw.

Then he crept back and pushed the straw in carefully, in the general area where the smoker had tapped out his pipe.

Then he was gone, back out of the barn before the first wisps of smoke tickled the noses of the goblin pair.

The hay went up like a giant candle, and how the goblins howled!

“Attack!” some yelled. “Enemies! Enemies!” cried others. But when they went to investigate and saw their comrades batting wildly at the flames, including one goblin with a lit pipe still stuck in its mouth, they changed their song.

Those goblins out with the woodcutting prisoners did not go in to fight fire, but their attention was diverted enough for Roger to easily scamper around the back of the group, coming to a stop behind the large oak that Mrs. Kelso was halfheartedly chopping. She let out a chirp when he peeked around, but he quickly hushed her and those nearby.

“Hear me quick,” he whispered, crawling halfway around, his hands immediately going to work on her shackles while he locked Mrs. Kelso’s gaze with his own. “Now stand still! They mean to kill you. I heard them.”

“You cannot take her out or they’ll kill us all!” one man complained, his voice loud enough to draw a growl and an order to “Work!” from the goblin guards.

“You must take us all, then,” demanded another.

“That I cannot do,” Roger replied. “But they won’t kill you, they won’t even blame you.”

“But—” the first man started, before Roger hushed him with a look.

“When I get her free, I will put her shackles about that sapling,” he explained. “Give us a five-count to get away, then here is what you do . . .”

“Stupid Grimy Snorts and that smelly pipe o’ his,” one of the goblin guards remarked, sorting out the mess in the town proper. “Ugly Kos-kosio ain’t to be giving us extra food tonight.”

The other laughed. “Might that we’ll be eating Grimy Snorts!”

“Demon!” came a cry that sent the goblins spinning. They saw the prisoner line, tools thrown down, the people struggling mightily, trying to run away.

“ ’Ere now!” one of the goblins yelled, charging up to the nearest human and laying her low with a shield rush.“ ’Ere now!”

“Demon!” yelled the other humans, precisely as Roger had instructed them. “Demon dactyl!”

“He turned her into a tree!” one woman shrieked. The goblin guards looked on curiously, even scratched their heads, dumbstruck, for the two lines of prisoners—and there did seem to be two lines now—were stretched out to the length of the chains, and were both anchored by a small but sturdy sapling.

“A tree?” one goblin croaked.

“Blimey,” said another.

All the attention of the encampment shifted from the now dying fire in the barn to the bustle at the forest’s edge. Many goblins ran over, along with the powrie host, led by their merciless leader, Kos-kosio Begulne.

“What’d ye see?” the powrie demanded of the man who had been chained to Mrs. Kelso’s right and was now closest to the sapling.

“Demon,” the man sputtered.

“Demon?” Kos-kosio echoed skeptically. “And what’d the demon look like?”

“Big and black,” the man stammered. “Big winged shadow.

I . . . I didn’t stay nearby to watch. He . . . it turned poor Mrs. Kelso into a tree!”

“Mrs. Kelso?” Kos-kosio Begulne repeated a couple of times, until he remembered the woman and the fate he had planned for her. Had Bestesbulzibar, the demon dactyl, the lord of the dark army, returned? Was this a signal from the dactyl that it was again with him, Kos-kosio, watching over his operation?

A shudder coursed up the powrie’s spine as he remembered the fate of a former leader of this band, a goblin named Gothra. In a fit of its all-too-typical rage, Bestesbulzibar had ripped the skin from the goblin while it remained alive to watch and to feel. That was when Kos-kosio had been put in charge, and the powrie had known from the beginning that this was a tentative command.

The powrie studied the tree closely, trying to remember, without success, if the sapling had been there all along. Had Bestesbulzibar really returned, or was it a trick? the ever-suspicious powrie wondered.

“Search all the area!” Kos-kosio ordered his minions, and when they started out cautiously, eyes darting about, the powrie roared even louder, promising death to any who did not hustle.

“And yerself, human dog,” Kos-kosio said to the man nearest the tree. “Pickup yer stinking axe and cut Mrs. Kelso down!”

The man’s horrified expression was convincing enough to bring a smile to the ugly powrie’s square-chinned face.

Roger realized he was taking a chance in coming back near the town, but with Mrs. Kelso safely on her way to Tomas and the others, he simply couldn’t resist the sport of it all. He relaxed comfortably, his back against a tree, as two stupid goblins wandered right below him. When that patrol had moved farther along and no others were in the immediate area, he moved in even closer, climbing into the same oak he had slithered around to get to Mrs. Kelso in the first place.

Then he watched contentedly. The humans were back to work—the two men who had been flanking Mrs. Kelso now shackled together—and the powries had returned to the town, leaving a handful of goblins to guard the humans, and another dozen or so of the nervous wretches searching the woods.

Yes, it was a perfectly wonderful situation, Roger mused, for never in his young life had he found so much fun.

CHAPTER 4

At the Gates of Paradise

Graceful and strong, Nightbird slipped down from Symphony’s side while the horse was in mid-gallop. The ranger hit the ground running, stringing Hawkwing as he went, while Pony, who had been sitting behind him on the horse, hopped forward, took up the reins and kept Symphony’s run true and in control, for the muddy ground was treacherous. She expertly veered the horse to the left, around the base of a wide mound, while Elbryan went right.

Before Pony and Symphony were halfway around, they spotted the trio of goblins they had been chasing. Two were far ahead, running wildly for the cover of a copse of trees, but the third had doubled back and was going around the mound the other way. “Coming fast!” Pony yelled and bent low on Symphony, angling the horse more sharply about the hillock.

Symphony broke stride as the goblin came staggering back out from behind the mound, clutching at the arrow lodged in its throat. A second arrow hit it in the chest, dropping it to the mud.

“They made for the trees,” Pony said to the ranger as he came running into sight. “They will lay up in there,” she reasoned.

The ranger slowed and glanced at the copse, then, apparently agreeing, he went to the dead goblin and began extracting his arrows. That done, he stood again and scanned the landscape, a curious expression crossing his handsome face.

“We can do a circuit of the copse,” Pony reasoned. “Find the best way to get in and strike at them.”

Nightbird seemed not to be listening.

“Elbryan?”

Still the ranger kept looking around, his mouth open now, his face full of wonderment.

“Elbryan?” the woman said again, more insistent.

“I know this place,” he replied absently, his gaze darting from spot to spot.

“The Moorlands?” Pony asked incredulously, her face scrunching with disgust as she looked around at the desolate region. “How could you?”

“I passed this very way on my road back to Dundalis,” he explained. “When I left the elves.” He ran to a nearby birch tangle, bending low as if he expected his long-ago campsite to still be under there. “Yes,” he said excitedly. “I slept here in this very place one quiet night. The gnats were horrific,” he added with a chuckle.

“The goblins?” Pony asked, nodding in the direction of the distant copse.

“I did find some goblins in here, but farther to the east, on the edges of the Moorlands,” Elbryan replied.

“I mean those goblins,” Pony said firmly, pointing ahead.

Elbryan waved his hand dismissively. The goblins were not important to him at the moment, not with that long-ago-traveled road coming clearer and clearer in his mind. He scrambled to the side, past Pony and Symphony, and looked over the splotchy brush and the rolling clay to the black silhouette of mountain tops just visible far in the west, their outlines silver under the light of the descending sun.

“Forget the goblins,” Elbryan said suddenly, grabbing Symphony’s bridle and leading horse and rider away, on a course that would bring them well to the side of the copse of trees and more directly in line with the distant mountains.

“Forget them?” Pony echoed. “We chased that tribe twenty miles, into the Moorlands and more than halfway through. I’ve got a thousand gnat bites swelling on every part of my body, and the smell of this place will follow us for a year to come! And you want me to just forget them?”

“They are unimportant,” Elbryan said without looking at her. “The last two out of thirty. With their score-and-eight companions slain, I doubt they’ll head back toward End-o’-the-World for some time to come.”

“Do not underestimate goblin mischief,” Pony replied.

“Forget them,” Elbryan said again.

Pony lowered her head and growled softly. She could hardly believe that Elbryan was leading her farther west, away from the Timberlands, even if he meant to dismiss the goblin pair. But she trusted him, and if her guess was right, they were closer to the western edge of the Moorlands than the eastern. The sooner they got out of this wretched, bug-ridden place, the better she would like it.

They went on for a short while, until the sun began to set over the distant mountains, then Elbryan went about the task of setting up camp. They were still in the Moorlands, still haunted by the buzzing insects, and, even more to Pony’s dislike, they were still too close to the copse of trees wherein the goblins had disappeared. She repeatedly tried to point this out to her companion, but he would hear none of it. “I must go to Oracle,” he announced.

Pony followed his gaze to the base of a large tree, one root pulled up out of the soft ground to create a small hollow underneath. “A fine place to be sitting when the goblins come charging in,” the woman replied sourly.

“There were only two.”

“You doubt that they’ll find friends in this wretched place?” Pony asked. “We could set our camp with thoughts of a quiet night, only to find that we are fighting half the entire goblin army before the dawn.”

Elbryan seemed to have run out of answers. He chewed his bottom lip for a bit, looking to the nearby tree, its hollowed base inviting him to Oracle. He had to go to Uncle Mather, he felt, and soon, before the images of that long-lost trail faded from his thoughts.

“Go and do what you must,” Pony said to him, recognizing the true dilemma etched on his face. “But give me the cat’s-eye. Symphony and I will scout about for any signs of enemies.”

Elbryan was genuinely relieved as he took the circlet from his head and handed it to the woman. It was a gift from Avelyn Desbris that he and Pony had been passing back and forth as needed. He couldn’t use it in Oracle anyway; it would defeat the whole mood of the meditation, for the gemstone set in the front of the circlet, a chrysoberyl, more commonly known as cat’s-eye, would allow the wearer of the circlet to see clearly in the darkest of nights, even in the darkest of caves.

“You owe me for my indulgence,” Pony informed him as she placed the circlet about her thick mop of blond hair. Her tone, and the sudden grin that lifted the edges of her mouth, told the ranger what she might have in mind, a notion reinforced when she hopped over to him a moment later and kissed him passionately.

“Later,” she said.

“When we are not surrounded by goblins and insects,” Elbryan agreed.

Pony swung up onto Symphony’s saddle. With a wink at Elbryan, she turned the horse about and trotted away into the growing gloom—but with the cat’s-eye securely in place, the images before her remained distinct.

Elbryan watched her go with the deepest affection and respect. This was a trying time for the young ranger, a time when all his skills, physical and mental, were being put to the absolute test every day. Every decision could prove tragic; every move he made could give his enemies the advantage. How glad he was to have Pony, so thoughtful, so skilled, so beautiful, at his side.

He sighed when she passed out of sight, then turned to the business at hand: the construction of a proper sight for Oracle and a meeting with Uncle Mather.

It didn’t take Pony long to discern that the goblins had not given up the chase, and had in fact begun trailing her and Elbryan. And the tracks she found when she circled back indicated that the goblin pair had indeed found some friends, more goblins, perhaps as many as a dozen. Pony looked ahead, back toward her camp, which was now no more than a mile away. She would be hard-pressed to ride by the goblins and get to Elbryan in time, she realized.

“Oracle,” she said, shaking her head and giving a great sigh. She bade Symphony to stay put, then reached into her pouch for her malachite. She slipped her feet out of the stirrups as she put her thoughts into the gem, summoning its power. Then she began to rise, slowly, into the nighttime sky, hoping the darkness was complete enough to keep her hidden from sharp goblin eyes.

She had only gone up about twenty feet when she spotted the creatures, gathered about a small, well-concealed fire in another copse of trees, barely a couple hundred yards from her position. They hadn’t settled for the night, she knew, but were up and agitated, sketching in the dirt—probably approach routes or searching routes—pushing each other and arguing.

Pony didn’t want to expend too much of her magical energy, so she gradually released the malachite’s levitational powers, drifting back down to land atop Symphony. “Are you ready to have some fun?” she asked the horse, replacing the malachite in her pouch and taking out two different stones.

Symphony nickered softly and Pony patted his neck. She had never tried this particular trick before, and especially not while taking a horse in with her, but she was brimming with confidence. Avelyn had taught her well, and, given her newfound insights into the gemstones—an understanding that went beyond anything she had ever known—she believed with all her heart that she was ready.

She started Symphony walking in the direction of the goblin camp, then took up a serpentine and began gathering its magic. In her other hand she held both bridle and a ruby, perhaps the most powerful stone in her possession.

With the cat’s-eye, Pony picked her path carefully, a trail that would take her and Symphony in fast and hard. Barely twenty yards away, Symphony’s hoofbeats covered by the sounds of arguing goblins, the woman communicated her intentions to the horse via the turquoise, then kicked the powerful stallion into a dead gallop and let her own thoughts fall into the serpentine, bringing up a glowing white shield about her and the horse, making it look as though she and Symphony had fallen into a vat of a sticky, milky substance.

Pony only had seconds to secure the shield about them both, to switch hands on the bridle and bring the ruby up high dropping the serpentine shield about the ruby, then completing the protective bubble about her hand under the gemstone.

Goblins howled and reached for their weapons, diving and rolling as horse and rider thundered into their midst. One ugly brute had a spear up and ready to throw.

Pony paid it no heed, could see nothing but the red swirls within the ruby, could hear nothing but the wind in her ears and the simmering, mounting power of the gemstone.

Symphony ran straight and true, right to the goblins’ fire, then skidded to an abrupt halt and reared.

Goblins shouted; some charged, some continued to scramble away. Not far enough away.

Pony loosed the destructive power of the ruby, a tremendous, concussive fireball that exploded out from her hand, engulfing goblin and tree alike in a sudden blazing inferno.

Symphony reared again and whinnied, pulling wildly. Pony held on and called comforting words to the horse, though she doubted that Symphony could even hear her through the tremendous roar of the blaze, or even sense her calming thoughts with the sheer commotion of the conflagration. Pony could hardly see, smoke rolling all about, but she urged Symphony forward, and so solid was her serpentine shield that neither she nor the great horse felt any heat whatsoever. They passed by one fallen goblin, the one who had raised its spear to throw, and Pony looked on in disgust as the blackened creature, still holding fast the charring spear, settled, its super-heated chest collapsing with a crackle.

Soon after, horse and rider came out of the copse, into the cooler night, and moved away, an exhausted and coughing Pony dropping the protective shield. “Oracle,” she said again and sighed again, glancing back at the blaze.

No goblins would emerge from that catastrophe, she knew.

When she got back to her camp, she found Elbryan standing on the edge, staring at the continuing fire nearly a mile away.

“Your doing,” he stated more than asked.

“Somebody had to see to the goblins,” Pony replied, slipping down from the still-agitated black horse. “And it should interest you to know that their numbers had swelled.”

Elbryan gave her a disarming grin. “I had confidence that you could handle whatever situation arose,” he said.

“While you played at Oracle?”

The smile left the ranger’s face and he shook his head slowly. “No play,” he said gravely. “A search that might save all the world.”

“You are being very mysterious this night,” Pony remarked.

“If you took a moment from your insults and considered the tales I told you about my time away from Dundalis, you would begin to understand.”

Pony cocked her head and regarded the man, the ranger, the elven-trained ranger.

“Juraviel?” she asked suddenly, breathlessly, referring to an elf she had once known, friend and mentor to Elbryan.

“And his kin,” Elbryan said, nodding his chin toward the west. “I believe that I have remembered the road back to Andur’Blough Inninness.”

Andur’Blough Inninness, Pony echoed in her mind. The “Forest of Cloud” wherein lay Caer’alfar, home to the Touel’alfar, the slight, winged elves of Corona. Elbryan had told her many tales of the enchanted place, but always answered her pleas to go there with a frustrated reply that he could not recall the trail, that the elves desired their privacy even from him, the one they named Nightbird, a ranger trained in their home. If he was right now, if he could indeed find the trail back to the elven home, then his words about the unimportance of a couple of goblins suddenly rang with more conviction.

“We shall set off in the morning,” Elbryan promised into her eager expression. “Before the dawn.”

“Symphony will be packed and waiting,” Pony replied, her blue eyes twinkling with excitement.

Elbryan took her hand and led her to the small tent they shared. “Have you any enchantments which will repel insects?” he asked on a whim.

Pony considered the thought for a moment. “A fireball would give us a short reprieve,” she replied.

Elbryan glanced back to the east, to the still-burning, thoroughly decimated copse, then scrunched up his face and shook his head. He’d suffer the inconvenience of a few thousand gnats.

No goblins bothered them the rest of that night, nor the next day as they exited the Moorlands through the western border. Both rode atop Symphony as soon as the ground became more firm, and Elbryan pushed the horse at a swift pace. Joined telepathically through the turquoise, the ranger understood that Symphony wanted to run hard, had been born to run hard. And so they made their swift way, setting camps for only short hours in the darkest part of the night, and, on Elbryan’s insistence, avoiding any goblins or giants or powries, or any other distraction. His purpose was singular now, while the ever-elusive trail to Andur’Blough Inninness remained clear in his thoughts, and Pony didn’t argue with the wisdom of trying to enlist the elves in their continuing struggle.

And there was an added benefit for the woman. With all the enchanting tales Elbryan had told of his days training as a ranger, she dearly wanted to see the elven forest.

She used the reprieve from battle for another purpose, as well. “Are you ready to begin your new career?” she asked one bright morning, Elbryan breaking down the camp and grumbling that they had overslept and should have been on the trail before the dawn.

The ranger cocked his head curiously.

Pony held aloft the pouch of gemstones, and gave them a definitive shake when Elbryan’s expression soured. “You have seen their power,” she protested.

“I am a warrior, and no wizard,” Elbryan replied. “And certainly no monk!”

“And I am not a warrior?” Pony asked slyly. “How many times have I put you down to the ground?”

Elbryan couldn’t suppress a chuckle at that. When they were younger, children in Dundalis before the goblins came, he and Pony had wrestled several times, with Pony always emerging the victor. And once, after being caught by the hair by Elbryan, the girl had even laid the boy out cold with a punch to the face. The memories, even of the knockout, were the brightest of all for Elbryan, for then had come the dark time, the first goblin invasion, and he and Pony had been separated for so many years, each thinking the other dead.

Now he was Nightbird, among the finest warriors in all the world, and she was a wielder of magic, a wizard trained in the use of the sacred gemstones by Avelyn Desbris, who had been perhaps the most powerful magic-wielder in all the world.

“You must learn them,” Pony insisted. “At least a bit.”

“You seem to do well with them on your own,” Elbryan replied defiantly, though he was privately a bit intrigued by the prospects of using the powerful gemstones. “Would we not be weakened as a fighting team if some of the stones were in my possession?”

“That would depend on the situation,” Pony answered. “If you get wounded, I can use the soul stone to mend your injuries, but what if I get wounded? Who will heal me? Or would you just leave me sitting against a tree to die?”

The image conjured by that thought nearly buckled Elbryan’s knees. He couldn’t believe that neither he nor Pony had thought of that possibility before—at least not enough to do anything about it. All objections gone, he said, “We must be on the trail.” He held his hand up as Pony began her expected protest. “But with every meal and every break, I will be tutored, particularly with the soul stone,” he explained. “All our waking hours will be filled, then, with traveling and learning.”

Pony considered that for just a moment, and nodded her agreement with the concession. Then, with a sudden wistful smile, she took a step closer to Elbryan, hooked her finger in the top of his tunic and pursed her sensual lips. “Every waking moment?” she asked coyly.

Elbryan couldn’t find the breath to reply. That was what he most loved about this woman: her ability to keep him always off-balance, to surprise him and entice him with the simplest statements, with movements subtly suggestive. Every time he thought he was planted firmly in the ground, Pony found away to make him realize that the ground was as tentative as the shifting silt of the Moorlands.

They were late for the trail, the ranger knew, and he knew, too, that they wouldn’t be going anywhere for a little while.

What struck them most was the pure majesty of the mountains—there was simply no other word for it. They walked along rocky trails, with Elbryan in the lead, checking the trail and watching for tracks. Pony, walking behind, held Symphony by the bridle, though with its telepathic connection to both these humans, the horse would have followed anyway. Neither Elbryan nor Pony spoke, for the sound of voices seemed out of place here, unless those voices were raised in glorious song.

All about them great mountains reached up their white caps of snow to touch the sky. Clouds drifted by, sometimes above them, sometimes below them, and often they walked right through the gray air. The wind blew constantly, but it only dulled the sound even more, making this majestic place utterly silent, utterly serene. So they walked and they looked, and were humbled by the sheer power and glory of nature.

Elbryan knew he was on the right trail, knew he was closing in on his intended destination. This place, so powerful, so overwhelming, felt like Andur’Blough Inninness.

The trail forked, going up and to the left, down and to the right, around an outcropping of stone. Elbryan started left and motioned for Pony to move on to the right, figuring the paths would cross again soon enough. He was still climbing, and still veering left, when he heard Pony cry out. Down he sprinted, cutting over the rough ground between the paths, leaping atop any boulders in his path and springing away, as surefooted as any mountain cat. How often Nightbird had run along such terrain during his years of training with the Touel’alfar!

He slowed his pace when he spotted Pony standing calmly with Symphony by her side. When he got up beside her and followed her gaze over the lip of a steep descent, he understood.

There was a valley below them, obviously, but it was hidden from view by a wall of thick fog, an unbroken blanket of gray.

“It cannot be natural,” Pony reasoned. “No cloud as I have ever seen.”

“Andur’Blough Inninness,” Elbryan replied breathlessly, and when he finished his statement, the corners of his mouth rose in a wide smile.

“The Forest of Cloud,” Pony added, the common translation of the elven words.

“There is a cloud above it all the day, every day—” Elbryan started to explain.

“Not a cheery place,” the woman interrupted.

Elbryan gave her a sidelong glance. “But it is,” he replied. “When you want it to be.”

Now it was Pony’s turn to regard her companion curiously.

“I cannot even begin to explain it,” Elbryan stammered. “It seems so gray from up here, but it’s not like that underneath, not at all. The blanket is illusionary, and yet it is not.”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

Elbryan gave a great sigh and searched for a different approach. “It is gray down there, and melancholy, beautifully so,” he said. “But only if you want it to be. For those who prefer a day in the sun, there is plenty to be found.”

“The gray blanket looks solid,” Pony remarked doubtfully.

“Appearances are often far from the truth where the Touel’alfar are concerned.”

Pony couldn’t miss the reverence with which Elbryan spoke of the elves, and having met a couple of them, she could understand his respect—though she wasn’t so enamored of them, and in truth found them to be a bit arrogant and callous. Still, looking at Elbryan now, she noticed that he was beaming, as obviously delighted and charmed as she had ever seen him.

And the source of that charm, she knew, was right below them. She stopped her arguing then, taking the ranger at his word.

“It was not until this very moment that I realized how much I miss my days in Caer’alfar,” Elbryan said quietly. “Or how much I miss Belli’mar Juraviel, and even Tuntun, who made my life quite difficult in those years.”

Pony nodded grimly at the mention of Tuntun, the gallant elf maiden who had given her life in Aida saving Elbryan and her from one of the demon dactyl’s monstrous creations, the spirit of a man encased in magma.

Elbryan chuckled, stealing the somber mood.

“What is it?” Pony prompted.

“The milk stones,” the ranger replied.

Pony looked at him curiously; he had told her quite a bit about his days with the elves, but had only mentioned the milk stones in passing. Day after day, week after week, month after month, young Elbryan had spent his mornings with the stones. They were sponge-like, though harder and more solid. Each day they would be placed in a bog, where they would soak up the liquid. It was Elbryan’s job to fish them out and carry them to a trough, where he would squeeze the now-flavored water out of them, a concoction that the elves used to create a sweet and potent wine.

“The warmth of my meal would depend on how fast I could get those stones milked,” Elbryan went on. “I would gather a basket and run to the trough, then return again and again until I had collected my quota. Meanwhile, the elves would set out my meal, piping hot.”

“But you were not fast enough and had to eat it cold,” Pony teased.

“At first,” Elbryan admitted in all seriousness. “But soon enough I could complete my task fast enough to burn my tongue.”

“And so you ate many a hot meal.”

Elbryan shook his head and smiled wistfully. “No,” he replied. “For Tuntun was always there, setting traps, slowing me down. Sometimes I was the trickier, and got the meal hot. Many times I wound up sitting in the brush, my feet entangled by invisible elven cords, and often right in view of the meal, watching the steam go off the soup.” Elbryan could talk about it wistfully now, could remember with the wisdom of hindsight, with the knowledge of the great value of the often brutal lessons that the Touel’alfar had taught him. How strong his arms had become from squeezing those stones! And how resilient his spirit had become from dealing with Tuntun. He could laugh about it now, but the treatment had brought him near to blows with the elf many times, and had actually put him in a very real fight with her once—a fight that he lost badly. Despite the rough treatment, the humiliation and the pain, Elbryan had come to realize that Tuntun, in her heart, had only his best interests in mind. She was not his mother, not his sibling, and, at that time, not even his friend. She was his instructor, and her methods, however punishing, had been undeniably effective. Elbryan had come to love the elf maiden.

And now all that he had of Tuntun were his memories.

“Blood of Mather,” he said with a sneer.

“What?”

“That’s what she always used to call me,” Elbryan explained. “And, at first, she always edged it with heavy sarcasm. Blood of Mather.”

“But you soon proved to her that it was a true enough title,” came a melodious voice from within the shroud of fog, and not so far below the pair.

Elbryan knew that voice; so did Pony. “Belli’mar!” they called together.

Belli’mar Juraviel answered that call, emerging from the fog blanket, his gossamer wings beating to help him navigate the steep angle of the mountainous slope. The sheer beauty of the elf, his golden hair, his golden eyes, his angular features and lithe form, gave both humans pause and added to the already majestic aura of this place. Elbryan and Pony could almost hear music with every one of Juraviel’s short, hopping steps, with every beat of his nearly translucent wings. His movements were a dance of harmony, of perfect balance, a compliment to Nature itself.

“My friends,” the elf greeted them warmly, though there was also an edge to his voice that rang unfamiliar to Elbryan. Juraviel had started with them on the quest to Aida, as the sole representative of the elven race, but sacrificed his place in the journey to serve as a guide for a band of haggard refugees.

Elbryan walked over and clasped hands with the elf, but the ranger’s smile did not hold. He would have to tell Juraviel of the fate of his friend, for the elves had not known that Tuntun was following the band. The ranger glanced back to his companion, his expression revealing his distress to Pony.

“You know that the demon dactyl has been defeated?” Pony asked, to get things moving.

Juraviel nodded. “Though the world remains a dangerous place,” he answered. “The dactyl has been thrown down, but the fiend’s legacy lives on, in the form of a monstrous army rampaging through the civilized lands of your human kin.”

“Perhaps we should talk about these dark matters down in the valley,” Elbryan put in. “Hope is ever-present under the fair boughs of Caer’alfar.” He started moving down the slope, but Juraviel put out a hand to stop him, and the elf’s suddenly grim expression showed that there was no possibility of debate on this subject.

“We will speak here,” the elf said quietly.

Elbryan stood straight and studied his friend for a long moment, trying to decipher the emotions behind the unexpected declaration. He saw pain there, and a bit of anger, but not much else. Like all the elves, Juraviel’s eyes possessed that strange and paradoxical combination of innocence and wisdom, of youth and great age. Elbryan would learn nothing more until Juraviel offered it openly.

“We have killed many goblins and powries, even giants, on our passage back to the south,” the ranger remarked. “Yet it seems as if we have made little progress against the hordes.”

“The defeat of the dactyl was no small thing,” Juraviel offered, a hint of his smile returning. “ ’Twas Bestesbulzibar who bound the three races together. Our . . . your enemies are not so well organized now, and fight with each other as much as they battle the humans.”

Elbryan hardly heard the rest of the sentence after the elf had shifted possession of the enemies solely to Elbryan’s people. The Touel’alfar had stepped out of the fight, he realized then, and that was something the world could ill afford.

“What of the refugees you escorted?” Pony asked.

“I delivered them to Andur’Blough Inninness safely,” Juraviel replied. “Though we were accosted by the demon dactyl itself—a meeting in which I never would have survived had not Lady Dasslerond personally come forward from the elven home to stand beside me. We did get through to safety, and those beleaguered people have been delivered back to the southland with their kin, safe.” Juraviel managed a chuckle as he finished the thought. “Though they returned south lacking quite a few of their more recent memories.”

Elbryan nodded, understanding that the elves could work a bit of their own magic, including some to erase directions, as they had enacted that magic on him. Lady Dasslerond meant to keep the location of her valley secret at any costs. Perhaps that was why Juraviel was upset at his appearance here; perhaps, by returning, he had violated some elven code.

“As safe as any can be in these times,” Pony remarked.

“Indeed,” said the elf. “But safer now than before, due to the efforts of Elbryan and Jilseponie, and to the sacrifices of Bradwarden the centaur and Avelyn Desbris.” He paused and took a deep breath, then looked Elbryan squarely in the eye. “And of Tuntun of Caer’alfar,” he finished.

“You know?” the ranger asked.

Juraviel nodded, his expression grave. “We are not numerous. My people and our community are joined in many ways which humans cannot begin to understand. We learned of Tuntun’s death as Tuntun realized it. I trust that she died valiantly.”

“Saving us both,” Elbryan was quick to say. “And saving the quest. Were it not for Tuntun, Pony and I would have perished before we ever reached the lair of the dactyl.”

Juraviel nodded and seemed satisfied with that answer, a great peace washing over his fair features. “Then Tuntun will live on in song forever,” he said.

Elbryan nodded his agreement with the sentiment, then closed his eyes and imagined the elves, gathered in a field in the valley, under a starry sky, singing of Tuntun.

“You should tell me the details of her death,” Juraviel said. “But later,” he added quickly, holding up his hand before Elbryan could begin. “For now, I fear, the business is more pressing. Why have you come here?”

The bluntness of his question, the almost accusing tone, set Elbryan back on his heels. Why had he come? Why wouldn’t he, once he had remembered the way? It had never occurred to Elbryan that he might not be welcomed in Andur’Blough Inninness, a place he considered as much his home as any he had ever known.

“This is not your place, Nightbird,” Juraviel explained, trying to sound friendly, sympathetic even, though the mere words he spoke could not help but wound Elbryan. “And to bring her here without the permission of Lady Dasslerond—”

“Permission?” the ranger balked. “After all that we have shared? After all that I have given to your people?”

“It was we who gave to you,” Juraviel promptly corrected.

Elbryan paused and thought it over. Indeed, the Touel’alfar had given him much, had raised him from a boy, had trained him as a ranger. But the generosity had been reciprocal, the young ranger now realized, as he considered the relationship in the sober tones of Juraviel’s attitude. The elves had given him much, that was true, but in return he had given to them the very course of his life. “Why do you treat me so?” he asked bluntly. “I had thought we were friends. Tuntun gave her life for me, for my quest, and did not the success of that quest benefit the Touel’alfar as well as the humans?”

Juraviel’s stern expression, exaggerated by his angular features, softened somewhat.

“I wield Tempest,” Elbryan went on, drawing forth the shining blade, a weapon forged of the secret silverel by the elves. “And Hawkwing,” he added, pulling the bow from his shoulder. Hawkwing was fashioned from the darkfern, a plant the elves cultivated and which leached the silverel from the ground. “Weapons of the Touel’alfar both,” the ranger went on. “Your own father crafted this bow for me, for the human friend and student of his son. And Tempest I rightfully carry, having passed the challenge of my uncle Mather’s ghost—”

Juraviel held up his hand to stop the speech. “Enough,” he begged. “Your words are true to me. All of them. But that does not change the details of this moment. Why have you come, my friend, unbidden, to this place which must remain secret?”

“I came to find out if your people will lend aid to mine in this time of great darkness,” Elbryan replied.

A great sadness washed over the face of Belli’mar Juraviel. “We have suffered,” he explained.

“As have the humans,” Elbryan replied. “Many more humans have died than Touel’alfar, if all the elves of Andur’Blough Inninness had perished!”

“Not many of my people have perished,” Juraviel admitted. “But death is only one measure of suffering. The demon dactyl came to our valley. Indeed, Lady Dasslerond had to take the foul fiend there to defeat it when it came upon me in my quest to rescue the refugees. The demon was sent away, but Bestesbulzibar, curse his name, left a scar upon our land, a wound in the earth itself that will never heal and that continues to expand despite all our efforts.”

Elbryan looked to Pony, and her expression was grave. He did not need to explain the implications.

“There is no place in all the world for us save Andur’Blough Inninness,” Juraviel went on somberly. “And the rot has begun. Our time will pass, my friend, and the Touel’alfar will be gone from this world, a children’s fireside tale to most, a memory for those descendants of the few, like Nightbird, who knew us well.”

“There is always hope,” Elbryan replied past the lump in his throat. “There is always a way.”

“And so we shall seek one,” Juraviel agreed. “But for now, our borders are closed to any who is n’Touel’alfar. If I had not come out to you, if you had descended into the mist that veils our home, it would have choked you and left you dead on the mountainside.”

Pony gave a surprised gasp. “That cannot be,” she said. “You would not kill Nightbird.”

Elbryan knew better. The Touel’alfar lived by a different code than did humans, one that few people could understand. To them, any who was not of their race, even those few selected to be trained as rangers, was considered inferior. The Touel’alfar could be among the greatest allies in all the world, would fight to the death to save a friend, would risk everything, as Juraviel had done with the refugees, out of compassion. But when threatened, the elves were unbending, and it didn’t surprise Elbryan in the least to learn that such a deadly trap had been set up to keep strangers from their land in this time of peril.

“Am I n’Touel’alfar?” the ranger asked boldly, looking Juraviel right in the eye. He saw the pain there, a profound disappointment within his elven friend.

“It does not matter,” Juraviel offered halfheartedly. “The mist distinguishes only physical form. To it, you are human, and nothing more. To it, you are indeed n’Touel’alfar.”

Elbryan wanted to press that point, wanted to hear how his friend felt about the situation. This was not the time, he decided. “If there was any way in which I might have asked permission to come, and to bring Pony, I would have,” he said sincerely. “I remembered the path, and so I came, that is all.”

Juraviel nodded, satisfied, then managed a sudden and warm smile. “And I am glad that you have,” he said cheerily. “It is good to see you again, good to know that you—and you,” he added, looking to Pony, “survived the ordeal at Aida.”

“You know of Avelyn and Bradwarden?”

Juraviel nodded. “We have ways of gathering information,” he said. “That is how I knew that two too-curious humans were approaching the warded borders of Andur’Blough Inninness. By all reports, only two forms, Nightbird and Pony, left the blasted Barbacan.”

“Alas for Avelyn,” Elbryan said somberly. “Alas for Bradwarden.”

“A good man was Avelyn Desbris,” Juraviel agreed. “And all the forest will mourn the passing of Bradwarden. Gentle was his song, and fierce his spirit. Often I would sit and listen to his piping, a melody so fitting to the forest.”

Both Elbryan and Pony nodded at that notion. When they were children in Dundalis, in better, more innocent times, they had sometimes heard the melodious drift of Bradwarden’s piping, though at that time they had no idea who the piper might be. The people of the two Timberland towns, Dundalis and Weedy Meadow—for End-o’-the-World was not in existence then—called the unknown piper the Forest Ghost and did not fear him, for they understood that no creature capable of making such hauntingly beautiful music would pose any threat to them.

“But enough of this,” Juraviel said suddenly, pulling the small pack from his back. “I have brought food—good food!—and Questel ni’Touel.”

“Boggle,” Elbryan translated, for Questel ni’Touel was the elvish wine made from the water filtered through the milk stones. It was sometimes traded through secret channels to humans under the name of boggle, an elvish joke signifying both the bog from which the liquid originally came, and from the state of mind it readily produced in the humans.

“Let us go and set a camp,” Juraviel offered. “Out of this wind and sheltered from the chill of the approaching night. Then we might eat and talk in a more comfortable manner.”

The two friends readily agreed, and both realized then that their previous agitation had only been due to the search for the magical valley. Now that the issue of Andur’Blough Inninness was decided, they could both relax, for neither feared any goblin or powrie, or even giant-inspired trouble, this close to the borders of the elven home.

When they sat down to eat, Elbryan and Pony found that Juraviel wasn’t exaggerating in the least concerning the quality of the food he had brought: berries, plump and sweet, fruit fattened under the gentle boughs of Caer’alfar, and bread flavored with just a touch of Questel ni’Touel. Juraviel hadn’t brought much with him, but it was immensely satisfying, and truly this was the finest meal that either of the weary travelers had enjoyed for many, many months.

The wine helped, too, taking the edge off the uncomfortable nature of their meeting, allowing Elbryan and Pony, and the elf, as well, to put aside the dangers of the continuing battle for just a while, to sit and relax and forget that their world was full of goblins and powries and giants. They spoke of times long past, of Elbryan’s training in the elvish valley, of Pony’s life in Palmaris and her time serving in the army of Honce-the-Bear’s King. They kept their chatter lighthearted, mostly relating amusing anecdotes, and many of Juraviel’s tales concerned Tuntun.

“Yes, I will find quite a bit of material for the song I plan for her,” the elf said quietly.

“A rousing war song?” Elbryan asked. “Or a song for a gentle soul?”

The notion of Tuntun being described as a gentle soul brought laughter bubbling to Juraviel’s lips. “Oh, Tuntun!” he cried dramatically, leaping to his feet, throwing his arms heavenward and taking up an impromptu song:

Oh gentle elf what poems hast thee written

To best describe thyself?

What lyrics spring from thy lips to Nightbird’s waiting ears?

But since you hold his head in the trough, ’tis doubtful he can hear!

Pony howled with laughter over that one, but Elbryan fixed a nasty stare over his friend.

“What troubles you, my friend?” Juraviel prompted.

“If I remember correctly, it was not Tuntun, but Belli’mar Juraviel, who put my head in the trough,” the ranger replied grimly.

The elf shrugged and smiled. “I will have to write another song, I fear,” he said calmly.

Elbryan couldn’t maintain the facade, and he, too, erupted in laughter.

Their boggle-enhanced mirth rolled on for several minutes, finally dying away to quiet titters, the occasional chuckle. That was followed by simple, reflective silence, all three sitting, none moving to be the first to speak.

Finally Juraviel walked back over and plopped down across the small fire from Elbryan. “You should go to the south and east,” he explained. “To the towns halfway between Dundalis and Palmaris. There you are most needed, and there you will do the most good.”

“That is the battle line?” Pony asked.

“One of the battle lines,” Juraviel replied. “There is greater fighting raging in the far east, along the coast, and up north, in the cold land of Alpinador, where mighty Andacanavar holds the elven-bestowed banner as ranger. But I fear that Elbryan and Pony would be only minor players in those greater battles, whereas you two might turn the tide in the more immediate area.”

“The area closer to the borders of Andur’Blough Inninness,” Elbryan said slyly, suspicious of the elf’s motives.

“We do not fear any attacks from goblins or powries,” Juraviel was quick to reply. “Our borders are safe from that enemy. It is the deeper evil, the stain of the demon dactyl . . . He paused, his voice trailing away, letting the dark thought hang in the air.

“But you two should go to those towns,” he said at length. “Do for those folk what you did for the people of Dundalis, Weedy Meadow, and End-o’-the-World, and all the region might soon be freed of the legacy of the demon dactyl.”

Elbryan looked to Pony, and both gave a nod to the elf. Elbryan studied his diminutive friend closely then, seeking unspoken signals that would clue him in to the importance of it all. He knew Juraviel well, and had a feeling that many things were not as set in stone as the elf had indicated.

“You two are formally betrothed?” Juraviel asked suddenly, catching Elbryan off his guard.

Pony and Elbryan looked to each other. “In our hearts,” the ranger explained.

“There has not been time nor opportunity,” Pony said, and then with a great sigh she added, “We should have asked Avelyn to perform the ceremony. Could any have been more fitting to such a task than he?”

“If you are married in your hearts, then married you are,” Juraviel decided. “But there should be a ceremony, a formal declaration made openly, to friend and to kin. It is more than a legality, and more than a celebration. It is a declaration, openly made, of fidelity and undying love, a proclamation to all the world that there is something higher than this corporeal form, and a love deeper than simple lust.”

“Someday,” Elbryan promised, staring at Pony, the only woman he believed he could ever love, and understanding every word Juraviel had just said.

“Two ceremonies!” Juraviel decided. “One for your human companions, one for the Touel’alfar.”

“Why would the Touel’alfar care?” Elbryan said, a hint of anger in his tone, which surprised both his companions.

“Why would we not?” Juraviel replied.

“Because the Touel’alfar care only for the affairs of the Touel’alfar,” Elbryan reasoned.

Juraviel started to protest, but saw where the trap was leading and only laughed instead.

“You do care,” Elbryan said.

“Of course,” Juraviel admitted. “And glad I am, and glad are all the elven folk of Caer’alfar, that Elbryan and Jilseponie survived the quest to Aida and have found each other. To us, your love is a shining light in a dark world.”

“That is how I knew,” Elbryan said.

“Knew what?” Juraviel and Pony asked together.

“That I . . . we,” he corrected, indicating Pony, “are not n’Touel’alfar. Not in the eyes of Belli’mar Juraviel.”

The elf gave a great, exaggerated sigh. “I admit it,” he said. “I surrender.”

“And that is how I know the other thing, as well,” Elbryan said, grinning from ear to ear.

“And what is that?” Juraviel asked, his tone one of feigned disinterest. “What else does the wise Nightbird know?”

“That Belli’mar Juraviel intends to accompany us to the south and east,” Elbryan replied.

That widened Juraviel’s eyes. “I had not considered that!”

“Then do,” Elbryan instructed, “because we, all three, leave at first light.” He rolled back from the fire then, nestling into his bedroll. “Time for us to sleep,” he said to Pony. “And time for our friend to go back to his valley, that he might tell his Lady Dasslerond that he will be away for a while.”

Pony, weary from the road and the wine, and content with the meal, was more than happy to fall back into her blankets.

Juraviel said not a word and did not move for some time. Before him, both Elbryan and Pony were soon breathing in the rhythms of a deep and contented sleep, and behind him, Symphony nickered softly in the quiet night. Then the elf was gone, slipping away silently into the darkness, running with his thoughts and running to his lady.

Quiet though he was, his departure woke Pony, whose sleep had become filled with troubling dreams. She felt the weight of Elbryan’s strong arm about her, felt the warmth of his body curled against her. All the world should have been warm and happy for her in that embrace.

But it was not.

She lay awake for a long while, and then Elbryan, too, as if sensing her anxiety, awoke.

“What troubles you?” he asked softly, nuzzling closer and kissing the nape of her neck.

Pony stiffened, and the ranger felt it. He pulled away and sat up, and she could see his dark silhouette against the starry sky. “I was only trying to be comforting,” he apologized.

“I know,” she replied.

“Then why are you angry?” he asked.

Pony considered that for a long while. “I am not angry,” she decided. “I am only frightened.”

Now it was the ranger’s turn to pause and reflect. He lay back down beside Pony, shifting to his back and looking up at the stars. He had never known Pony to be frightened—not since the day their homes were sacked, at least—and he was certain now that her fears were not based on any powries or giants, or even the demon dactyl. He considered her tenseness when he had touched her. She was not angry with him, he knew, but . . .

“You were quiet when Juraviel spoke of marriage,” he said.

“There was little you had not already said,” Pony replied, rolling over to face Elbryan. “We share hearts, and are of like mind.”

“But?”

Her face clouded over.

“You are afraid of becoming with child,” Elbryan reasoned, and Pony’s expression shifted to one of wonderment.

“How did you know?”

“You just said that we were of like hearts,” the ranger replied with a slight chuckle.

Pony sighed and draped her arm across Elbryan’s chest, kissing him softly on the cheek. “When we are together, I feel like all the world is wonderful,” she said. “I forget the loss at Dundalis, the loss of Avelyn and Bradwarden, of Tuntun. The world does not seem so terrible and dark, and all the monsters run away.”

“But if you were to become with child now, out here,” Elbryan said, “then those monsters would become all too real again.”

“We have a duty,” Pony explained. “With the gift the Touel’alfar gave to you, and the one Avelyn gave to me, we must be more to the folk than observers. How could I fight on if I become pregnant? And what life would our child know in these times?”

“How could I fight on if you could not remain beside me?” Elbryan asked, running his fingertips across her face.

“I do not wish to refuse you,” Pony said. “Ever.”

“Then I shan’t ask,” Elbryan replied sincerely. “But you told me that there were times each month when it was not likely that we would conceive a child.”

“Not likely?” Pony echoed skeptically. “What chance is acceptable?”

Elbryan thought on that for just a moment. “None,” he decided. “The stakes are too high, the cost too great. We will make a pact, here and now. Let us finish this business at hand, and when the world is put aright, we will turn our attention to our own needs and our own family.”

He said it with such simplicity, and such optimism that this pact would be a temporary thing, that the world would indeed be put aright, that a smile found its way across Pony’s troubled face. She snuggled closer then, wrapping herself around Elbryan, knowing in her heart that he would be true to his pact and that their lovemaking would wait until the time was right.

Both of them slept soundly the rest of the night.

Juraviel was back at the small camp when Pony awoke, to find their belongings already packed and in place atop Symphony. The sun was up, though still low in the eastern sky.

“We should already be on the road,” a sleepy-eyed Pony said through a yawn and a stretch.

“I gave you this one night of sleep,” Juraviel replied, “for I doubt you’ll find another anytime soon.”

Pony looked to Elbryan, still sleeping contentedly. Long and restful sleep, like other pleasures, would be a rarity now.

But only for a short while, she reminded herself determinedly.

CHAPTER 5

To Seek the Truth

The mountainous ring surrounding the Barbacan was fully twelve hundred miles from the stone walls of St.-Mere-Abelle, and that as a bird might fly. By road, in those places where a traveler would be fortunate enough to even find a road, the distance was much closer to two thousand miles, a trek that would have taken a conventional caravan twelve weeks to traverse—and that, only if the caravan ran into no unforeseen problems and did not stop a single day for any respite. In truth, any merchant planning such a journey would allow for three months of travel, and would have carried enough gold to replace his horse team several times. And in truth, in these dangerous times, with goblin and powrie forces running wild even along the normally tame areas of Honce-the-Bear, no merchant; not even the soldiers of the famous elite Allheart Brigade, would have made the attempt.

But the monks of St.-Mere-Abelle were not merchants or soldiers, and were possessed of magics that could cut tremendous amounts of time from their journey and keep them well-hidden from the eyes of potential enemies. And if it so happened they were discovered by goblins or other monsters, those magics would make them a formidable force indeed. The planning for such a journey from the abbey had already been done, centuries before. The monks of St.-Mere-Abelle were the original cartographers of Honce-the-Bear, and even of the Timberlands, northern Behren, southern Alpinador, and a good deal of the western reaches of the Wilderlands, as well. In those long past times, journey logs had been turned into travel guides, detailing supplies needed, magic stones recommended, and fastest routes. Those guides, in turn, were updated on a regular basis, and so Brother Francis’ biggest task that day after the repulsion of the powrie attack was to find the proper guide tomes, and convert the recommended supply figures to accommodate a party of twenty-five, the number of brothers that Father Abbot Markwart had determined would make the journey.

After vespers on only the second day, Brother Francis reported to the Father Abbot and the masters that the lists were complete and the route confirmed. All that needed to be done was rounding up the supplies—a task that Francis assured the Father Abbot could be done in a matter of two hours—and the naming of the journeying monks.

“I will lead the team personally,” the Father Abbot informed them, drawing gasps from Francis and all the masters, except for Master Jojonah, who had suspected that all along. Markwart was obsessed, Jojonah understood, and in such a state, his decision-making was greatly flawed.

“But Father Abbot,” one of the other masters argued, “this is unprecedented. You are the leader of St.-Mere-Abelle and all of the Abellican Church. To risk your safety on such a perilous trek—”

“We would risk less by sending the King himself!” another master protested.

Father Abbot Markwart held up his hand, silencing the men. “I have thought this through,” he replied. “It is fitting that I go—the greatest power of good sent to do battle with the greatest power of evil.”

“But surely not in your own body,” offered Master Jojonah, who had also done quite a bit of thinking on this very subject. “Might I suggest Brother Francis as a suitable vessel for your inquiries as to the progress of the troupe?”

Markwart looked long and hard at Jojonah, the Father Abbot obviously caught off his guard by the perfectly reasonable suggestion. With a telepathic connection between the two bodies, facilitated by a soul stone, physical distance would mean little. Father Abbot Markwart could make the trip, or could check in on its progress personally—in spirit—without ever leaving the comfort of the abbey.

“You would be honored at such a position, would you not, Brother Francis?” Master Jojonah went on.

Brother Francis’ eyes shot daggers at the sly master. Of course he would not be “honored” by such a position, something that he, and Jojonah, understood well. Possession was a horrible thing indeed, and nothing to ever be desired. Even worse, Francis knew that serving as a mere vessel for Markwart would reduce his role significantly, should he be chosen to go along on the journey. How could he be placed in any position of leadership, after all, if there was the possibility that he would not even be there, if his spirit and will were thrown out into empty limbo while Markwart used his body?

Brother Francis looked from Master Jojonah to the Father Abbot, to the other seven masters in attendance, all of them eyeing him expectantly. How could he refuse such a proposal? His angry gaze fell back over Jojonah, the younger monk staring unblinkingly at the master even as he mouthed, through gritted teeth, “Of course it would be the highest honor that any brother could expect or desire.”

“Well done, then,” the victorious Jojonah said, clapping his hands. In one fell swoop he had prevented Markwart from leading the caravan and had put the too-ambitious Brother Francis in his place. It wasn’t that Jojonah wanted to protect Markwart from any perils; far from that. It was simply that he feared the mischief Markwart might cause if the journey proved successful. More than a few speculations placed Avelyn Desbris at the scene of devastation in the north, and Jojonah feared that Markwart might cover whatever truth was to be found there with calculated tales that fell more in line with his hatred of Avelyn. If Markwart was in control of the caravan that reached the Barbacan, then Markwart would determine what had happened there.

“I do fear, though, that my work will have then been wasted,” Brother Francis added suddenly, even as Father Abbot Markwart started to speak.

All eyes turned to the young brother.

“I have planned the trip,” Francis explained—improvising, Jojonah and several others realized. “I am familiar with the course we must take and the amounts of supplies that should be remaining at each stop. Also, I am well-versed and, by all accounts, proficient with the stones, a necessary ingredient if we are to meet the timetable of three weeks offered in the guide tomes.”

“Twelve days,” Father Abbot Markwart said, drawing looks from all, and a gasp of disbelief from Brother Francis. “Our timetable will be twelve days?” the Father Abbot clarified.

“But . . .” Brother Francis started to respond, but if the old man’s tone left little room for debate, his glare left none, and the young monk wisely fell silent.

“And Master Jojonah is correct, and his suggestion is accepted as the wiser course,” Markwart went on. “Thus I will not go, but will look in on the expedition on a regular basis, through the willing eyes of Brother Francis.”

Jojonah was pleased by that announcement; he had feared that stubborn Markwart would hold out longer. He wasn’t surprised that his recommendation of Francis as the vessel had been accepted, though. The ambitious brother was one of the few in St.-Mere-Abelle trusted by the old Father Abbot, who had grown increasingly paranoid ever since Avelyn Desbris absconded with the gemstones.

“Since I will not personally, or at least not physically, lead the quest,” Markwart went on, “one of you masters must go.” His gaze drifted about the room, settling for a moment on eager De’Unnero before falling fully over Jojonah.

The portly old master returned that look with an incredulous expression. Surely Markwart would not choose him, he prayed. He was among the oldest of the masters of St.-Mere-Abelle, and was easily the least physically prepared for any long and hard road.

But Markwart did not back down from that gaze. “Master Jojonah, the senior master of St-Mere-Abelle, is the logical choice,” he said aloud. “With an immaculate to serve as his second, Brother Francis to serve as his third, and twenty-two others working the wagons and the horse teams.”

Jojonah stared long and hard at the Father Abbot as Markwart and the other masters began discussing which of the younger and stronger brothers would be best suited for the road. Jojonah offered no input into the selection process, just sat staring and thinking, and hating the man. Markwart had chosen him for no practical reason, he knew. He was being punished by the old man for his friendship and mentoring of Avelyn and for his continued arguments against so many of Markwart’s decisions on every issue, from the abbey’s role in the larger community to philosophical discussions about the true value of the gemstones and the true meaning of their faith. Markwart had voiced his displeasure with Jojonah on more than one occasion, had even once threatened a College of Abbots gathering to discuss, as he had put it, “Jojonah’s increasingly heretical way of thinking.”

Jojonah had almost hoped for that meeting, for he was convinced that many of the other abbots of the Abellican Church would see things his way. He saw the bluff for what it was, for he knew that Markwart probably feared the same judgments. Over the last few years, Markwart had purposefully lessened St.-Mere-Abelle’s contact with the other abbeys, and the last thing the old Father Abbot wanted was a showdown with the rest of the Church over philosophical matters.

Despite that, Master Jojonah had feared that Markwart would find a way to get back at him, and so, it seemed, it had come to pass. Twelve hundred miles in twelve days, with much of that time, no doubt, spent dodging disaster in the form of powries, goblins, and giants. And then the troupe would spend weeks, perhaps months, trying to decipher the riddles left behind in the inhospitable wasteland of the Barbacan, tormented by a climate, according to the tomes, where water might freeze even on a summer night, and surrounded by vast hosts of their enemies, perhaps even including the demon dactyl itself. They did not know, after all, whether the fiend had really been destroyed. It was all speculation.

Ambitious Brother Francis desperately wanted to make this journey—though with his own spirit inhabiting his own body—but for Master Jojonah, having passed the mark of his sixth decade and with no further aspirations for power or for glory, and certainly not for adventure, this was indeed a punishment, and quite possibly a death sentence.

There would be no debate, however. The twenty-two were selected quickly, based on their strengths both magical and physical. Most were fifth- or sixth-year students, men in the prime of their physical life, though a pair of immaculates, a tenth-year and a twelfth-year student, had been included.

“And your selection for your second?” the Father Abbot asked Jojonah.

The master took his time considering his options. The obvious choice, from a purely selfish point of view, would have been Brother Braumin Herde, a close friend and often a confidant. But Jojonah had to consider the wider picture. If this caravan met with disaster, a very real possibility, and both he and Braumin Herde were killed, that would leave Markwart virtually unopposed. The other masters, with the possible exception of Master Engress, were too entrenched in their trappings of power and wealth to even argue with the Father Abbot, and the other immaculates and even ninth year students were too ambitious, too much like Brother Francis.

Except for one, Jojonah mused.

“Must it be an immaculate?” he asked.

“I’ll not spare another master,” Father Abbot Markwart was quick to reply. His tone, full of surprise and with an edge of anger, revealed to Jojonah that he had expected and hoped that Jojonah would select Braumin Herde.

“I was thinking of one of Brother Francis’ peers,” Master Jojonah explained.

“Another ninth-year student?” Markwart asked skeptically.

“But we have selected two immaculates among the twenty-two,” Master Engress pointed out. “They may not take kindly to the fact that a ninth-year student has already been appointed as the third in rank.”

“Though they will accept it, since said ninth-year student is serving as the vessel for the Father Abbot,” another of the masters quickly and reverently put in, bowing his head in deference to Markwart.

Master Jojonah resisted the urge to run over and punch the man.

“But to give them a ninth-year student as a second, as well,” Master Engress continued, not to be argumentative, for that was not his nature, but only to play a necessary dissenting voice here.

Markwart looked at the master, who had stood up for the decision to name Francis as third, and gave a slight nod, one that Jojonah was sure the old man wasn’t even aware of doing, which tipped Jojonah off to the coming decision.

“Who did you plan to name?” Father Abbot Markwart asked.

Master Jojonah shrugged noncommittally. It was a moot point, as far as his journey was concerned, he realized, for Markwart had already made up his mind that no ninth-year student would serve as second. The Father Abbot was merely fishing now, he realized, trying to find out if there were any other potential troublemakers among the underlings at St.-Mere-Abelle, any other conspirators in Master Jojonah’s little gang.

“I only hoped that Brother Braumin Herde might accompany me,” Jojonah remarked offhandedly. “He is a friend, and one I consider a bit of a protégé.”

The Father Abbot’s face screwed up with confusion, his smug expression disappearing.

“Then what—” one of the masters started to ask.

“Brother Herde is no peer of mine,” Brother Francis interrupted. “He is an immaculate.”

Jojonah put on his best confused look. “Is he?”

Several masters began speaking all at once, most voicing their fears that their portly fellow might be going soft in more than the belly.

“You wanted Herde?” Father Abbot Markwart said loudly, calming the din.

Jojonah grinned and nodded sheepishly. “So he is a tenth-year student,” the master answered, feigning embarrassment. “The years do pass so quickly, and they all seem to blend together.”

The nods and chuckles about the table told Jojonah that he had managed to wriggle out of that tight spot. Still, he wasn’t thrilled about the fact that both he and Braumin Herde were going off together so far from St.-Mere-Abelle and so near to mortal danger.

Brother Braumin Herde was a handsome man with short black, curly hair and strong features, including dark, penetrating eyes and a face that was always shadowed by hair, no matter how often the man shaved it clean. He was not tall, but his shoulders were broad and his posture straight, giving him a solid appearance. He was into his early thirties, having spent more than a third of his life at St.-Mere-Abelle, and since his first love was for his God, many of the women in the area surely lamented that decision and devotion.

He glanced both ways along the corridor in the upper level of the abbey, then backed into the room, softly closing the door behind him. “I should be going on this journey,” he said in his rich and resonating voice, turning to face Master Jojonah. “Through my years of work, I have earned a place on the caravan to the Barbacan.”

“A place with me, or with Markwart?” Master Jojonah replied.

“You were given the pick of a second, and that after the others, not including me, had been selected,” Braumin Herde was quick to reply. “And you chose me, though I know that you meant to choose otherwise.”

Jojonah looked at him quizzically.

“I heard the story. You could not have forgotten that I was an immaculate, since you yourself presented me the scroll of honor,” Braumin reasoned. “You meant to choose Brother Viscenti.”

Jojonah rocked back on his heels, surprised that such detailed information concerning the meeting had already spread. He studied Brother Braumin carefully, and had never seen such pain and anger on the man’s face. Braumin Herde was a forceful and physically imposing man, all hair and muscle, and with a huge square jaw. His broad chest angled down in a V to a narrow waist, for there was nothing soft about him; it seemed as if he had been cut from stone, and there were few in all of St.-Mere-Abelle who could match him in feats of sheer strength. Master Jojonah knew him well, though, his inner being, his compassionate heart, and understood that the man was not a fighter. For all his great strength, Brother Braumin had never been anything exceptional in the martial training, a fact that had so often frustrated Master De’Unnero, who saw such potential in the man. To De’Unnero’s dismay, Brother Braumin was a gentle soul, and Jojonah was not worried that he might act out his anger now.

“You would have been my first choice,” the master answered honestly. “But I had to consider the implications of naming you. The road to the Barbacan is fraught with peril, and we have no idea what we might find when—if—we do get there.”

Braumin gave a deep sigh and his shoulders slumped a bit. “I am not afraid,” he replied.

“But I am,” said Jojonah. “What we two have come to believe must not die with us on a road to the Wilderlands.”

Braumin Herde’s disappointment could not hold against the logical reasoning and Jojonah’s clear concern. “We have to make certain that Brother Viscenti and the others understand,” he agreed.

Jojonah nodded, and the two stood silent for a long while, each considering the dangerous course they had taken. If Father Abbot Markwart came to know the level of what was in their hearts, if he came to realize that these two above all others in St.-Mere-Abelle saw his leadership as errant, and had even begun to question the entire direction of the Abellican Church, then he would likely, without hesitation, brand them as heretics and have them publicly tortured to death—an act not without precedent in the often brutal history of the Abellican Church.

“What if it is Brother Avelyn?” Braumin Herde asked at length. “What if we find him there alive?”

Master Jojonah gave a helpless chuckle. “No doubt, our orders will be to bring him back in chains,” he replied. “The Father Abbot will not suffer Avelyn to live, I fear, and will not rest easy until the gemstones Avelyn took are returned to St.-Mere-Abelle.”

“And will we bring him back?”

Again the helpless chuckle. “I do not know if we could restrain Brother Avelyn if we wanted to,” Jojonah replied. “You never had the pleasure of seeing Brother Avelyn at work with the magic stones. If we find that it was indeed he who caused the explosion in the north, if Avelyn destroyed the dactyl and is still alive, then pity us if we try to wage battle against him.”

“Twenty-five monks?” Braumin Herde asked skeptically.

“Never underestimate Brother Avelyn,” came the curt reply. “But it would not come to that, in any case,” Jojonah was quick to add. “I pray that we do find Brother Avelyn; oh, how I would love to see him again!”

“It would force conflict,” Braumin Herds reasoned. “If Brother Avelyn is alive, then we must take a side, either with him or with the Father Abbot.”

Master Jojonah closed his eyes, recognizing the truth of his young friend’s words. Jojonah and Herde, and, to a lesser extent, several others at St.-Mere-Abelle, were not pleased by Markwart’s leadership, but if they were to side with Avelyn, who had been called a heretic openly by the Father Abbot, and who would likely be formally branded as one in the College of Abbots that was to convene later that year, they would find themselves against the whole of the Church. Jojonah, believing in the righteousness of his position, didn’t doubt that many other monks—in St-Mere-Abelle, in St. Precious of Palmaris, and in all the other abbeys— might join in his cause, but did he really want to split the Church? Did he want to begin a war?

And yet, if they did indeed find Brother Avelyn alive, how could Jojonah in good conscience go against him, or even turn away from any others’ actions against him? Brother Avelyn was no heretic, Jojonah knew—in fact, was quite the opposite. Avelyn’s crime against the Father Abbot and against all the Church was that he had held a mirror up to them, showing them the truth of their actions when measured against the honest precepts of their faith. And the brothers, Markwart most of all, had not liked the image in that mirror. Not at all.

“I believe that it was Brother Avelyn in the Barbacan,” Jojonah said with confidence. “Only he could have gone against the demon dactyl. But which survived, if either, remains to be determined.”

“We have evidence that the dactyl is no more,” Braumin Herds replied. “The monster army has lost its direction and its cohesiveness. Powries and goblins no longer closely ally, by all reports, and we have personally seen their disarray in their attack on our walls.”

“Then perhaps the dactyl has been badly wounded, and we will go and finish the task,” Jojonah said.

“Or perhaps the demon is destroyed, and we will find Brother Avelyn,” Braumin Herde said grimly.

“If the dactyl is dead, and thus the business at the Barbacan finished, it is likely that Brother Avelyn will be far gone from that cursed place.”

“Let us hope,” said Braumin Herde. “We are not ready to go against the Father Abbot yet.”

That last statement caught Jojonah off guard and gave him pause. He and Herde had never discussed going against the Father Abbot at all. By the implications of all their conversations, they would hold fast to their beliefs about the way the Church should behave, and would funnel those beliefs to others through example and voice in council. But never once had they discussed, or even intimated, any formal plans to “go against” Markwart or the Church.

Braumin Herde caught the nonverbal cues and sank back a bit, embarrassed by his forward stance.

Jojonah let the slip pass with yet another chuckle. He remembered when he was younger, much younger, a firebrand like Herde, who thought he could change the world. The wisdom, or perhaps just the weariness, of age had taught him better, though. It was not the world Master Jojonah meant to change, not even the Church, but only his own little corner of both places. He would let Markwart have his direction, would let the Church follow the course that others decided. But he would remain true to his own heart, and would follow a course of piety, dignity, and poverty, as he pledged those decades ago when he had taken his vows at St.-Mere-Abelle. He would spread the word of truth to those younger monks, like Braumin Herde and Viscenti Marlboro, who wished to listen, but it was neither his intent nor his desire to see the Abellican Church split apart.

That was his fear.

And so Master Jojonah, the gentleman, the true friend of Avelyn Desbris, hoped that Avelyn was dead.

“We will be leaving in the morning,” Jojonah said. “Go to Brother Viscenti and reinforce all that we three have discussed. Bid him to study well and hard and hold fast to the truth. Bid him to always offer charity, to believers and unbelievers alike, to tend the wounds of the body and the soul for friend and for enemy. Bid him to speak out against injustice and excess, but to temper his voice with compassion. The good will win out in the end, by the truth of their words and not the swing of their sword, though that victory may be centuries in the making.”

Braumin Herds considered the wisdom of those words for a time, then gave a respectful bow and turned for the corridor.

“And prepare yourself well for the road,” Master Jojonah added before he opened the door. “Brother Francis speaks for the Father Abbot, and do not doubt the loyalty of the other twenty-two in our party. Rein in your temper, brother, or we will find trouble before we ever leave the civilized lands.”

Again Braumin Herde bowed respectfully, and he nodded as he came up straight, assuring his mentor that he would indeed heed the words.

Master Jojonah didn’t doubt that for a moment, for Herde, both firebrand and gentle soul, was a disciplined man. He knew Brother Braumin would do the right thing, and so would he, though Jojonah feared what the right thing might become should they find Brother Avelyn Desbris alive and well on the road.

“You know what I suspect, and what I expect,” Father Abbot Markwart said sharply.

“I am a willing vessel, Father Abbot,” Brother Francis said, lowering his eyes. “You will find entrance to my body whenever you so desire.”

“As if you could stop me,” the old abbot boasted. The words were hollow, Markwart knew, for possession, even with his new understanding of the stones, was a difficult thing, and even more so when the vessel was a man trained in the magics. “But this is about more than that,” he continued. “Do you understand the true purpose of this journey?”

“To discover if the dactyl was destroyed,” the younger monk replied without hesitation. “Or to see if ever there was a demon dactyl.”

“Of course there was,” snapped an impatient Markwart. “But that is not the issue. You are going to the Barbacan to determine the fate of the demon, that is true, but you are going, more importantly, to determine the whereabouts of Avelyn Desbris.”

Brother Francis’ face screwed up with confusion. He knew the Church sought Avelyn, knew it was suspected that Avelyn had been involved in the reputed explosion far to the north, but he never imagined that the Father Abbot would place Avelyn’s whereabouts as more important than the fate of the demon dactyl.

“The demon dactyl threatens the lives of thousands,” the Father Abbot conceded. “The suffering caused by the emergence of the beast is truly horrifying and regrettable. But the demon dactyl has appeared before and will appear again; the cycle of suffering is the fate of Man. Brother Avelyn’s threat, however, is more insidious, and potentially more long-lasting and more devastating. His actions and his tempting heretical viewpoints threaten the very foundations of our beloved Abellican Order.”

Still Francis appeared doubtful.

“From those few reports of his actions on the run, it seems that Avelyn masks his heresy with pretty words and seemingly charitable actions,” Markwart went on, raising his voice in frustration. “He disavows the importance of ancient traditions without understanding the value of such traditions and, indeed, the utter necessity of them if the Church is to survive.”

“My pardon, Father Abbot,” Brother Francis said quietly, “but I had thought that Avelyn was long on tradition—too long, some would say. I had thought that his errors went the other way, that he was so devoted to outdated rituals, he could not see the truth and the realities of the modern-day Church.”

Markwart waved his bony hand and turned away, chewing his lip, trying to find some way out of the logic trap. “True enough,” he agreed, then turned back fiercely, forcing Francis to back away a step. “In some matters, Avelyn was so seemingly devoted as to appear inhuman. Do you know that he did not even care, did not shed a single tear, when his own mother died?”

Francis’ eyes went wide.

“It is true,” Markwart went on. “He was so obsessed with his vows that the passing of his own mother was to him an unimportant matter. But do not be fooled into thinking that his actions were wrought of true spirituality. No, no, they were the product of ambition, as he proved when he murdered Master Siherton and absconded with the gemstones. Avelyn is dangerous to all the Order, and he, not the dactyl, remains the first order of business.”

Brother Francis thought it over for a few moments, then nodded. “I understand, Father Abbot.”

“Do you?” Markwart replied, in such a tone that Francis doubted himself. “Do you understand what you are to do if you encounter Avelyn Desbris?”

“We are twenty-five strong—” Francis began.

“Do not count on the Support of twenty-five,” Markwart warned.

That, too, gave Brother Francis pause. “Still,” he said hesitantly and at length, “there are enough of us to take Avelyn and return him and the gemstones to St.-Mere-Abelle.”

“No.” The simple manner in which Markwart replied put Francis on his heels yet again.

“But—”

“If you encounter Avelyn Desbris,” Markwart explained grimly, “if you even catch the slightest hint of his scent, you will return to me that which was stolen, along with the news of wandering Avelyn’s demise. You may bring me back his head, if possible.”

Brother Francis squared his shoulders. He was not a gentle man, and probably would have been ranked higher in his class except for several brawls he had been all too willingly involved in. Still, he never expected such a command from the Father Abbot of St.-Mere-Abelle. Francis was an ambitious and blindly loyal monk, though, and never one to let conscience get in the way of following orders. “I will not fail in this,” he said. “Master Jojonah and I—”

“Beware Jojonah,” Markwart interrupted. “And Brother Braumin Herde, as well. They serve as first and second for the journey to the Barbacan and in any matter concerning the disposition of the demon dactyl. Where Avelyn Desbris is concerned, if Avelyn Desbris is concerned, Brother Francis speaks for Father Abbot, and the Father Abbot’s word is unquestionable law.”

Brother Francis bowed deeply, and seeing the dismissive wave of Father Abbot’s hand, turned about and left the room, full of anticipation, full of possibilities.

The night was deep about St.-Mere-Abelle as Brother Braumin made his way across the upper levels of the ancient structure. Though his mission was vital—he had already passed word to Brother Viscenti to await his arrival in his private chambers—he took a circuitous route, moving through the long, long corridor that ran along the abbey’s seawall, overlooking All Saints Bay. With no torches burning along the structure’s outer walls, and none on the few docks far below, Braumin was afforded the most spectacular view of the evening canopy, a million million stars twinkling above the dark waters of the great Mirianic. He had been born too late, he mused as he stared out one of the tall and narrow windows, for he had missed the journey to Pimaninicuit, the equatorial island upon whose shores the monks of St.-Mere-Abelle collected the sacred stones. Such journeys only occurred every six generations, every 173 years.

Braumin Herde wasn’t even supposed to know the details of such things, for he was not yet a master, but Jojonah had told him the story of the most recent journey, of how Brothers Avelyn, Thagraine, Pellimar, and Quintall had traveled to the island aboard a chartered ship, the Windrunner. It was the subsequent destruction of the Windrunner by the monks as it sailed away from St-Mere-Abelle, its mission complete, that had set Brother Avelyn fully at odds with the Abellican Church, Master Jojonah had told Braumin. Looking out now, the young monk tried to imagine that scene, all the power, the ballistae and catapults, the tremendous energies of the ring stones, loosed upon a single sailing vessel. Braumin had witnessed St.-Mere-Abelle’s fury against the powrie invasion; he shuddered when he thought of that power brought to bear against a single ship and her unsuspecting crew.

What a fateful night that had been, the man mused. If Avelyn had not learned of the destruction, might he have remained a loyal and dedicated servant of Father Abbot Markwart? And if, as they suspected, Brother Avelyn had played no minor role in the possibly momentous events in the northland, in the Timberlands and all the way to the Barbacan, then what darkness would still hold the world fast in its grip if Avelyn had indeed remained at the abbey?

Braumin Herde sent his fingers through his tight-curled black hair. Everything had a purpose, his mother had so often told him. Everything happened for a reason. In the case of Brother Avelyn Desbris, those words rang true indeed.

He pushed away from the window and went on his way, moving quietly but swiftly along the corridor. Most of the monks were asleep now—it was required of the younger monks, and recommended for the older, though ninth- and tenth-year students could make their own curfew if they had important matters to tend to, such as penning passages from ancient texts, or, Braumin thought with a snicker, conspiring against the Father Abbot. Braumin, too, wanted to get to his bed as quickly as possible; he would be up before the dawn, and soon after that out on the road, a long and dangerous road.

He nodded when he saw a line of dim light underneath the door of Viscenti Marlboro’s room. His knock was gentle; he didn’t want to wake any in the nearby rooms, nor did he want to draw any attention to his presence at this man’s door.

The door opened; Braumin slipped inside.

Brother Viscenti Marlboro, a skinny and short man with darting dark eyes and perpetual stubble on his weathered face, was quick to close the door behind his friend.

Already’ rubbing his hands together, Braumin noted. Brother Viscenti was perhaps the most nervous person he had ever met. He was always rubbing his hands together, and always ducking his head as if he expected someone to slap him.

“You will both be gone, and both be dead,” Viscenti said suddenly, sharply, his squeaky voice seeming more fitting for a weasel or a squirrel than a man.

“Gone, yes,” Braumin conceded. “But for a month, two at the most.”

“If the Father Abbot has his way, you’ll not return,” Viscenti remarked, and he ducked low and spun about, and put a finger to his own pursed lips, as if speaking openly about Father Abbot Markwart would bring a host of guards bursting through his door.

Braumin Herde didn’t even try to hide his amusement. “If the Father Abbot wanted to move against us openly, he would have done so long before now,” he reasoned. “The hierarchy does not fear us.”

“They feared Avelyn,” Viscenti pointed out.

“They hated Avelyn because he stole the stones,” Braumin corrected. “To say nothing of his killing of Master Siherton. The Father Abbot despised Avelyn because in taking the stones, Avelyn took Markwart’s reputation, as well. If Father Abbot Markwart passes from this world with those stones unrecovered, then his time of leadership will be viewed by future Abellican monks as a failure. That is what the man fears, and no revolution because of Brother Avelyn.”

Brother Viscenti had heard it all before, of course, and he threw up his hands in surrender and shuffled across the floor, taking a seat at his desk.

“But I’ll not diminish the danger to myself and to Master Jojonah,” Braumin Herde said to him, taking a seat on the edge of Viscenti’s bed, a small and unremarkable cot. “Nor, in that event, should we diminish the responsibility that will fall upon your shoulders, my friend.”

Viscenti’s look was one of sheer terror.

“You have allies,” Braumin Herde reminded him.

Viscenti snorted. “A handful of first- and second-year novitiates?”

“Who will grow to ninth- and tenth-year students,” Braumin replied sternly. “Who will achieve their status as immaculates even as you, if you are wise enough, attain the rank of master.”

“Under the auspices of Father Abbot Markwart,” Brother Viscenti came back sarcastically, “who knows that I have befriended you and Master Jojonah.”

“The Father Abbot does not determine rank,” Brother Braumin replied. “Not alone. Your ascension, at least to master, is a foregone conclusion as long as you remain steadfast in your studies. If the Father Abbot went against that, he would be inviting whispers from every abbey, and from many of the masters of St.-Mere-Abelle. No, he cannot deny you a position.”

“But he decides upon assignment,” Brother Viscenti argued. “He could send me to St. Rontelmore in the hot sands of Entel, or even worse, he might assign me as a chaplain to the Coastpoint Guards in lonely Pireth Dancard, in the middle of the Gulf!”

Braumin Herde did not blink, only shrugged as if such possibilities did not matter. “And there you will hold fast to your beliefs,” he explained quietly. “There, you will keep our hopes for the Abellican Order alive in your heart.”

Brother Viscenti wrung his hands again, got up and began pacing about the room. He had to be satisfied with his friend’s answer, he knew, for their fates were not their own to decide. Not now. But still, it seemed to Viscenti as if the whole world was suddenly moving too fast for him, as if events were sweeping him along without a moment to consider his next move.

“What do I do if you do not return?” he asked in all seriousness.

“You keep the truth in your heart,” Brother Braumin replied without hesitation. “You continue to speak with those younger monks who share our tenets, fight back in their minds against the pressures to conform that they will know as they move higher in the Order. That is all that Master Jojonah has ever asked of us; that is all that Brother Avelyn would ever ask of us.”

Brother Viscenti stopped his pacing and stared long and hard at Braumin Herde. The man was right, he believed with all confidence, for he, like Brother Braumin Herde, like Master Jojonah, and like several other younger monks, had Avelyn’s spirit within him.

“Piety, dignity, poverty,” Braumin Herde recited, his Abellican vows. When Brother Viscenti looked at him and nodded, he added the one word that Master Jojonah, in light of Avelyn’s work, had secretly tagged on: “Charity.”

There was no fanfare, no general announcement, as the caravan of six wagons rolled through the gates of St.-Mere-Abelle. Four of those wagons carried five monks each, while another, full of supplies, held only the two drivers. The second in line was also manned by two monks, and held Master Jojonah, the maps and the logs.

The three monks in the back of the fourth wagon, including Brother Braumin and another immaculate, worked continually with gemstones, quartz mostly, though the other immaculate also held a hematite. They used the quartz, a stone for distance sight, to scout out all the area around the caravan, and if anything looked the slightest bit suspicious, the immaculate would then use the hematite to project his spirit into the area to better discern the situation. These three were the eyes and ears of the caravan, the guides to keep the wagons away from trouble, and if they failed, the monks would surely see battle, perhaps long before they had even left the so-called civilized lands of Honce-the-Bear.

They rode throughout the morning, traveling the northwestern road toward Amvoy, the small port across the great Masur Delaval from Palmaris. Normally such a large caravan would travel southwest, to Ursal and the bridges over the great river, for there were no ferries large enough to get them across to Palmaris in one trip. But the monks had their own methods; their line to the Barbacan would be as near to straight as possible, and with the magic stones, quite a bit was possible.

The horses, two for each wagon, were soon exhausted, some drawing breath so forcefully that they seemed near to death, for each wore a bridle set with magical turquoise that allowed the drivers to communicate with the animal, to push the beast beyond its limits with mental intrusions. They took their first break at noon, in a field off to the side of the road, an appointed rendezvous. Half the monks went to work on wheels and undercarriages immediately, tightening, straightening, while others prepared a quick meal, and the three with the scouting stones sent their eyes out wide to make contact. The Church was well-prepared for such undertakings as this journey, for all along the roads of Honce-the-Bear were allies, pastors of small congregations, missionaries, and the like. The previous day, several of St.-Mere-Abelle’s masters, using the maps and logs provided by Brother Francis, had used hematite to make contact with these strategically placed allies, informing them of their duties.

Within an hour of their noontime break a dozen fresh horses were brought to the field. Master Jojonah recognized the friar leading the procession, a man who had gone out into the world after a dozen years at St.-Mere-Abelle. Jojonah watched him from the flaps of his wagon cover and did not go out to greet the man, for familiarity would breed questions, he knew, questions it was neither this friar’s place to ask nor Jojonah’s to answer.

To the friar’s credit, he stayed no longer than the couple of minutes it took him and his five helpers to make the exchange.

Soon the teams were yoked, the supplies repacked, and the caravan on its way, running hard across the miles. In mid-afternoon they veered from the road, turning more to the north, and soon thereafter, amazingly, the great Masur Delaval was in sight, with more than seventy miles already behind them. To the south lay Amvoy, and across the twenty miles of watery expanse, beyond their sight, was the city of Palmaris, the second largest city in all of Honce-the-Bear.

“Take good meals and gather your strength,” Master Jojonah instructed them all. The monks understood; this would likely be the most difficult and taxing part of their journey, at least until the Timberlands had been left behind.

An hour passed, and though Brother Francis’ detailed itinerary had only allowed for that much of a respite, Master Jojonah made no indication that he meant to get them going.

Brother Francis came to him in his wagon. “It is time,” the younger monk said quietly, though firmly.

“Another hour,” Master Jojonah replied.

Brother Francis shook his head and began to unroll a parchment. Jojonah stopped him.

“I know what it says,” the master assured.

“Then you know—”

“I know that if we get halfway across that water and any of us weaken, we will lose a wagon, or all the wagons,” Jojonah interrupted.

“The amber is not so taxing,” Brother Francis argued.

“Not for one to walk across the water,” Jojonah agreed. “But to carry such a load?”

“There are twenty-five of us.”

“And there will remain twenty-five of us when we exit onto the river’s western bank,” Jojonah said sternly.

Brother Francis gave a slight growl and spun on his heel, starting away.

“We will travel long into the night,” Jojonah said to him, “using diamonds to light the way, and thus make up the time lost resting here.”

“And drawing attention to us with our beacons?” Francis asked sourly.

“Perhaps,” Jojonah replied. “But that is less a risk, by my estimation, than is crossing the Masur Delaval with weary brothers.”

Brother Francis narrowed his eyes and set his jaw, then turned about and left in a huff, nearly running over Brother Braumin Herde, who was on his way up the few stairs at the back of the wagon.

“We are not on his schedule,” Jojonah explained dryly as his friend entered.

“He will report this to the Father Abbot, of course,” Brother Braumin reasoned.

“It is as if Father Abbot Markwart were right here beside us,” said Jojonah with a great sigh. “The joy of it all.”

His frown melted into a smile, though, and then that turned into a laugh when Braumin Herde gave a chuckle.

Outside the wagon, Brother Francis heard it all.

An hour later, with a proper landing found along the banks of the river, and the sun riding low in the western sky, they were on the move again. Now Master Jojonah, the most seasoned and most powerful with the magical stones, led the way, with two first-year novitiates beside him and only a single driver up front. Eighteen of the twenty-five monks, all except for the actual drivers and one whose duties remained scouting with the quartz, were divided equally among the six wagons, the three in each joining hands in a ring about a piece of enchanted amber. They pooled their powers, sent their energy into the stone, calling forth its magical properties. Amber was the stone used for walking on water, and as each wagon rolled off the landing and onto the river, it did not sink, horses’ hooves and the bottom of the wheels making only slight depressions on the liquid surface.

The eighteen monks fell deep into their meditative trance; the drivers worked hard, constantly angling their teams to compensate for the current. But this part of the journey proved easy going. The ride was so very smooth, a gentle reprieve on the wagons, on the horses, and on the monks.

Less than two hours later Jojonah’s driver, using diamonds to light the course ahead, found a smooth and easy slope along the western bank and put his wagon back on dry ground. He went back then to inform the master, and Jojonah came out of his trance and moved outside for a good stretch and to watch the other five wagons come ashore, one by one. To the south, a handful of miles in the distance, the lights of Palmaris could be seen; to the north and west was only the darkness of night.

“The line will be tightened for our evening drive,” Master Jojonah informed them, “with no more than a single horse’s length between the back of one wagon and the noses of the team of the next. Go easy on the turquoise intrusions and take your rest and your last meal in the seat. We will ride long into the night, as long as the horses can take it, but at a comfortable pace. I wish to put twenty more miles behind us before we set a proper camp.”

He dismissed the group then, except for Brother Francis. “When do we next exchange horses?” he asked the young monk.

“Not until late afternoon,” Francis replied. “We may be taking a dozen fresh ones in exchange for only six who will ever be able to pull a cart again.”

“As it must be, so it shall be,” Master Jojonah said, and headed back for his wagon, truly regretting having to work the poor animals so hard.

CHAPTER 6

Underestimated

He thought it curious to find powrie sentries on the outskirts of Caer Tinella this late at night. Usually the dwarves and goblins moved back into the town proper soon after sunset. While the goblins, in particular, did favor the cover of night for their misdeeds, with the town secured, they normally used this active period to play their gambling games, drinking and shoving each other until fights inevitably broke out among them.

That was before Mrs. Kelso had supposedly been turned into a tree, though, an action the monsters attributed to their god figure, the demon dactyl. So now they apparently meant to be more vigilant, just in case the dactyl showed up to personally scrutinize their work.

Roger smiled; he was glad his little ruse had caused so much trouble for the wretches. As for the guards, he wasn’t overly concerned. He had come this way to go into Caer Tinella, and so into Caer Tinella he would go, whatever the powries might try to do to stop him. Oh yes, the guards would slow him down, he realized, but not in any manner they had foreseen.

The two powries stood calmly, one with its hands in its pockets, the other drawing deeply on a long-stemmed pipe. Roger noted that their caps shone a crimson hue, even in the dim light. These were seasoned veterans, he understood. Powries were called “bloody caps” for their practice of dipping their berets, hats fashioned of skin, often human, in the blood of their enemies. The berets were treated with special oils that would allow them to retain the color of the blood, with each new victim’s essence brightening the hue. Thus, a powrie’s standing could often be determined by the color of its cap.

Roger was repulsed by the sight and the implications of those shining berets, but he was not deterred. If anything, the realization that this pair had dipped their caps often only made him more determined. To his thinking, this little action would avenge those killed, at least a little bit. A low fire burned between the powries, and they had set three torches out a dozen feet in a semicircular pattern, leaving open only the short path back to the nearby town. Roger slipped beyond that semicircle, moving as silently as a cloud drifting across the path of the moon. As he passed by the circle, the town was open to him, but he turned about, moving in behind the dwarven pair, sliding down behind a hedgerow a few feet away. He waited there a few moments, making sure the powries were off their guard and that no others were in the immediate area. Then he slithered around the edge of the bushes, belly-crawling for his prey.

“Could use a draw myself,” one of the dwarves remarked, and it pulled one hand from its pocket, holding a pipe of its own.

Even as the dwarf’s hand came out, Roger’s fingers slipped in.

“Weed me up,” the dwarf said, handing the pipe to its companion. The other powrie took it and lifted a packet of pipe weed, while the first moved its hand back to its pocket—even as Roger’s hand came sliding out with a pair of gold pieces, the strange, eight-sided coinage of the Weathered Isles.

Roger smiled widely as the dwarf retrieved its pipe—with its other hand, thus opening the second pocket.

“You are sure?” Belster O’Comely asked for the tenth time.

“Saw them myself,” the man, Jansen Bridges, answered. “No more than an hour ago.”

“Big?”

“Could eat a man with room left in their bellies for his wife,” Jansen replied.

Belster stood up from his tree-trunk seat and walked to the southern edge of the small clearing that was serving as a base camp for the refugee band.

“How many went to town?” Jansen asked.

“Just Roger Lockless,” Belster replied.

“He goes in every night,” Jansen said in a somewhat derisive tone. Jansen had come from the north, with Belster’s group, and had never been enamored of Roger Lockless.

“Yeah, and we all eat the better for it!” Belster retorted, turning about to regard the man.

He saw then that Jansen’s tone was more wrought of frustration than of any anger aimed at Roger, and so the gentle Belster let it pass.

“If any can get by them, it’s Roger Lockless,” Belster continued, talking as much to himself as to Jansen.

“So we all hope,” said Jansen. “But we cannot wait to find out. I say we put another five miles between us and the dwarves, at least until we see how dangerous these new additions might be.”

Belster considered the notion for a short while, then nodded his assent. “Go and tell Tomas Gingerwart,” he instructed. “If he agrees that it is better we are on the road this very night, our group will be ready to march.”

Jansen Bridges nodded and moved off across the clearing, leaving Belster to his thoughts.

He was growing tired of it all, Belster realized. Tired of hiding in the woods and tired of powries. He had been a successful tavern-keeper in Palmaris, a town he had called home since the tender age of five, relocating with his parents from the southland near Ursal. For more than thirty years he had lived in that prosperous city on the Masur Delaval, working first with his father, a builder, and then on his own in a tavern business of his own making. Then his mother had died, peacefully, and less than a year later, his father, and only then had Belster learned of the debt his father left behind, a legacy that fell squarely on the large shoulders of the man’s only son.

Belster had lost the tavern, and was still in debt to the point where he would either have had to accept a decade of indenture to the creditors or go and rot for a like period in a Palmaris jail.

He had created his own third option instead, packing his few remaining belongings and fleeing for the wild north, to the Timberlands and a place called Dundalis, a new town being raised from the ruins of one destroyed by a goblin raid several years earlier.

In Dundalis, Belster O’Comely had found his home and his niche, opening a new tavern, the Howling Sheila. There weren’t many patrons—the Timberlands were not heavily populated, and the only visitors who passed through were the seasonal merchant caravans—but in the self-supporting lifestyle of the wilderness town, the man didn’t need much money.

But then the goblins had come back, this time with hosts of powries and giants. And so Belster became a fugitive again, and this time the stakes were much higher.

He looked back to the dark forest, in the direction of Caer Tinella, though the town was too far away, and beyond too many hills and trees, to be seen. The outlaw band could not afford to lose Roger Lockless, Belster knew. The young man had become a legend to the beleaguered refugees, their leader of sorts, though he was rarely among them, and even more rarely ever spoke to any of them. Since Roger’s daring rescue of poor Mrs. Kelso, that status had even increased, if possible. If Roger was caught and killed now, the blow to morale would be heavy indeed.

“What do you know?” came a question. Belster turned about to see Reston Meadows, another of his fellow Dundalis refugees, standing behind him.

“Roger is in town,” Belster replied.

“So Jansen told us,” Reston replied grimly. “And he told us of the new additions, too. Roger will have to live up to his reputation and more, I fear.”

“Has Tomas spoken on the matter?”

Reston nodded. “We will be on the move within the hour.”

Belster rubbed his thick jowls. “Take a pair of your best scouts and make for Caer Tinella,” he said. “Try to determine the fate of Roger Lockless.”

“You think that three of us might get in to save him?” Reston asked incredulously.

Belster understood the sentiment; few in the camp wanted any encounters with Kos-kosio Begulne and his tough powries. “I only asked you to learn of his fate, not to determine it,” the portly man explained. “If Roger was taken and killed, we will have to concoct a more fitting tale of his absence.”

Reston cocked his head curiously.

“For them,” Belster finished, motioning his chin in the direction of the encampment. “It did not break us when the Nightbird, Pony, and Avelyn went off for the Barbacan, but how heavy might our hearts have been if they were slain?”

Reston understood. “They need Roger,” he reasoned.

“They need to believe that Roger is working for their freedom,” Belster replied.

The man nodded again and scampered off to find two appropriate scouting companions, leaving Belster alone again, staring into the forest. Yes, Belster O’ Comely was tired of it all, particularly of the responsibility. He felt like the father of a hundred and eighty children, and there was one risk-taker in particular who kept his nerves tingling.

Belster dearly hoped that one troublemaker would return safely.

His booty secured, Roger began to slither away. As he crossed back into the brush, though, he noticed a length of coiled rope, one used by the slaves to haul logs. Roger couldn’t resist. He looped the middle of the rope around a sturdy tree trunk, then took both ends with him as he returned to the oblivious pipe-smoking powries.

He was back in the woods soon after. He decided that he would come back this way on his departure and startle the pair. If, as was usually the case with powries, they had not moved much in the meanwhile, they would find a bit of trouble, and Roger would find a bit of fun, when they took up the howling chase and the loops he had put about their feet tightened and they fell flat to the ground.

He might even be able to get back to them and snatch one of their precious caps before they managed to extricate themselves.

Roger filed the thoughts away for a later time; the town was in clear sight now, quiet and dark. A couple of goblins milled about, but even the central building, usually used for gambling, was quiet this night. Again Roger considered his ruse about the dactyl and Mrs. Kelso. The monsters were on their best behavior, fearing that their unforgiving master was about.

Given that on-guard stance, Roger almost wished he had used a different explanation concerning Mrs. Kelso’s disappearance.

Too late to worry about that now, the young man told himself, and into the town he went. He would be careful this night; instead of his normal rounds, moving from building to building, picking pockets—and often placing not-so-valuables in the possession of other monsters, just to see if he might start a fight—he went straight for the larders, thinking to get a good meal and to bring some food back out to the folk hiding in the forest.

The larder door was locked, its hoop handles wrapped in heavy chains and secured by a heavy padlock.

Where did they get that? Roger wondered, rubbing his chin and cheeks and glancing all around. And why did they bother?

With a bored sigh, Roger pulled a small pick out from behind his ear and slipped it into the padlock’s opening, bending low that he might better hear his work. A couple of twists, a couple of clicks later, and the lock popped open. Roger lifted it free and started to unwrap the chains, but paused and considered his actions. He wasn’t really hungry, now that he thought about it.

He glanced all about, taking in the silence, trying to measure the level of wariness in the town. Perhaps he could find a bit of sport this night. Then he could return and gather some food for his friends.

He took the lock and the chain, and left the door unopened.

Good fortune was with him, he realized before he had gone two steps, when he heard the low rumbling behind him. He skittered back to the door, bent low and put his ear to the wood.

Growling and snarling came from behind the door, and then, with sudden ferocity that stood Roger up straight in the blink of an eye, a loud and angry bark.

The young man sped away, slipping behind another building. He stashed the chains and lock—they were too noisy for flight—under a loose board along the alley, then went up to the roof, climbing easily and silently.

A powrie crossed the open ground to the larder door, cursing every step. “Bah, what’re ye howling about?” the dwarf grumbled in its stone-against-stone voice. The powrie reached for the door, but stopped and scratched its head, recognizing that something was missing.

“Drat,” Roger muttered when he saw the powrie run off, back the way it had come. Roger’s normal tactics would have called for him to sit tight, but the hairs on the back of his neck were prickling, his instincts telling him to get away, and quickly. He went down the far side of the building, then sprinted away into the darkness. Behind him, all through the town, torches went up, one after another, the commotion mounting, cries of “Thief!” echoing through the night.

Roger went from rooftop to rooftop, scrambled down one wall and up another, then over a split-rail fence into a corral on the northwestern edge of town. Down low, the young man picked his way among the cows, trying not to disturb them, touching them only gently and whispering softly, urging them to keep quiet.

He would have gotten through without incident; the resting cows weren’t overly concerned with him.

Except that not all of them were cows.

If Roger hadn’t been so concerned with waking powries and goblins, he would have realized that this was Rosin Delaval’s farm, and that Rosin had a bull, the most mean-tempered animal in all of Caer Tinella. Rosin usually kept the bull separate from the cows, for the bullying beast often hurt them and didn’t make it easy for him to go in and get any milk. But the powries did not separate the animals, taking sport in the wounded cattle, and in the antics of their goblin lessers whenever they sent the goblins in to get milk, or a cow for slaughter.

Roger, looking over his shoulder more than ahead, and walking through a veritable maze of cow bodies, gently nudged one beast aside, then pushed softly on another. He noticed immediately that this animal seemed sturdier than the others, and less willing to give ground.

Roger started to push again, but froze in place, slowly turning his head around to regard the animal.

The bull, all two thousand pounds of it, was half asleep, and Roger, thinking that to be a half too little, backed away slowly and quietly. He bumped into a cow, and the animal moaned its complaint.

The bull snorted, its huge, horned head swinging about.

Roger darted away, cutting a path right behind the spinning bull, then turning back, right behind it again. He entertained some brief fantasy about getting the thing so dizzy that it would just fall down. Brief indeed, for despite his darting movements and strong foot speed, the bull was turning inside him, those deadly horns gaining ground.

Roger took the only course that seemed open: he leaped on the bull’s back.

Rationally, he knew he shouldn’t be screaming, but he was anyway. The bull bucked and snorted, hooves slamming the ground in absolute rage. It twisted and leaped, ducked its head and cut a tight turn, nearly pitching Roger over its shoulder.

Somehow he held on as the bull worked its way to the far end of the corral, with only the dark forest beyond the fence. It was a good thing, too, Roger realized, for back the other way, goblins and powries were all about, most yelling and pointing toward the corral.

The bull ran flat out for a short burst, then skidded to an abrupt stop, cutting hard to the right, then back to the left. Again Roger held on for all his life, even grabbing one of the bull’s horns. On the second cut the bull overbalanced, and quick-thinking Roger saw his chance. He pulled one leg up under him and tugged with all his might on the horn, turning the bull’s head even farther.

The bull pitched over and Roger leaped away, hitting the ground in a stumble that quickly turned into a dead run. He made the rail fence before the squirming bull even managed to regain its footing, and was over in the blink of an eye.

The bull trotted up to the fence; Roger, though he saw goblins running both ways along the rail back by the town, paused long enough to boast, “I could have broken your fat neck.” He ended by snapping his fingers in the air just in front of the bull’s nose.

The bull snorted and pawed the ground, then ducked its head.

Roger’s mouth fell open. “You cannot understand me,” he protested.

The point was moot; the bull charged the fence.

Roger bolted for the woods. The bull thrashed and kicked, taking out rails, knocking logs high into the air.

Then it was free, bursting onto the small clearing just beyond the corral. Goblins were closing in both directions by then, and suddenly the bull was on Roger’s side.

“Aiyeeee!” one of the goblins squealed. Considered a quick-thinker among its dim-witted friends, the goblin grabbed its nearest companion and threw the poor fool right in the bull’s path.

That goblin was soon airborne, spinning two complete somersaults before landing hard on the ground. It crawled away, trying not to groan, trying not to do anything that would get the bull’s attention, for the enraged beast was giving chase to the rest of the fleeing goblins.

From a tree not so far away, Roger watched with sincere amusement. His chuckles turned into a sympathetic groan, though, when the bull gored one scrambling goblin, the sharp horn stabbing into the back of the goblin’s leg, then coming right out through its kneecap. The bull snapped its head back, and over the goblin went, screaming, falling flat out across the bull’s huge neck. The bull ran on, bucking wildly, the goblin flopping all about, until finally the horn tore free of the knee and the goblin pitched away. The bull wasn’t done with it, though, and turned about, throwing sod, running down the goblin before it could begin to crawl away.

Up in the tree, Roger moved along the limb, out from the trunk, and leaped out to the branch of another tree, making his way to the north, back toward the encampment.

“Another night,” he promised himself, remembering the chain and padlock. He could create more than a little mischief for the powries with those items, he mused. So even though he hadn’t gotten into the larders, and in spite of the encounter with the bull, the ever-optimistic Roger considered the night a success, and it was with a light heart and dancing feet that he came down from the trees and began picking his trails back to the first two powries. He spotted them from a distance, both sitting on the ground, trying to pull their ankles out of the rope. The commotion in town had stirred them, and the rope had tripped them, it seemed.

Roger was sorry he had missed it. He took some satisfaction in the two pipes lying in the dirt, and in the muttered curses of his victims. That only made his heart skip lighter, a mischievous grin widening across his face as he made his way into the deep forest.

But then he heard the baying.

“What?” the young man asked, pausing, studying the strange sound. He had no experience with hunting dogs and didn’t understand that they were calling out a trail, his trail. He knew from the continuing sound, though, that they were getting closer, and so he scrambled up a tall and wide oak set apart from any other trees and peered back into the darkness.

Far to the south he saw the glow of torches. “Stubborn,” he muttered, shaking his head, confident that the monsters would never find him in the dark woods.

He started back down the tree, but reversed his course almost immediately as snarling sounds came up at him. From a low branch he could make out the four forms. Roger had seen dogs before—Rosin Delaval kept a pair for working his herd. But those dogs were small and friendly, always wagging their tails, always happy to play with him, or anyone else, for that matter. These dogs seemed to Roger to be a different species altogether. The tone of their barking was not friendly, but threatening, and deep and resonating, the stuff of nightmares. He couldn’t make out much detail in the darkness, but realized from the sound of the barking and the black silhouettes that these dogs were much larger than Rosin’s.

“Where did they get those?” the young thief muttered, for indeed the dogs were a new addition to Caer Tinella. He glanced around, looking for a way down the tree, far enough to the side to get him away from the animals.

It struck him almost immediately that to come down from that tree was to be eaten. He had to trust his luck, and up he went to the highest branches of the oak, hoping the dogs would lose sight of him, and lose interest in him.

He didn’t understand the training of these animals. The hounds stayed right at the base of the tree, snuffling and scratching, and then baying. One kept jumping high, scratching at the bark.

Roger glanced anxiously to the south, to see the torches moving closer, closer, following the commotion. He had to shut the dogs up, or find some way to get away from this area.

He didn’t know where to begin. He carried only one weapon, a small knife, better suited to picking locks than fighting, and even if he had a great sword with him, the thought of facing those dogs appalled him. He scratched his head, glancing all around. Why had he gone up this particular tree, so far from any others?

Because he hadn’t understood his enemies.

“I underestimated them,” Roger scolded himself as powries entered the clearing beneath the oak. In moments his tree was encircled by the dwarven brutes, a smiling Kos-kosio Begulne among them. Roger heard the powrie leader’s fellows congratulating him on acquiring the dogs—Craggoth hounds, they called them.

Roger understood then that he had been outsmarted.

“Come on down, then,” Kos-kosio Begulne bellowed up the tree. “Yeah, we see ye, so come on down, or blimey, I’ll burn the damned tree out from under ye! And then I’ll let me dogs eat up what’s left of ye,” he added slyly.

Roger knew that the fierce Kos-kosio wasn’t kidding, not at all. With a resigned shrug, he slipped down to the lowest branches of the tree, in clear sight of the powrie leader.

“Down!” Kos-kosio Begulne demanded, the dwarf’s voice suddenly stern and terrifying.

Roger looked doubtfully at the frenzied dogs.

“Ye like me Craggoth hounds?” the powrie asked. “We breed ’em on the Julianthes just to catch rats like yerself.” Kos-kosio Begulne motioned to several others, and they quickly went to the dogs, looping choke chains and hauling the animals aside—no small feat, given the dogs’ level of excitement. Roger got a good look at them then, in the torchlight, and saw, as he had suspected, that these beasts hardly resembled Rosin’s dogs. Their heads and chests were huge, great muscled torsos, tall on thin legs, with coats of short brown and black hair and eyes that blazed red in the forest night, as if with the flames of hell. They seemed to be fully restrained by that point, but still, Roger could hardly bring himself to move.

“Down!” Kos-kosio. Begulne said again. “Last time I’m asking.”

Roger dropped lightly to the ground right in front of the powrie leader. “Roger Billingsbury at your service, good dwarf,” he said with a bow.

“Roger Lockless, they call ’im,” another powrie piped in.

Roger nodded and smiled, taking it as a compliment.

Kos-kosio Begulne laid him low with a heavy punch.

CHAPTER 7

The Long Night of Fighting

Their journey on the road had thus far been surprisingly uneventful. They had encountered a band of goblins on the southern edge of the Moorlands, but dispatched that group with typical efficiency—three shots from Juraviel’s bow, a lightning bolt from Pony, and Elbryan and Symphony running down those couple that managed to scamper away from the main, doomed group. Searching the area afterward, the ranger and the elf, both expert trackers, had found no signs to indicate that any greater number of the monsters might be in the immediate area, and so the fighting, for the present, was at its end.

Things got even quieter when they left the always wild Moorlands far behind, crossing into the kingdom of Honce-the-Bear, just south of the Timberlands. The northwestern corner of Honce-the-Bear was not heavily populated, and there was really only one path that could be considered a road, that covered the ground between the Wilderlands and the main road connecting Palmaris and Weedy Meadow. Apparently the goblins and powries hadn’t found enough sport in the immediate region, for there was no sign at all that any were about.

Soon, though, the trio was farther south, in more populated regions, crossing fields lined by planted hedgerows and stone walls, and with many roads to choose from. And all of those roads showed many sets of tracks, powrie, goblin, and giant, and the deep grooves of the wheels of laden carts and powrie war engines.

“Landsdown,” explained Pony, pointing to a plume of smoke rising in the distance, just over a short hill. She had been through this area only a couple of times, but from even those short passages, knew it far better than either of her companions. When the invading monstrous army had first come to the three towns of the Timberlands, it was Pony who traveled south to warn the folk of Landsdown and the neighboring community of impending danger.

“Occupied by monsters,” the ranger reasoned, for it seemed unlikely to him that humans could still be in the towns, given the sheer number of enemy tracks along the roads. And the smoke was not that of a sacked village, not the angry, billowing blackness of buildings burning, but rather the simple gray plumes of a hearth.

“And likely we’ll find the neighboring town in a similar position,” Belli’mar Juraviel reasoned. “It seems as if our enemies are well-entrenched and mean to stay.”

“Caer Tinella,” Pony remarked after some thought. “The next town in line is Caer Tinella.” She looked back to the north as she spoke, for the group had veered from the one main road, the one between Palmaris and Weedy Meadow. They were moving through the forest, and had come in from the west, below the level of Caer Tinella, the northernmost organized township in Honce-the-Bear, and thus the closest to the three towns of the Timberlands.

“And beyond Caer Tinella?” Elbryan asked.

“The road back home,” Pony answered.

“We should start in the north, then,” the ranger reasoned. “We will swing back around Caer Tinella and see what we might find, then come back to Landsdown to take up the fight.”

“You will probably find a fight waiting for you right over that hill,” Juraviel remarked.

“Our first order of business is to locate the refugees, if there are any in the area,” Elbryan replied, and it was not the first time he had expressed those sentiments. He didn’t say it aloud, but hoped he might find Belster O’Comely and the other folk of Dundalis among any resistance bands operating in this area.

The ranger looked to Pony, saw a smile on her fair face, and knew that she understood the reasoning behind the urgency in his voice, and knew, too, that she was of like heart. It would be good to be among trusted allies again. At Elbryan’s bidding, Pony climbed up behind him on Symphony’s broad back.

“The town is right on the road?” Belli’mar Juraviel asked.

“Both of them are,” Pony replied. “Landsdown to the south and Caer Tinella just a few miles to the north.”

“But we’ll give Caer Tinella a wide berth to the west, going right around the town,” Elbryan explained. “It is possible that any resistance bands would be encamped farther in the north, where the fields and roads are less, and the forest is thicker.”

“You go west,” Juraviel agreed, eyeing the north road. “I will go closer to Caer Tinella to see if I can get a good measure of our enemy’s strength.”

Elbryan, fearing for his diminutive friend, started to protest, but bit the words back, considering the stealthiness of the Touel’alfar. Belli’mar Juraviel could walk right up behind the most alert deer and pat it twice on the rump before it ever knew he was there.

Juraviel wouldn’t have listened to any arguments anyway, Elbryan knew from the sly expression on his angular face, an observation confirmed when Juraviel shot Elbryan and Pony a wink of a golden eye and added, “And our enemy’s weaknesses.”

Then the elf was gone, slipping away, a shadow among shadows.

“Ye will tell me what I wants to know,” Kos-kosio Begulne promised.

Roger sat as straight as his tight bindings would allow and painted a disarming smile on his face.

Kos-kosio Begulne’s head snapped forward, the powrie’s bony forehead crushing Roger’s nose and knocking the man over backward.

Roger sputtered and tried to roll away, but the cords held his arms fast behind the chair back and he could get no leverage. A pair of powries were beside him suddenly, roughly pulling him back up.

“Oh, ye’ll tell me,” Kos-kosio Begulne declared. The powrie smiled evilly and raised one gnarly hand, snapping its fingers.

The sound jolted poor Roger’s sensibilities; he could only groan as the door to the small room opened and another powrie entered, leading on a short leash the biggest, meanest dog Roger had ever seen. The dog strained in his direction against the powrie’s strong pull, baring its formidable teeth, growling and snarling and snapping its powerful jaws.

“Craggoth hounds eat lots,” the grinning Kos-kosio Begulne said. “Now, boy, ye got something to tell me?”

Roger took several deep breaths, trying to steady himself, trying hard not to panic. The powries wanted to know the location of the refugee encampment, something Roger was determined he would not divulge, no matter what torture they exacted.

“Too long,” said Kos-kosio Begulne, snapping his fingers again. The powrie dropped the leash and the Craggoth hound came on, leaping for Roger’s throat.

Roger threw himself over backward, but the dog only followed, its fangs scoring the man’s cheek, cracking at his jawline.

“Don’t ye let the beast kill him,” Kos-kosio Begulne instructed the others. “Just make him hurt real bad. He’ll talk to us, don’t ye doubt.” With other matters to attend to, the powrie leader left the room then, though he was surely enjoying the spectacle.

For poor Roger, all the world was blood and snapping jaws.

Belster O’Comely eyed the approaching torches with the greatest fear he had known since leaving Dundalis. According to the returned scouts, the powries had Roger, and now the appearance of so large a monstrous force in the forest, moving unerringly to the north, led the portly man to believe that Roger had been forced to give them up. Maybe Jansen Bridges had been right in his disdain for Roger’s nightly antics.

There was no way that nearly two hundred refugees, many very old and many very young, would get away from such a force, Belster realized, and so he and his fellows had only one apparent option: the able-bodied would go out and fight the powries in the woods, occupy them with hit-and-run tactics until those who could not fight could get far, far away.

Belster wasn’t thrilled with the prospects, and neither was Tomas or the other leaders of the refugee band. Hitting at an organized and prepared group of monsters would cost them greatly and probably spell the end of any real resistance in the region. Belster suspected that any humans surviving this night would have to move farther south and try the dangerous maneuver of slipping around the monster lines to get into Palmaris. Many times over the last couple of weeks, Belster and Tomas had considered just such an option, and each time had dismissed it as too perilous. There simply wasn’t yet enough pressure being exerted on the monsters from the forces of Palmaris; the monster lines were too thick and too well-entrenched.

Still, the innkeeper had suspected all along that it would come to this, and in fact had known that the primary mission for him and his fellow warriors was to get the noncombatants far from the field of battle. The run to Palmaris would be fraught with danger, but the summer wouldn’t last forever, and many of the old and young would not likely survive the cold nights of winter in the forest.

Belster blew all those thoughts away with a profound and helpless sigh. He had to concentrate on the business at hand, on directing the coming battle. His archers had already gone out to both the east and west of the advancing monstrous horde.

“The eastern flank is ready to strike,” Tomas Gingerwart said, moving near the innkeeper.

“They hit hard, and retreat fast,” Belster explained.

“And those in the west have to come in hard and fast as soon as the monsters make their turn to the east,” Tomas replied appropriately.

Belster nodded. “And then comes our job, Tomas, the most critical of all. We must assess the strength of our enemy at once, and determine if they are weak enough, and disorganized enough, for a full assault. If so, then we send our fighters straight in, and signal for east and west to close like the jaws of a wolf.”

“And if not,” Tomas interrupted, for he had heard all of this before, “those in the west flee into the forest and those in the east come back in hard at the rear of Kos-kosio Begulne’s turning line.”

“While you and land our fellows go to the others and begin the long circuit to the south,” Belster finished, his deflated tone showing he did not like that prospect.

“You would begin that at once?” Tomas asked, somewhat surprised. He had thought that they would finish the night, however it was to be decided, in the forest, and wait for the revealing daylight to lay their plans.

“If we mean to go south—and if this force is on to us, then we have few options—it would be better that we go while the monsters are preoccupied with our archers,” Belster decided.

“We have to get word to them, then,” Tomas replied. “When they finally break ranks, they must know where to find us.”

Belster considered that for a moment, then shook his head, his expression grave. “If in their fear they turn directly to the south, they will be chased, and thus we will be chased,” he reasoned. “They have already been instructed to flee into the forest if the attack is routed. They will find their way from there, wherever they choose to go.” Those were indeed the most difficult words Belster O’Comely had ever spoken. He knew the reasoning to be correct, but still felt as if he was abandoning his comrades.

Tomas’ first reaction called for an immediate protest, but he sublimated it quickly, seeing Belster’s pained expression, and, because of that, taking the moment to consider the wider situation. He found he had to agree with the decision, and understood that no matter how difficult the situation might become for the archers, it would be no less so for Belster’s retreating group, for by all reports they would have to cross miles and miles of land even thicker with monsters.

Another man came running toward them then, from the south. “The powries and goblins have four giant allies,” he reported. “They’ve just crossed Arnesun’s Creek.”

Belster closed his eyes and felt weary indeed. Four giants, any one of which could probably wipe out half of his warriors. Even worse, giants could return the arrow volleys by hurling huge stones or spears the size of tree trunks.

“Should we change the plan?” Tomas asked.

Belster knew it was too late. “No,” he said gravely. “Send the eastern flank into action. And may God be with them.”

Tomas nodded to the scout and the man ran off, passing the word. Barely ten minutes later the forest to the south erupted with screams and roars, with the sound of zipping arrows and the thunder of giant-hurled boulders.

“Powries, goblins, and giants,” Juraviel explained to Elbryan and Pony when he caught up to them northwest of Caer Tinella. “A strong force, heading north, with purpose, it would seem.”

Elbryan and Pony exchanged concerned looks; they could guess easily enough what that purpose might be.

“Up with us,” Elbryan bade, lowering his hand to the elf.

“Three on Symphony?” Juraviel asked doubtfully. “He is as fine a horse as ever there was, I do not question, but three is too many.”

“Then run, my friend,” Elbryan bade the elf. “Find where you might best fit into the battle.”

Juraviel was gone in the blink of an eye, scampering through the forest.

“And keep your head low!” Elbryan called after him.

“And you, Nightbird!” came the already distant reply.

The ranger turned to Pony, giving her that prebattle expression, a look of sheer determination she had come to know so well. “Are you ready with the stones?”

“Always,” Pony answered grimly, marveling at the change in the man. In the span of a few seconds he had gone from Elbryan to Nightbird. “You just remember all that I taught you with the hematite.”

The ranger chuckled as he turned back and kicked his great stallion into a run. Pony had a diamond out, calling forth its magics to light the way, and as they rode she removed the cat’s-eye circlet from around her head and set it on her companion’s. Then she let the diamond light die away. Nightbird would guide Symphony, for with his telepathic connection to the horse through the magical turquoise, it was almost as if the horse could see through his eyes. Even with that guidance, though, the ranger found the trail difficult, with thick brush and tightly packed trees, and paths that seemed to always lead him farther to the west instead of directly north, and so it was Juraviel, cutting a straighter course than the riders, for trees were hardly an obstacle to the nimble elf, who actually got within hearing distance of the battle first. He saw the monsters soon after, running hard left to right, to the east, apparently in pursuit.

“Giants,” the elf said grimly, spotting the huge forms. Even as he watched, one of the behemoths launched a heavy stone through the tangle of trees, smashing branches.

A man came tumbling down hard from that tree. A host of goblins and the stone-throwing giant made for him, while the other monsters continued their chase.

Juraviel glanced all around, hoping that Nightbird and Pony would come onto the scene. Alone, what might he do against so powerful a force?

The noble elf shook those thoughts away. Whatever he might do, he had to try; he could not stand idly by and watch a man be murdered. Up a tree he went, running along a solid branch.

The fallen man was still alive, his head lolling, groans escaping his lips. On came a goblin, spiked club in hand.

Juraviel’s first bowshot took the creature in the kidney.

“Blimey!” the goblin howled. “I been stuck!”

Juraviel’s second arrow took it in the throat, and it fell over, gurgling, clasping futilely at the mortal wound.

The elf wasn’t watching, though, after having seen the giant’s tactics. Sure enough, a heavy stone came slamming into the tree, where Juraviel had just been standing.

The elf, far to the side in another tree, giggled loudly—giants hated that. “Oh, big and stupid is not the way!” Juraviel sang out, emphasizing his point by shooting an arrow right into the giant’s face.

Even so perfect a shot had little physical effect, though, the behemoth waving the tiny arrow away as if it were no more than a stinging insect. The emotional toll, however, was more to Juraviel’s liking. The giant roared and charged blindly, smashing through trees, ordering the goblins to follow.

Soon the elf was running, skipping lightly along high branches and stopping every so often to hurl a taunt, or, when the opportunity presented itself, to shoot an arrow, just to keep his pursuers on course. He doubted he would kill the giant, or would even get enough of a clear shot to bring down a goblin, but he figured that having the behemoth and half a dozen goblins chasing him far from the field of battle was a solid contribution.

The elf’s keen ears picked up the sound of battle again soon after, but it was far to the north now, or at least he and the pursuers were far to the south, closer to Caer Tinella than the spot where the man had fallen.

Juraviel meant to keep them running all night if need be, past Caer Tinella and all the way to the south of Landsdown.

“Oh, well done,” Elbryan congratulated when he saw the second band of human archers moving east, behind the monstrous force.

Pony looked at him curiously.

“I know this tactic,” the ranger explained. “They hit side to side, trying to confuse their enemies.” A smile widened on the ranger’s face.

“I know it, too,” Pony agreed, catching on. “And so does—”

“Belster O’Comely,” the ranger reasoned. “Let us hope.”

“And let us see where we might fit in,” Pony added, kicking Symphony’s flanks. Off the great stallion surged, thundering along the path, closing ground to the second wave of Belster’s army. Elbryan took care to guide Symphony to the south of the opposing forces—except for one monstrous group that, for some reason Elbryan and Pony could only guess at, had gone charging off far to the south. Pulling up behind the cover of a line of thick pines, the ranger slid down from the horse and handed Pony the reins.

“Stay safe,” he whispered, reaching up to touch the woman’s hand. To his surprise, Pony handed the small diamond over to him.

“I cannot use it without drawing too much attention,” she explained.

“But if they get close—” Elbryan started to protest.

“Do you remember the copse in the Moorlands?” Pony replied evenly. “They were close then.”

That image of carnage quieted the ranger’s concerns. If the monsters did get close to Pony, pity them, not her.

“You take the diamond and mark out targets for me,” the woman explained. “If you can use the hematite, you can also use the diamond. Seeking out the magic of each stone is much the same process. Put a glow on a band of powries, and then run clear”

Elbryan grabbed her hand more tightly and pulled her down to the side, going up on tiptoes that he could give her a kiss. “For luck,” he said, and started away.

“For later,” Pony replied slyly just as Elbryan moved out of sight. She remembered their pact as soon as she had spoken the words, though, and gave a frustrated sigh. This war was getting too long for her liking.

For Elbryan’s liking as well. With the cat’s-eye, the ranger could see well in the night. Still, when Pony’s teasing reply drifted to his ears, he almost fell over a log.

He took a deep breath and put aside any images her comment had inspired, bringing himself fully into the present, to the situation at hand. Then he was off and running, using the sounds of fighting to guide his movements, to bring him closer to the action. Adrenaline coursed through his veins; he fell into that almost trancelike state, the warrior incarnate, the same perfect balance and honed senses that he found in bi’nelle dasada, his morning sword-dance.

He was Nightbird now, the elven-trained warrior. Even his step seemed to change, to grow lighter, more agile.

Soon he was close enough to view the movements of the combatants, both human and monster. He had to keep reminding himself that they, unlike he with his gemstone, could not see very far ahead, that the powries and goblins were perfectly blind outside the tiny perimeter of their torchlight And for those not carrying torches, this night fighting in the dark forest was as much a matter of feeling their way along as of seeing their enemies. The ranger watched, measuring the situation, trying hard not to chuckle at the utter ridiculousness of it all, as humans and powries often passed right by each other, barely ten feet apart, without ever noticing.

The ranger knew that it was time to find his place. He spotted a pair of goblins huddled low at the base of a tree, peering to the west, the direction from which the most recent assault had been launched. He saw the pair clearly, but without any source of light, they did not see him. Silent and swift, Nightbird put himself along a clear run to them, then inched closer, closer, and leaped into their midst. Mighty Tempest flashed left, then right, then Nightbird turned back to the left, driving his sword out straight with all his weight and strength behind it, a sudden, explosive thrust that skewered the first.

He tore the blade free and pivoted back the other way, to find the other goblin down on its knees, clutching its belly, staggered from the first strike. Tempest slashed across, powerful and sure, lopping off the creature’s ugly head.

Nightbird ran on, cutting swiftly across open patches of grass, climbing into trees at times to gain a better vantage of the unfolding scene around him. Always he tried to remain cognizant of where Pony might be waiting and of what help the woman might offer.

Seconds seemed like long minutes to anxious Pony, sitting quiet on Symphony within the sheltering boughs of the pine grove. Every so often she spotted or heard some movement not so far away, but could not tell if it was human or powrie, or perhaps even a deer frightened by the tumult of the battle.

All the while, Pony rubbed her fingers about several chosen stones: graphite and magnetite, the powerful ruby and protective serpentine and malachite.

“Hurry along, Elbryan,” she whispered, anxious to get into the fray, to launch the first blows that she might be rid of this typical nervousness. That was how battles—except, of course, for unexpected fights—always started for her, with the churning stomach and the beads of sweat, the tingling anticipation. One strike would rid her of that edginess, she knew, when purpose and adrenaline would surge through her body.

She heard a commotion not far ahead and spotted a form, a huge silhouette. Pony needed no diamond light to discern the identity of that massive creature. Up came the graphite, the lightning stone, Pony holding it up at arm’s length, gathering its energies. She hesitated a bit longer, letting the power mount, letting the giant and its handful of allies settle into position on a ridge across a short depression of thin trees.

Still she waited—she doubted that her lightning stroke would kill many of the creatures, and certainly it would not destroy the giant if she loosed the magic, her position would be given away and she would indeed be in the thick of the fight. Perhaps a better opportunity would be presented to her.

But then the giant roared and hurled a huge stone to the west, where a group of humans was fast approaching, and the issue was settled. Goblins and powries howled in glee, thinking they had ambushed and would quickly overrun this one small band.

Then came the stroke, a sudden, jarring, blinding burst of searing white energy. Several goblins and a pair of powries went flying to the ground; the giant was thrown back so forcefully that it uprooted a small tree as it stumbled.

And most important of all, from Pony’s perspective, the human band had been warned, had seen the full extent of the enemies crouched in this area in one sudden, brightening instant.

But so, too, was Pony’s position surrendered. Fires flickered to life in the small vale between her and the monsters, lightning-clipped trees going up like candles. The giant, more angry than hurt, came right back her way, reaching into a huge sack to produce another boulder.

Pony thought to loose another lightning blast, but graphite was a particularly draining stone, and she knew that she would have to be more focused this time. She fumbled with the stones; she saw the giant’s arms go up high, and could only pray that his throw would be off the mark.

Another light appeared, bright and white, the glow of a diamond, backlighting the giant and its allies. It lasted only a second or two, giving Pony a clearer picture of the enemy and distracting the giant for just an instant.

All the time Pony needed. Out came the magnetite, the lodestone. The woman focused on the stone’s magics, saw through its magnetic energy, seeking an attraction, any attraction. She “saw” the powrie swords, the belt buckle of one dwarf. The image of the giant in the diamond backlight came clear in her mind, particularly its upraised arms, the great hands that held the boulder.

The giant was wearing metal-banded gauntlets.

Pony quickly focused the magnetite energy, blocked out all other metallic influences except one giant gauntlet She brought the power of the stone to an explosive release and let it fly, many times the speed and power of one of Elbryan’s deadly bowshots.

The giant dismissed the flash of light behind it and brought the boulder over its head again, thinking to throw it in the direction of the unseen lightning caster. But suddenly its right wrist exploded in searing pain and lost all strength, and the boulder fell from its grasp, bouncing off one square shoulder before tumbling harmlessly to the ground.

The giant hardly felt the bruise on the shoulder, for its wrist and hand were thoroughly shattered, what little remained of the metal gauntlet crushed in against the behemoth’s hand. Two fingers hung loose on flaps of skin; another finger was altogether gone, just gone.

The giant staggered back a couple of long strides, blinded by surprise and agony.

Another lightning bolt slammed in then, driving the monster right over backward, dropping it, groaning, to the ground. Hardly conscious, the behemoth did hear the sounds of its few remaining comrades, all of them running away into the dark night.

Pony eased Symphony out of the pines and into the valley, picking her way through the tangle. She drew out her sword as she rode, and found no opposition when she came upon the squirming giant.

She killed it quickly.

Confident in Pony’s abilities and judgment, Nightbird didn’t stay around after he had marked out the target with the diamond light. Back in the darkness again, the ranger made his way farther north, cutting right across the monster and human lines.

He saw a group of men crawling through some ferns, and, on a low branch above them, a pair of goblins holding cruel spears, both peering down at the fern bed, trying to find an open shot.

Up came Hawkwing, and a split second later one of the goblins dropped heavily from the branch.

“Huh?” its companion said, turning to where the other had been standing, trying to figure out why it had jumped away.

The ranger’s second shot took it through the temple, and it, too, fell away, dead before it hit the ground.

The men in the ferns scrambled, not knowing what had dropped about them.

Nightbird moved ahead quickly, closing the distance. One man came up, hearing his approach, bow drawn and ready. “What?” he asked incredulously, and then added in a whisper as the ranger rushed by him, “Nightbird.”

“Follow me,” the ranger instructed. “The dark is no obstacle; I will guide you.”

“It is Nightbird,” another man insisted.

“Who?” asked another.

“A friend,” the first explained quickly, and the small group, five men and three women, set off after the ranger.

Soon enough the ranger spotted yet another band of allies crouching in the dark, and led his group that way. Suddenly his force was twenty strong, and he led them out to find enemies. He understood the realities of night-fighting in the dark forest, and the huge advantage the cat’s-eye afforded him and his band. All around the group the larger battle quickly deteriorated into pockets of screaming and cursing frustration, with arrows launched blindly into the darkness, or opponents inadvertently stumbling into each other, or even comrades stumbling into one another, often lashing out before they paused long enough to identify their allies. Somewhere far back in the distance there came a cry, the grating voice of a powrie, followed by a tremendous explosion, and Nightbird knew that another unfortunate enemy had stumbled upon Pony.

He bit his lip and resisted the urge to rush back and check on his love. He had to trust in her, had to remind himself repeatedly that she knew how to fight, day or night, and that, in addition to her expertise with a sword, she carried enough magical power to carry her through.

Another battle erupted far in the opposite direction, a group of goblins stumbling across the northern end of what remained of the human line. This time the results were less clear-cut, with screams of outrage and agony, both human and goblin, splitting the air. The fighting drew more combatants, spreading until all the forest seemed thick with tumult, monsters and humans rushing this way and that. The ranger set his band in a purely defensive posture, then moved out to walk a perimeter. Any humans who ventured near were ushered in, the numbers of the group soon rising to more than thirty. Whenever any enemies ventured near, Nightbird circled about them, bringing up the diamond light so his archers could take their sudden and deadly toll.

When the immediate area finally appeared clear of monsters, Nightbird got his group moving again, putting the men in a tight formation, that they could guide each other by touch.

Torches flared to life in several places deeper in the forest, screams issued from the darkness in many others, and there were no clear lines of combat for the group to engage. But those with the ranger held their calm, methodical way, moving along in their tight and organized formation, the tireless Nightbird continually circling about them, guiding them. More than once the ranger spotted enemies moving in the brush, but he held his forces in quiet check, not willing to reveal them. Not yet.

Soon the sounds of fighting withered away, leaving the forest night as quiet as it was dark. A torch flared to life in the distance; Nightbird understood it to be powries, the cocky dwarves likely confident now that the battle had ended. He moved to the nearest of his soldiers and bade the man to pass the word that the time to strike was near.

Then the ranger settled the group once more into a defensive posture and moved out alone. No stranger to powrie tactics, he figured that those with the torch would form the hub of their formation, with their forces encircling them like the spokes of a wheel. The torchlight was still more than two hundred feet away when the ranger encountered the tip of one of those spokes, a pair of goblins crouched beside a tight grouping of small birch trees.

With all his great skill, Nightbird slipped around and moved in behind the oblivious pair. He thought to flash his diamond light, that his archers could mow the goblins down, but decided against that tactic, preferring to make this one strike decisive. He went in alone, inch by inch.

His hand clamped over the mouth of the goblin to his left; his sword drove through the lungs of the goblin to the right. He let Tempest fall free with the dead goblin, and grabbed the remaining creature’s hair with his now free right hand, sliding his left down enough to cup the monster’s chin. Before the goblin could begin to cry out, the ranger drove both arms across his body, right to left, left to right, then violently yanked them back the other way.

The goblin hardly found the chance to squeal, and the only sound was the snapping of its neck bone—it might have been a footstep on a dry twig.

The ranger retrieved Tempest and moved in deeper, nearer the hub, surveying the enemy formation, which was exactly as he had suspected. Taking as accurate a count as possible, he silently went back to his waiting force.

“There are monsters about,” he explained. “A trio of powries within that torchlight”

“Then show them to us and let us be done with this night,” one eager warrior piped in, and his words were echoed many times over.

“It is a trap,” the ranger explained, “with more powries and goblins waiting in the darkness and a pair of giants lurking behind the trees.”

“What do we do?” one man asked, his tone very different now, more subdued.

The ranger looked around at all his men, a wry smile widening on his face. They thought they were outmatched—that much was obvious from their expressions. But Nightbird, who had been fighting bands of monsters all the way from the Barbacan, knew better. “We kill the giants first,” he coolly explained.

Belster and Tomas watched and listened from a distant hilltop. The innkeeper rubbed his hands repeatedly, nervously, trying to guess at what might be happening down there. Should he retract his forces? Should he press the fight?

Could he? The plans seemed so logical when they were made, so easily executed and, if need be, retracted. But the truth of battle never worked out that way, particularly in the dark and confusing night.

Beside him, Tomas Gingerwart was fighting an equally difficult dilemma. He was a tough man, battle hardened, but for all his hatred of the monsters, Tomas understood that to engage them in drawn-out conflict was a fool’s game.

But he, too, could not get a clear picture of what might be happening. He heard the occasional screams—more often a monster’s voice than a man’s—and saw the flares of light. A couple of surprising flashes, brilliant and sudden, caught his and Belster’s attention more keenly, though, for they were not the fires of torches. Belster recognized them well enough as an obvious stroke of lightning magic.

The problem was, neither Belster nor Tomas had any idea which side was tossing the magic about. Their little band possessed no gemstones, and wouldn’t have known how to use them if they did, but likewise, powries, goblins, and giants had never been known to wield such magic.

“We must decide, and quickly,” Tomas remarked, his voice edged with frustration.

“Jansen Bridges should return soon,” Belster replied. “We must find out who loosed that magic.”

“We haven’t seen it in along while,” Tomas went on. “The point may be moot, with the magic expended or the wielder dead.”

“But who?”

“Roger Lockless, likely,” Tomas replied. “Ever has he a trick to play.”

Belster wasn’t so sure of that, though the notion that Roger had a bit of magic about him was nothing new to the innkeeper. The legends of Roger might be exaggerated, but his exploits were indeed amazing.

“Call them back,” Tomas decided then. “Light the signals and send runners with the word. The battle is ended.”

“But Jansen—”

“We haven’t time to wait,” Tomas interrupted firmly. “Call them back.”

Belster shrugged, and couldn’t rightly disagree, but before either he or Tomas could give the retreat signal, a man came loping up the side of the hillock.

“Nightbird!” he cried to the two. “Nightbird, and Avelyn Desbris!”

Belster ran down to meet him. “Are you sure?”

“I saw Nightbird myself,” Jansen replied, huffing and puffing as he tried to catch his breath. “It had to be him, for no other could move with such grace. I saw him kill a goblin, oh, and beautifully, too. Sword left and right” He waved his arm about, imitating the move as he spoke.

“Who does he speak of?” Tomas asked, coming down to join them.

“The ranger,” Belster replied. “And Avelyn?” he asked of Jansen. “Did you speak with Avelyn?”

“It had to be him,” Jansen replied. “The flash of lightning, scattering powries, felling giants. They have returned to us!”

“You assume much,” pragmatic Tomas put in, then to Belster he added, “Are we to hope that this man’s observations ring true? If he is wrong—”

“Then still it would seem as if we have found some allies, powerful allies,” Belster replied. “But let us indeed light the torches. Let us regroup and see how strong we have become.” Belster eagerly led the way from the hillock, silently hoping that his old comrades from Dundalis had indeed returned to help in the cause.

Their expressions were mixed, some nodding eagerly, others hesitantly, and still others glancing doubtfully to their fellows.

“The torchlight marks the hub of the powrie defensive position,” Nightbird quickly explained. “The way is open to it if we are quiet enough and clever enough. We must strike hard and sure, and be prepared for any attacks that come in about us.”

“The hub?” one man echoed doubtfully.

“The center of the powrie defensive ring,” the ranger clarified. “A small grouping in the middle of a wide perimeter.”

“If we attack there, right in the middle, then we will be surrounded,” the man replied, and several incredulous grunts of accord sprang up about him.

“If we hit them strong enough at the center and kill the giants, the others, particularly the goblins, will not dare to come in against us,” the ranger countered with confidence.

“The torches are naught but bait,” the man argued, raising his voice so that the ranger and several others had to motion for him to be quiet.

“The torches are indeed meant to bring in enemies,” Nightbird conceded. “But those enemies are supposed to be identified and engaged on the edge of the ring. If we move without further delay, the path is open all the way to the hub; our enemies will not expect so strong an attack.”

The man started to argue again, but those near him, their trust in the ranger growing, hushed him before he could begin.

“Go in quiet and in a line three abreast,” Nightbird explained. “Then we shall form a tight circle about the hub, and kill it before any reinforcements can arrive.”

Still, many of the others exchanged doubtful glances.

“I have been fighting powries for many months, and these are powrie tactics, to be sure,” Nightbird explained.

His tone, full of absolute confidence, bolstered those nearest him, and they in turn turned back to nod to the men behind.

The group set off immediately, with Nightbird far in the lead. He went back to the spot where he had slain the two goblins, and was relieved to find their bodies as he had left them, and that no new tracks were about the area. The enemy force was not numerous and the spokes of this defensive wheel were few, he reasoned, for when he searched both left and right, using the light of the powries’ own torches as his guiding beacon, he saw no other monsters.

Nightbird led his force straight in, then fanned them out, barely thirty feet from the powries—and the giants, he realized, for the behemoth pair was still in place, their lanky forms pressed up tight against the back side of the oak tree, using its girth to shadow them from the revealing light.

The ranger picked his course quietly. He moved along his line, signaling for all to be ready, and clutched the diamond tight in his fist. Far out to the left of the powrie trio, he found a low, thick limb. He went onto it slowly, easing his weight up so it would not rustle, then picked his careful path along the solid wood, moving nearer, nearer, to the trunk.

Nearer to the giants.

Nightbird concentrated on the stone, building its energy, but not yet releasing it.

Building, building—all his hand was tingling from the stone’s magic, begging release.

Nightbird ran along the branch; the powries looked up at the sound.

And then they, and the giants, looked away, blinded by the sudden burst of radiance, a brilliant white light, brighter than the day itself.

Nightbird rushed above the stunned powries and bore down on the nearest giant, its head even with his own. He knew he wouldn’t get many swings; he grabbed up Tempest in both hands and came in running, jerking to a stop and transferring every ounce of his momentum and strength into that one downward chop.

The blade, trailing a line of white light hardly discernable in the brilliant diamond glare, smashed down through the giant’s forehead, cleaving bone and tearing brains, and the behemoth, howling, grasped at its head and tumbled backward.

The other giant rushed in, only to be met by a hail of stinging arrows.

Nightbird changed direction, scampering straight up the tree.

Powries and goblins cried out and scrambled all about the area; the archers had to shift their rain to nearer, closing targets.

The remaining behemoth shrugged away the initial volley and grabbed hard on the tree, thinking to tear it right from the ground, thinking to smash the ranger, the miserable rat who had just inflicted a mortal wound on its brother. It looked up, roaring in pain and outrage, and then went quiet, seeing the ranger looking back at it, down the arrow set on his strange-looking bow.

Nightbird had Hawkwing drawn all the way back. With corded muscles perfectly taut, arms locked with the bow, legs locked about the branch and trunk, he had held the pose until the giant was in position, directly below him, and the behemoth glanced up at him.

Then he released, the arrow burrowing into the monster’s face, driving deep, deep, disappearing.

The giant’s outstretched arms flailed wildly, helplessly, and then it slumped to its knees, crumbling right beside its brother, dying even as its brother continued to squirm in the dirt.

Nightbird wasn’t watching, was too busy climbing, realizing he was vulnerable at this low position. Then, from a branch higher up he watched the fight and carefully picked his shots, taking out those couple of monsters too well hidden, from ground level, for his companions to spot them.

“To hiding!” the ranger called, and a moment later he dropped the diamond light, leaving the area black, save one fallen torch flickering in its death throes on the ground.

Nightbird closed his eyes, then opened them slowly, letting them adjust to the new lighting, letting the cat’s-eye take control once more. The monsters were far from defeated, he realized immediately, for several groups had banded together and were stubbornly coming in, mostly from the south. He had to make a decision, and quickly. The element of surprise was gone, and the enemy still badly outnumbered his meager force of thirty.

“Take to the north,” he called down, keeping his voice as low as possible. “Stay together at all costs. I will rejoin you as soon as I can.”

As his soldiers slipped away through the brush, the ranger turned his attention back to the south, to the many monstrous groups, thinking he would find some way to deter them, perhaps to lead them on a long and roundabout chase back to the south.

But then he looked behind the monstrous lines, saw the blue-glowing form of a woman on a horse.

“Run on!” the ranger cried to the humans. “Run for all your life!” And Nightbird began to climb, scampering wildly up the tree, and not in fear of any powrie crossbow.

Trusting in Symphony’s superior senses to get her through the tangle, Pony urged the horse ahead. She crossed by a pair of startled powries—who hooted and gave chase—and strengthened her serpentine shield.

They were all about her, rushing in, crying in savage glee.

And then, in the blink of a powrie eye, they were all burning, and so were the trees.

Using the light to guide her way, Pony moved through the conflagration, straining to keep the protective fire shield in place. She blinked in disbelief as she neared a huge oak on the very edge of the fires, for coming down the far side, dropping frantically from branch to branch, came Nightbird.

Pony guided Symphony under the lowest branch, and the ranger dropped to the ground right before her, immediately diving into a roll to smother a few errant flames. He rolled to his feet and scrambled away. “You might have warned me!” he scolded, wisps of smoke trailing from his leather tunic.

“The night is warm,” Pony remarked with a snicker. She took Symphony right by him then, leaning to the side and offering him her hand. He grabbed on—falling into the protective shield as soon as their fingers touched—scrambled up behind her, and away they trotted, confident that no monsters were anywhere near in pursuit.

“You should be more careful about where you blow up,” the ranger scolded.

“You should be wiser about where you hide,” Pony countered.

“There are options other than the gemstones,” the ranger argued.

“Then teach me bi’nelle dasada,” the woman said without hesitation.

The ranger let it go at that, knowing all too well that with Pony, he would never get the last word.

CHAPTER 8

Intervention of Conscience

In a meadow a score of miles east of the town of Landsdown, the caravan from St.-Mere-Abelle made its last exchange of horses. Friar Pembleton, who brought the fresh animals, also brought news that was not welcomed by the leaders of the caravan.

“We must go farther to the east, then,” Brother Braumin Herde reasoned, looking to the northwest, their intended course, as if he expected a host of monsters to rush down upon them.

Brother Francis eyed Braumin dangerously, the young and ambitious monk taking every little change to his itinerary personally.

“Be at ease, Brother Francis,” Master Jojonah remarked, seeing the anxious man chewing hard on his lip. “You have heard good Friar Pembleton. All the lands between Landsdown and the Wilderlands are thick with our enemies.”

“We can hide from them,” Brother Francis argued.

“At what magical cost?” Master Jojonah asked. “And at what delay?” Jojonah gave a sigh, and Francis growled and spun away. That settled, for the moment at least, Jojonah turned back to Friar Pembleton, a large and round man with a thick black beard and bushy eyebrows. “Pray tell us, good Pembleton,” he bade the man. “You know the region far better than we.”

“Where are you going?” the friar asked.

“That I cannot say,” Master Jojonah replied. “You need know only that we must get through the Timberlands, to the north.”

The friar rubbed a hand over his bushy chin. “There is a road that will lead you to the north, though into and through the eastern sections of the Timberlands, not the western reaches, as you had originally planned. It is a good road, though little used.”

“And what word of powries and goblins up there?” Brother Braumin asked.

The friar shrugged. “No word,” he admitted. “It appears as though the monsters came from the northwest, sweeping through the Timberlands past the three towns of Dundalis, Weedy Meadow, and End-o’-the-World. From there they have extended south, but, as far as I have heard, not to the east.

“It seems a reasonable detour,” the friar added hopefully, “for there is little in the east that would give the monsters sport. No towns, and very few, if any, homesteads.”

A younger monk joined the group then, bearing a satchel full of rolled parchments, their ends sticking from the leather bag. Brother Francis moved immediately to intercept, and yanked the satchel away.

“Thank you, Brother Dellman,” Master Jojonah said calmly to the young monk, and he made a gentle motion for the startled young man to go back to the others.

Brother Francis flipped through the various rolls, finally settling on one and pulling it forth. He unrolled it gingerly, spreading it on a tree stump as Master Jojonah, Brother Braumin, and Friar Pembleton huddled around him.

“Our path was right through Weedy Meadow,” Brother Francis remarked, tracing the line on the map with his finger.

“Then expect to be fighting every step of the way,” Friar Pembleton answered sincerely. “And Weedy Meadow, by all accounts, is now a powrie outpost Lots of giants up there, too.”

“Where is this more eastern road?” Master Jojonah asked.

The friar moved in close to the map, studied it for just a moment, then ran his finger to the east of their present position, and then north, cutting through the narrower region of the eastern Timberlands and right into southern Alpinador. “Of course, you can turn back to the west before you get through the Timberlands, circling north of the three Timberland towns.”

“What terrain might we find?” Master Jojonah asked. “Have you ever been up there?”

“Once,” the friar replied. “When they first rebuilt Dundalis after the goblin raid—that was several years ago, of course. It’s all forest, settled on the hillsides, hence the name of the region.”

“All forest, and thus not well-suited for wagon travel,” Brother Braumin put in.

“Not so bad,” the friar replied. “It’s old forest, with great and dark trees, but not much undergrowth. Except of course for the caribou moss; you will encounter more than a bit of that.”

“Caribou moss?” All eyes turned to the questioner, Brother Francis, his fellow monks surprised indeed that he did not recognize the name. Francis met Jojonah’s curious gaze head-on, the younger man again narrowing his eyes threateningly. “No tomes told of it,” he answered the master’s unspoken question.

“A shrub, white and low to the ground,” Friar Pembleton explained. “Your horses should have no trouble pushing through, though it will grab at your wheels. Other than that, the canopy is too dark for much undergrowth. You will get through, no matter where you turn to the west.”

“We will get through along the original course,” Brother Francis replied sternly.

“I beg your pardon, good brother,” Friar Pembleton said with a gracious bow. “I never said that you would not I only warned you—”

“And for that, we are truly grateful,” Master Jojonah said to the man, though he was looking directly at Francis as he spoke. “I ask you now, in good faith, which road would you, who are more familiar with this terrain, select?”

Pembleton scratched his thick beard, mulling over the options. “I would go east,” he said. “And then north, right up into Alpinador. The land is sparsely populated, but you’ll find the barbarians living along the route to be cordial enough, though probably of not much assistance.”

Master Jojonah nodded; Brother Francis started to protest.

“Will you go and speak with the drivers now, that you might guide them to the entrance of this eastern road?” Jojonah bade the friar. “We must be back on the trail at once.”

The friar bowed again and walked away, glancing back several times.

“Father Abbot—” Brother Francis began.

“Is not here,” Master Jojonah promptly interrupted. “And if he were here, he would agree with this new course. Sublimate your pride, brother. It is unfitting to one of your training and station.”

Brother Francis started to argue, but the words were lost in a swirl of absolute rage before they ever got out of his mouth. He quickly gathered up the parchment, creasing it in many places with his rough handling—the first time the others had seen him treat one of the maps in that manner—and stormed away.

“He goes to contact Father Abbot,” Brother Braumin reasoned.

Master Jojonah chuckled at the thought, confident that his choice was the correct one and that Francis was simply too blinded by his anger and wounded pride to see past the inconvenience.

The caravan was on its way soon after, moving onto the eastern road without incident. Brother Francis did not emerge from the back of his wagon all that day, though the monks riding with him were quick to get out and away from him. He was pouting, by their accounts.

“In some situations, Father Abbot Markwart can be counted on,” Master Jojonah whispered to Brother Braumin, offering a sly wink.

The younger monk smiled widely, always thrilled to see the ambitious Francis put in his proper place.

As Friar Pembleton had told them, the road was easy and clear. Those monks searching the area with the quartz reported no monstrous activity at all, just the wild forest Master Jojonah set the pace at steady and smooth. They couldn’t afford to drive these horses beyond their limits, for they expected no replacements the rest of the way to the Barbacan and all the way back again, until they met with Friar Pembleton in the very same field they had just left behind, swapping these horses for the ones they had given into the man’s care.

Of course, that was assuming that Pembleton’s little hamlet would survive over the next few weeks, and given the reports of monsters just a score of miles away, the monks could only pray that would be the case.

They traveled late into the night, with Master Jojonah even daring to put up substantial diamond light to guide their way. They camped right on the road, circling the wagons for protection. Great care was given to the precious horses, with hooves cleaned and shoes carefully inspected. The animals were toweled down and brought to graze in a nearby meadow, and more guards were posted about them than about the wagon ring.

The going was easy again the next day, but their new track would be much longer, and there was no way they could meet the timetable without pushing the horses. Brother Francis ran up behind Master Jojonah’s wagon and climbed in precisely to make that point.

“And if we drive them so hard that they cannot continue?” the master argued.

“There is a way,” Brother Francis said evenly.

Master Jojonah knew what he was talking about: in the old tomes, Francis had stumbled upon a formula, a combination of magic stones, that could steal the life force from one animal and give it to another. Master Jojonah thought the process truly barbaric, and had hoped they would find no cause to even discuss the matter. Or at least, he had hoped he could keep the caravan on schedule, thus giving him the ability to deny Francis, for he knew that the eager and ambitious brother would surely want to try this new combination of magics, if only to add a major footnote to his account of the journey. Now, facing the reality of a longer road, the master glanced to Brother Braumin, who could only shrug, for he, too, had no practical answers. Finally, Jojonah threw up his hands in defeat “See to it,” he instructed Brother Francis.

The monk nodded, couldn’t hide his smile, and was gone.

Using turquoise and hematite, the monks under Brother Francis’ charge brought the first few deer to the wagons within the hour. The unfortunate wild animals were lashed beside the horses, and again the hematite and turquoise combination was used upon them, this time to draw their very life force from them, transferring their strength and energy to the horse teams.

The deer were soon left behind in the road, two of them dead, the other three too exhausted to even stand. Master Jojonah looked back at them with sincere sympathy. He had to keep reminding himself of the urgency of the mission, of the fact that many, many more animals and people would suffer greatly if the answers were not found and the monsters not turned back.

Still, the sight of the drained animals on the road saddened him greatly. The Abellican Order should not be about such dark things as this, he thought.

More deer were brought in, and even, at one point, a large bear, the creature posing no threat, for it was overwhelmed by telepathic intrusions. Continually refreshed by the stolen energy, the horses crossed more than sixty miles before the sun was down, and again the caravan rolled on long into the night.

With the abundance of wildlife and absence of monsters, neither Jojonah nor Francis doubted they would be back on schedule within a couple of days, despite the roundabout detour.

“Just goblins!” one man declared, slamming his mug of ale down on the oaken table so forcefully that the metal handle broke apart at its top brace, sending the golden liquid flying about. The man was huge and powerful, with bulging arms and chest, thick hair and beard. He hardly stood out in this gathering of thirty adult men of Tol Hengor, hardy folk all, tall and strong from a life in the harsh climate of southern Alpinador.

“A hundred goblins, at the least,” another man put in. “And with a giant or two, do not doubt”

“And them stupid little dwarf things,” added another. “Ugly as an old dog’s arse, but tougher than stewed boot!”

“Bah! But we’ll smash them down, every one!” the first man promised, growling with every word.

The door to the town’s mead hall opened then, and all eyes turned to see a man, tall even by Alpinadoran standards, enter. He had seen more than sixty winters, but stood as straight as any twenty-year-old, and there was nothing slack about his muscles or his posture. About the town, about all of Alpinador, it was often whispered that this one had been touched by “faerie magic,” and in a sense, that was true enough. His hair was flaxen and long, well below his shoulders, and his face adorned with a well-trimmed golden beard, accentuating his eyes, which remained as sparkling and blue as a clear northern sky. All boasts ended at that moment, in deference to the great man.

“You have seen them?” one man asked, a perfectly silly question in the minds of all who knew this man, the ranger Andacanavar.

He walked up to the long table and nodded, then pulled his tremendous claymore over his shoulder and laid its bloodstained blade across the table.

“But is there any sport remaining for us?” a man said with a burst of laughter, which was joined by all in attendance.

All except for one.

“Too much sport,” Andacanavar said grimly, and the room went silent.

“Just goblins!” the man who had spilled his mead repeated determinedly.

“Goblins and giants and powries,” the ranger corrected.

“How many giants?” came a call from the far end of the great table.

“There were seven,” the ranger replied, lifting his gleaming blade up before their eyes. “Now there are five.”

“Bah, not so many,” two men said in unison.

“Too many,” Andacanavar said again, more forcefully. “With their smaller allies holding our warriors at bay, the five giants will destroy Tol Hengor.”

Nervous glances met angry glares, the proud northlanders not knowing how to respond. They held Andacanavar in the greatest respect—never before had he led them astray. Over the last few months, with the invasion by sea and by land, all the towns of Alpinador had been sorely pressed, and many overrun. Whenever tireless Andacanavar was about, though, the odds were more even, and the Alpinadorans had fared well.

“What are we to do, then?” a bear of a man named Bruinhelde, the chieftain of Tol Hengor, asked, leaning forward over the table to stare the ranger in the eye. He motioned to a woman standing in waiting at the side of the tent, and she took up a cloth and approached the great ranger.

“You will take your people out to the west,” Andacanavar explained, handing his claymore to the woman, who reverently began to clean it.

“And hide in the woods like women and children?” the ale-spiller roared, leaping up from his seat. Having had too many drinks, he wobbled on unsteady feet, and the man next to him promptly shoved him back down.

“I will try to keep striking at the giants,” the ranger explained. “If I can defeat them, or lead them away, you and your warriors can strike back at the rest and reclaim Tol Hengor.”

“I do not wish to leave my home,” Bruinhelde replied, and then paused, and all the room hushed. Bruinhelde was the leader, a title won in battle, and the tribe would follow his words, whatever Andacanavar might suggest. “But I trust in you, my friend.” he added, and reached out and dropped his hand on the ranger’s shoulder. “Strike fast and strike hard. It would be better if these filthy creatures did not set foot in Tol Hengor. And if they do, I wish to have them out quickly. I do not enjoy weathering the open forest at my age.” He said the last with a wink, for he was more than fifteen years Andacanavar’s junior, and it was well-known that the nomadic ranger lived almost exclusively in the deep forest.

The ranger nodded to the chieftain, then to all gathered. He took the cloth from the woman and finished wiping the giant blood from his blade, then lifted it up, gleaming for all to see. It was an elvish blade, Icebreaker by name, the largest item ever constructed of silverel. Icebreaker did not nick and did not dull, and in Andacanavar’s strong arms, it could cleave down small trees in a single swipe. The ranger slid the blade back into its sheath over his shoulder, nodded to Bruinhelde, and was gone.

Master Jojonah and Braumin Herde stood on the edge of a high ridge, looking down upon a small village of stone houses set in a wide and shallow vale. The sun was low in the west, sending long shadows along the valley.

“We have come farther than we believed,” the brother reasoned.

“Alpinadoran,” Master Jojonah agreed. “Either we have crossed through the Timberlands or these barbarians have settled beyond their accepted southern border.”

“The former, I would guess,” Brother Braumin replied. “Brother Baijuis, skilled in use of the sextant, agrees.”

“The magic used on the wild animals is effective, however immoral,” the master said dryly.

Brother Braumin glanced sidelong, studying his companion. He, too, had not been thrilled by the life-draining of innocent wild animals, though it seemed he was not nearly as distressed by it as Jojonah.

“Even stubborn Francis agrees that we have made up the time lost by the detour,” Master Jojonah went on. “Though he had little argument against us when Father Abbot Markwart agreed with our choice of the eastern road.”

“Brother Francis rarely needs support, or even logic, when disagreeing,” Braumin remarked, drawing a concurring chuckle from his superior. “He is plotting our new course now, and surprisingly, with the same fervor that he plotted our original course.”

“Not so surprising,” Master Jojonah replied, lowering his voice to a whisper when he noticed the approach of two younger monks. “Brother Francis will do anything to impress the Father Abbot”

Brother Braumin snickered, but lost his smile when he turned to regard the newcomers, their expressions grave.

“Pray you forgive our intrusion, Master Jojonah,” said one of them, Brother Dellman. Both young monks began bowing repeatedly.

“Yes yes,” the master prompted impatiently, for it was obvious to Jojonah, too, that something must be terribly wrong. “What is it?”

“A group of monsters,” Brother Dellman explained. “Moving from the west, toward that village.”

“Brother Francis insists that we can easily avoid them,” the other monk interjected. “And so we can, but are we to let those villagers be slaughtered?”

Master Jojonah turned to Braumin, who was shaking his head slowly, as if the very movement pained him profoundly. “Father Abbot Markwart’s instructions were clear and uncompromising,” the immaculate said uncomfortably. “We are not to engage any, enemy or friend, at least until we have completed our task at the Barbacan.”

Jojonah looked down at the village, at the plumes of gray smoke drifting lazily from the chimneys. He imagined how dark that cloud might soon be, black smoke billowing from burning houses; people, children, running about, screaming, in terror and in pain.

And then dying, horribly.

“What is in your heart, Brother Dellman?” the master asked unexpectedly.

“I am loyal to Father Abbot Markwart,” the young monk replied without hesitation, straightening his shoulders resolutely.

“I did not ask how you would proceed were the decision yours,” Master Jojonah explained to him. “I only asked what was in your heart. What should the monks of St-Mere-Abelle do when they come upon a situation such as the one before us?”

Dellman started to answer in favor of fighting beside the folk of the village, but stopped, confused. Then he started again, his reasoning moving in a different direction, speaking of the larger goal, the greater good to all the world. But then he stopped again, grunting in frustration.

“The Abellican Order has a long tradition of defending those who cannot defend themselves,” the other young monk put in. “In our own region, we have oft welcomed the townsfolk into the safety of our abbey in times of peril, be it powrie invasion or impending storms.”

“But what of the greater good?” Master Jojonah asked, stopping the young monk before he could gain too much momentum.

With no answer forthcoming, Jojonah took a different tack. “How many people do you estimate are down there?” he asked.

“Thirty,” Brother Braumin replied. “Perhaps as many as fifty.”

“And are fifty lives worth the price of defeating our most important mission, a risk that we surely assume if we intervene?”

Again there was only silence, with the two younger monks glancing repeatedly at each other, each wanting the other to seek out the proper answer.

“We know Father Abbot Markwart’s position on that,” Brother Braumin remarked.

“Father Abbot would insist that they are not worth the potential cost,” Master Jojonah said bluntly. “And he would make a strong case for his point”

“And we are loyal to Father Abbot Markwart,” Brother Dellman said, as though that simple fact ended the debate.

But Master Jojonah wasn’t going to let him off that easily, wasn’t going to let Dellman or any of the others hand off the responsibility of this decision; a decision, he believed, that went to the very core of the Abellican Order, and to the very heart of his dispute with Markwart. “We are loyal to the tenets of the Church,” he corrected. “Not to people.”

“The Father Abbot represents those tenets,” Brother Dellman argued.

“So we would hope,” replied the master. He glanced at Braumin Herde again, and the man was visibly anxious about the course of Jojonah’s questioning.

“What say you, Brother Braumin?” the master asked bluntly. “You have been in the service of the Church for more than ten years; what do your studies of the tenets of the Abellican Order tell you of our course now? By those tenets, are fifty lives, or a hundred lives, worth the risk of the greater good?”

Braumin straightened, honestly surprised that Master Jojonah had put him on the spot, had called him out to reveal publicly what was in his heart. His thoughts whirled back to the powrie battle at St-Mere-Abelle, to the peasant Father Abbot had possessed, then leaping the body to its death. That act was for the greater good—many powries were destroyed in the action—and yet it still left a lingering foul taste in Braumin’s mouth and a cold blackness in his heart.

“Are they?” Jojonah pressed.

“They are,” Braumin answered sincerely. “One life is worth the risk. With so important a quest before us, we should not go out of our way to seek those in peril, but when God sees fit to present them before us, we have a sacred obligation to intervene.”

The two younger monks gasped in unison, surprised by the words, but also somewhat relieved—an expression, particularly on the face of young Brother Dellman, that Master Jojonah marked well.

“And you two,” Jojonah asked of them, “what say you of our course?”

“I would like to save the village,” Brother Dellman replied. “Or at least warn them of the impending invasion.”

The other monk nodded his agreement.

Jojonah struck a pensive pose, weighing the risks. “Are there any other monsters in the area?” he asked.

The two young monks looked to each other curiously, then shrugged.

“And how strong is this coming force?” Master Jojonah went on.

Again, no answer.

“These are questions we must have answered, and quickly,” Master Jojonah explained. “Else we must follow Father Abbot Markwart’s decree and be on our way, leaving the villagers to their grim fate. Go then,” he bade them both, shooing them away as if they were stray dogs. “Get you to those with the quartz stones. Find me my answers, and be quick about it.”

The young monks bowed immediately, turned and sped away.

“You take a great risk,” Brother Braumin remarked as soon as the pair were gone. “And more a risk for yourself than for our quest.”

“What risk to my soul if I let this pass?” Jojonah asked, a point that temporarily stole Brother Braumin’s argument.

“Still,” the younger monk said at length, “if the Father Abbot—”

“The Father Abbot is not here,” Master Jojonah reminded him.

“But he will be if Brother Francis discovers that you plan to intervene against these monsters.”

“I will deal with Brother Francis,” Master Jojonah assured him. “And with the Father Abbot, if he does indeed find his way into Francis’ body.” His tone showed that to be the end of the debate, and, despite his well-founded fears, Braumin Herde was smiling as Jojonah determinedly walked ahead of him. The master, his mentor, was taking a stand, Braumin understood. Sometimes, when the heart called loudly enough, one just had to dig in his heels.

The night was dark; a full moon had risen early, but had been blotted out by thick and threatening storm clouds. A fitting night, given the monstrous force approaching Tol Hengor. Nearly two hundred strong, the vicious band had already overrun two villages, and had no reason to believe that this next one in line would prove any more difficult They came into the western end of the valley in their customary semicircular battle formation, with goblins forming the frontal shield perimeter, every other one carrying a torch, and the powries and giants clustered in the middle, ready to support either flank or charge straight ahead. Though they were walking between two ridges, along lower, less defensible ground, they did not fear any ambush. The Alpinadoran humans were not bowmen, typically, and even if the warriors of this village had perfected the art of distance fighting, their number—reported by scouts at no more than three dozen—would not be sufficient to cause too much distress. In addition the giants, who could take many arrow hits, would respond to any flanking attack with a devastating boulder barrage, turning the ambush back on the ambushers. No, the powrie leaders knew, Alpinadoran humans were dangerous in close combat, fighting hand-to-hand with their great strength, and not in hit-and-run tactics. And so the monsters had chosen this head-on formation rather than risk breaking the band into smaller, more scattered lines by traveling over the rougher ground of the ridges.

Thus it was with supreme confidence that the powries moved their combined force through the wide vale, all of them itching for the taste of human blood, all of the powries wanting to brighten the crimson stain of their berets.

They couldn’t comprehend the power that had come against them in the form of the monks of St-Mere-Abelle. A dozen lay in wait on either side of the vale, Brother Francis leading those on the northern wall, Brother Braumin in command of those in the south. Master Jojonah sat far in back of Braumin’s group, pressing a hematite, that most useful and versatile of stones, against his heart. He was the first to fall into the magic, releasing his soul from its corporeal bonds and drifting out into the night air.

His first task was easy enough. He willed his invisible spirit along at great speed, moving down to the west end of the valley, meeting the coming force, scouting out its strength and formation. The spirit whisked back the way it had come, first to the northern ridge and Brother Francis, then across the way to Brother Braumin, relaying the information to both groups. Then, with a thought, Master Jojonah was gone again, back to the approaching monsters.

Now came the master’s more difficult assignment: to infiltrate the monstrous force. Invisible and silent, he glided past the front goblin line and into the central group, going after a powrie body, but wisely reconsidering. Powries, so the ancient tomes declared, were especially resistant to magic, and particularly to any form of possession. They were tough and intelligent and strong of will.

Still, Master Jojonah did not want to get into a goblin body. He could cause a bit of mischief in one, of course, but nothing substantial, likely. Goblins were always an unpredictable and traitorous type, so the powries and giants wouldn’t even be caught too much by surprise when one of them suddenly turned against the group, and a frail goblin body wouldn’t do much damage against the likes of a tough powrie, let alone a giant.

That left one option for Master Jojonah, who knew he was venturing into wholly unexplored territory. He had never read of any possession of a giant, and knew very little about the behemoths, except for their bad temperaments and tremendous battle prowess.

His spirit moved cautiously beside the handful of fomorians. One in particular, a huge specimen indeed, seemed to be in control of the group, bullying the others and hurrying them along.

Jojonah thought out the different tactics he might use in this attempt, which led him to believe that one of the other behemoths might prove a better target. None of the group, not even the apparent leader, seemed overly intelligent, but one stood out at the other end of the spectrum, a big loping creature, wagging its head and giggling at the sound made by its flapping lips.

Jojonah’s spirit slipped into the monster’s subconscious.

Duh? the giant’s will asked.

Give me your form! Jojonah telepathically demanded.

Duh?

Your body! the monk’s will commanded. Give it to me! Get out!

“No!” the horrified giant roared aloud, and its will locked with Jojonah’s, instinctively trying to expel the monk.

Do you know who I am? Jojonah explained, trying to calm the behemoth before its companions could catch on that something was suddenly very wrong. If you understood, fool, you would not deny me!

Duh?

I am your god, Jojonah’s spirit coaxed. I am Bestesbulzibar the demon dactyl, come to aid in the slaughter of the humans. You are not honored that l chose your body as my vessel?

Duh? the giant’s spirit asked again, but this time the tone of the telepathic inquisition was markedly different.

Get out, Jojonah prompted, sensing the weakness, or I will find another vessel and use it to utterly destroy you!

“Yes, yes, my master,” the giant blubbered aloud.

Silence! Jojonah demanded.

“Yes, yes, my master,” the giant repeated in an even louder voice.

Jojonah, partially entrenched now, could hear the world through the behemoth’s ears, could hear the sound of the other giants gathering about this one, asking questions. He felt it as if it were his own shoulder when the giant leader pushed the loud and confused behemoth.

The targeted giant, convinced that this was indeed the demon dactyl, was trying desperately to comply, though it had little idea how it might vacate its own body. Jojonah knew he had to work fast, for possession, even upon a willing vessel, was never an easy task. He fell deeper into the hematite, used its magic to infiltrate every aspect, every synapse, of the giant’s brain. The giant’s id instinctively recoiled and fought back, but without the giant’s conscious will backing it, it had little power.

Jojonah felt the blow keenly when the biggest giant laid his new form low.

“Shut yer mouth!” the big brute demanded.

“Duh, yes, master,” Jojonah responded. Truly, the heavy jowls and heavy limbs proved an awkward experience for the monk as he tried to talk and pull himself up from the ground.

The big giant hit him again and he lowered his head submissively. “I be quiet,” he said softly.

That seemed to mollify the leader for the time being, and the group moved along, back into their place in the formation, oblivious to the fact that they had picked up an extra spirit in the process.

The dozen monks on each side of the valley stood in a line, hands joined, the fourth and tenth of each group holding a graphite, and Brother Francis, in a concession made by Jojonah to quiet the man’s outrage, holding a small diamond. Francis was the guidepost to both groups, the one who would select the time. The monks had to strike hard and unerringly; any retaliation from the monsters could cost them dearly.

Francis let the front rim of the goblin semicircle pass below him. The key to victory, they had all agreed, was to destroy the powries quickly and to hurt the giants enough to steal their heart for the fight. With the leaders eliminated, the reasoning went, the cowardly goblins would show little desire for any battle.

Francis was the only one in his line with his eyes open, the rest falling into the magic of the two graphites. He saw the goblins passing, some less than twenty yards away, and he could make out the towering silhouettes of a handful of giants. Francis took a deep breath and called forth the power of the diamond, flashing a brief signal to waiting Brother Braumin across the way.

“Now, brethren,” Francis whispered. “It is time.” And then Francis, too, fell into the communal magic, transferring his energy through the line to the graphites.

Brother Braumin’s words to his group were nearly identical.

A split second later the first thundering bolt erupted from the hand of the fourth monk in Francis’ line, followed by a blast from across the way, and then from the tenth in Francis’ line, and then again from across the way. Back and forth the lightning barrage went, each monk in sequence loosing his energy into the combined pool of power of his respective line. Many of the younger monks could not even use such stones on their own, but in their mental joining with Francis and Braumin and the older students, their energy was tapped, each in turn.

The whole of the valley trembled with the thunderous report; each successive searing flash revealed fewer monsters scrambling about.

In the center of the enemy formation, powries scrambled and were thrown down repeatedly, staggered and jolted. The giants, larger targets by far, took even more hits, but their great forms withstood the assault much better, and four of the five were still standing after the first complete volley, with only one taken down—and that one by a falling tree, not by a direct hit of magical lightning.

The largest of the giant group, ignoring its trapped and screaming companion, pointed up the northern slope and called for a boulder retaliation. Its intent and its expression changed quickly, though, when the giant beside it lifted a huge rock high into the air and then smashed it down upon its head.

Master Jojonah felt the sudden protests of the possessed giant’s true spirit. I kill him and we be leader! he telepathically improvised, and that calmed the stupid giant considerably. Still, for all the giant’s efforts to remain in the background and let what it believed to be the dactyl control its corporeal form, it simply didn’t know how to let go. Thus, the giant was giggling louder than ever as Jojonah instructed the arms to hit the giant leader again and again, finally beating the dazed creature to the ground.

The two remaining giants howled and moved to restrain him.

Jojonah tucked the boulder into his chest, then flung it out into the face of the nearest attacker, staggering the giant. The other hit him with a flying tackle, though, the pair squashing one of the few remaining powries as they tumbled to the ground.

Hey, the possessed giant’s spirit protested, and Jojonah sensed that the dim-witted creature was finally catching on. Hey!

The giant’s will took up the struggle for dominance anew, attacking Jojonah. And then the second lightning volley began.

Jojonah forced the giant form to its feet and ran right in the path of the searing lightning. Then, as he felt the burning energy blast against his chest, he relinquished the battered body to its rightful owner and his spirit flew free, hovering in the empty air to regard the scene.

The largest giant, blood pouring from its head, somehow managed to stagger back to its feet—only to be hit by the next lightning bolt, and then another right after that. The behemoth tumbled to the ground again, all strength and resilience gone, and waited for death to take it.

The lightning continued to roll in, each blast weaker than the previous, as the monks expended their magical energy. But there would be no significant retaliation, Master Jojonah recognized, for all that remained of the monstrous force were less than half of the goblins, a dozen powries, and a single giant, and all of those were too frightened, too battered, and too surprised to even think of continuing the fight. Scattered torches marked their flight back to the west, back out of the valley the way they had come in.

In their retreat, the monsters made their way past one other silent observer, a man who had thought to come in for quiet attacks at the rear of the formation. Any who inadvertently ventured too close to the ranger found death at the end of a huge sword. And when Andacanavar discovered that one of the giants remained alive, he moved in on the limping behemoth, hitting it a series of fierce blows that laid it low before it even realized that the man was there.

When at last the valley fell silent, Brother Francis led his monks quietly across the way to rejoin their peers. Then the whole of the group moved back from the southern ridge, back to the wagons and Master Jojonah, where they quickly formed up their train and started away, not wanting to be discovered by either monster or Alpinadoran.

Andacanavar watched it all with a mixture of hope and confusion.

CHAPTER 9

Old Friends Well Met

“So it is true!” the portly man cried, seeing Elbryan and Pony as they walked into the encampment beside the returning archers.

“Belster, my old friend,” the ranger replied. “How good it is to see you faring well.”

“Well indeed!” Belster declared. “Though we’ve been a bit short of rations of late.” He patted his ample belly as he spoke. “You will see to that, I am sure.”

Both Pony and Elbryan chuckled at that remark—ever did Belster O’Comely have his priorities in order!

“And where is my other friend?” Belster asked. “The one whose appetite rivals my own?”

A cloud passed over Elbryan’s face. He turned to Pony, who was even more distressed.

“But the reports from the forest spoke of great stone magic,” Belster protested. “Magic such as only the Mad Friar used to hurl. Do not tell me that he died this very night! Oh, what tragedy!”

“Avelyn has passed from this life,” Elbryan replied somberly. “But not this night. He died in Aida, when he destroyed the demon dactyl.”

“But the reports from the forest . . .” Belster stuttered, as though trying to use logic against the ranger’s words.

“The reports of the fighting were correct, but spoke of Pony,” Elbryan explained, putting his arm across the woman’s shoulders. “It was she who put the stones to their powerful use.” He turned to his love and lifted his other hand to stroke her thick golden mane. “Avelyn taught her well.”

“So it would seem,” Belster remarked.

The ranger pulled himself away from the woman and struck a determined pose, staring back at Belster. “And Pony is ready to carry on the work where Avelyn finished,” he declared. “In the bowels of smoky Aida, Avelyn destroyed the demon dactyl and turned the tide of this war, stealing the binding force from our enemies. Now it lies before us to finish the task, to rid our lands of these wicked creatures.”

To all those around, the ranger seemed to grow a bit taller as he spoke, and Belster O’Comely smiled knowingly. This was the charm of Elbryan, the mystique of Nightbird. Belster knew that the ranger would inspire them all to new heights of battle, would guide them as one pointed and focused force, striking hard at every weakness among their enemy’s ranks. Despite the news about Avelyn, despite his mounting fears about the missing Roger Lockless, it seemed to Belster that the world got a bit brighter that night.

The tallies of the victory proved impressive. The forest was littered with the bodies of dead goblins and powries, and several giants. Six men had been wounded, one gravely, and three others were missing and presumed dead. Those who had carried in the worst of the wounded did not expect the man to live through the night—indeed, they had only carried him back that he might say his farewells to his family and be properly buried.

Pony went to him with the hematite, working tirelessly hour after hour, willingly sacrificing every ounce of her own energy.

“She will save him,” Belster announced to Elbryan a short time later, when he and Tomas Gingerwart found the ranger as he tended to Symphony, wiping the horse down and cleaning the hooves. “She will,” the former innkeeper repeated over and over, obviously trying to convince himself.

“Shamus Tucker is a good man,” Tomas added. “He does not deserve such a fate.”

All the while he was speaking, Elbryan noted, Tomas looked directly at him, almost accusingly. It seemed to Elbryan that Tomas considered Pony’s work with the wounded man to be some kind of a test.

“Pony will do all that is possible,” the ranger answered simply. “She is strong with the stones, nearly as strong as was Avelyn, but she used most of her energy in the battle, I fear, and has not much left to give to Shamus Tucker. When I am done with Symphony, I will go to her to see if I can be of any assistance.”

“You tend to the horse first?” There was no mistaking the open accusations in Tomas Gingerwart’s tone.

“I do as Pony instructed me,” the ranger replied calmly. “She wished to start the healing process alone, for in that solitude she might find deeper levels of concentration, and thus a more intimate bond with the wounded man. I trust in her judgment, and so should you.”

Tomas cocked his head, regarding the man, and gave a slight and unconvincing nod.

A nervous Belster cleared his throat and nudged his stubborn companion. “Do not think us ungrateful—” he started to apologize to Elbryan.

The ranger’s laugh cut him short and he blustered with surprise. He looked to Tomas, who was obviously angry, thinking he was being mocked.

“How long have we lived like this?” Elbryan asked Belster. “How many months have we spent in the forest, fighting and running?”

“Too many,” Belster replied.

“Indeed,” said the ranger. “And in that time, I have come to understand much. I know why you are mistrusting, Master Gingerwart,” he said bluntly, turning from Symphony to stand directly before the man. “Before Pony and I arrived, you were one of the unquestioned leaders of this band.”

“Do you imply that I cannot see the greater good?” Tomas asked. “Do you believe that I would place my own desire for power above—”

“I speak the truth,” Elbryan interrupted. “That is all.”

Tomas nearly choked on that proclamation.

“You are fearful now, and so you should be,” the ranger went on, turning back to his horse. “Anytime one in your position of great responsibility senses a change, even a change that appears to be for the good, he must be wary. The stakes are too high.”

Belster hid his smile as he studied the change that came over Tomas. The ranger’s simple reasoning, honesty, and straightforward manner were truly disarming. Tomas’ agitation had passed its peak now, with the man visibly relaxing.

“But understand,” Elbryan went on, “that I, and Pony, are not your enemies, nor even your rivals. We will help out where we may. Our goals, as are your own, are to rid the land of the dactyl’s evil minions, even as we helped rid the world of the demon itself.”

Tomas nodded, seeming somewhat placated, if a bit confused.

“Will the man live?” Belster asked.

“Pony was hopeful,” the ranger replied. “Her work with the hematite is nothing short of miraculous.”

“Let us hope,” Tomas added sincerely.

The ranger finished tending to Symphony soon after, then sought out Pony and the wounded man. He found them under the shelter of a lean-to, the man sleeping comfortably, his breathing steady and strong. Pony was asleep, too, lying right across the man, one hand still holding tight to the soul stone. Elbryan thought to take the hematite and try to do some healing of his own on Shamus Tucker, but changed his mind, reasoning that sleep might be the best cure of all.

The ranger moved Pony slightly, trying to make her more comfortable, and then he left them. He went back to Symphony, thinking to make his bed there, and to his relief found Belli’mar Juraviel waiting for him.

“I led the small group back to Caer Tinella,” the elf explained, his voice grim. “And there found a hundred powries, a like number of goblins, and several more giants waiting to join in the chase.”

“More giants?” the ranger echoed incredulously, for it was not common for the behemoths to gather in numbers above a handful. The sheer potential for devastation of such a force stole Elbryan’s breath. “Do you think they mean to march on Palmaris?” he asked.

Juraviel shook his head. “More likely they are using the towns as staging areas for smaller excursions,” he reasoned. “But we should keep careful watch on Caer Tinella. The leader there is a powrie of apparently great renown; even the giants bow before him, and in all the time I spent hiding in the shadows in the town, I did not hear a single word of dissent against him, even when reports began coming in of the disaster in the forest”

“We haven’t stung them so hard, then,” the ranger remarked.

“We have stung them,” Juraviel replied, “and that may serve to only make them more angry. We should watch the south and watch it well. The next force coming to find your friends will be overwhelming, I am sure.”

Elbryan instinctively glanced to the south, as though expecting a horde of monsters to be tearing through the trees.

“There is another matter,” Juraviel went on, “concerning a particular prisoner the powries have taken.”

“It is my understanding that the powries have many prisoners in many towns,” Elbryan replied.

“This one may be different,” Juraviel explained. “This one knows of your friends in the forest; indeed, he is highly regarded among them, much as you were among the people of Dundalis and the other towns of the Timberlands.”

On the edge of the clearing, sheltered by the thick boughs of a pine, Belster O’Comely watched the ranger curiously. Beside him, Tomas was more animated, and only the portly innkeeper’s constant prodding prevented the man from getting them both discovered.

Elbryan was talking, to himself, it appeared, though Belster suspected he might know the reason. The ranger was looking up into a tree, to an apparently empty branch, and holding a conversation, though they could not come close to making out the words.

“Your friend’s a bit of a loon?” Tomas whispered in Belster’s ear.

Belster shook his head resolutely. “All the world should be so crazy,” he replied.

Too loudly.

Elbryan turned and cocked his head, and Belster, knowing the game was up, led Tomas from behind the pine. “Ah, Elbryan,” the portly man said. “There you are. We have been searching all about for you.”

“Not so hard to find,” the ranger replied evenly, suspiciously. “I went to Pony—your friend is resting well and appears as though he will survive—and then back here to Symphony.”

“To Symphony and . . .” Belster prompted, nodding toward the tree.

The ranger stood calm and did not answer. He wasn’t sure how Tomas might react to Juraviel, though Belster had seen the elf and several other Touel’alfar during the time he fought with Elbryan in the north.

“Come now,” Belster went on, “I know Elbryan well, and would not expect him to be standing alone and talking to himself.”

You should sit with me at Oracle, the ranger thought, and gave a slight chuckle.

“You’ve brought a friend, unless I miss my guess,” said Belster. “A friend whose special talents bode well for me and my companions.”

Elbryan motioned for the two men to join him by the tree, and Belli’mar Juraviel, picking up the cue, hopped from the branch, using his nearly translucent wings to flutter down to a soft landing beside his ranger friend.

Tomas Gingerwart nearly jumped out of his boots. “What in all the dark holes in all the strange world is that?” he bellowed.

“That is an elf,” Belster calmly explained.

“Touel’alfar,” Elbryan added.

“Belli’mar Juraviel, at your service,” the elf said, bowing low to Tomas.

The big man only nodded stupidly, wagging his head, wagging his lips.

“Come now,” Belster said to him. “I told you of the elves that fought with us at Dundalis. I told you of the catapult caravan, where Brother Avelyn nearly blew himself up, and of the elves who stung our enemies from the trees.”

“I . . .I . . . I did not expect . . .” Tomas stuttered.

Elbryan looked to Juraviel, who seemed almost bored by the typical reaction.

With a loud sigh, Tomas managed to steady himself.

“Juraviel has been to Caer Tinella—” Elbryan began to explain.

“I would have asked him to do so if he had not,” Belster interrupted anxiously. “We fear for one of our own, Roger Lockless by name. He went into town this very evening, shortly before the monsters came out after us.”

“Either their march toward our position began as a search for him, or they have him, it would seem,” Tomas added.

“The latter,” Elbryan informed them. “Juraviel has seen your Roger Lockless.”

“Alive?” both men asked together, their tone showing true concern.

“Very much so,” the elf replied. “Wounded, but not too badly. I could not get close; the powries have him under tight and watchful guard.”

“Roger has been a thorn to them since they arrived,” Tomas explained.

Belster then recounted the many tales of Roger’s adventures, the thievery, the mocking jokes left behind, his common practice of having goblins take the blame for his nighttime raids, and the freeing of Mrs. Kelso.

“You will need to fill large shoes, Nightbird,” Tomas Gingerwart said gravely, “if you are to replace Roger Lockless.”

“Replace him?” the ranger balked. “You speak as if he is already dead.”

“In the clutches of Kos-kosio Begulne, he may as well be,” Tomas replied.

Elbryan glanced to Juraviel, the two exchanging wry smiles. “We shall see,” the ranger said.

Belster nearly hopped for joy, his hopes soaring.

Elbryan was surprised to find Pony up and waiting for him when he arose the next morning, the eastern sky just beginning to brighten with the hint of dawn.

“I would have expected you to sleep the day away after your efforts with the stones,” the ranger said.

“I would, were this not so important a day,” Pony replied.

Elbryan wore a puzzled expression, but only for a moment as he considered Pony’s stance, her sword belted at her hip. “You wish to learn the sword-dance,” he reasoned.

“As you agreed,” said Pony.

The ranger’s lack of enthusiasm showed clearly. “There are so many matters to attend to,” he explained. “Roger Lockless, an important figure to these folk, is held prisoner in Caer Tinella, and we have to take a reckoning of the band, to see who can fight and who cannot.”

“So you do not intend to do your own sword-dance this morning?” Pony asked, and the ranger knew he was caught by her logic.

“Where is Juraviel?”

“He was gone when I awoke,” Pony replied. “But is he not gone every morning, after all?”

“To his own sword-dance, likely,” said the ranger. “And to scout the area. Many of the Touel’alfar prefer this time of day, just before the dawn.”

“As do I,” said Pony. “A fine time for bi’nelle dasada.”

Elbryan could not hold out against her persistence. “Come along,” he said. “Let us find a place where we might begin.”

He led her through the dark forest and down into a small shallow where the ground was flat and clear of any large brush.

“I have seen you fight,” he explained, “but I have never really found the chance or the cause to examine your style. A few simple attack and defense routines should suffice.” He motioned for her to step out into the clearing to give the demonstration.

Pony eyed him curiously. “Should we remove our clothes?” she asked coyly.

Elbryan blew a frustrated sigh. “You intend to keep teasing me?” he asked helplessly.

“Teasing?” Pony replied too innocently. “I have seen you at the sword-dance, and—”

“Are we here to learn or to play?” the ranger said firmly.

“I was not teasing,” Pony retorted in a voice just as determined. “I only mean to keep you interested as the weeks of this war drag on.” She stepped into the clearing then and drew out her sword, setting herself in a low crouch.

But then she was grabbed by the shoulder and turned about, to find Elbryan, his expression perfectly serious, staring into her eyes. “It was not my choice to abstain,” he said quietly, seriously. “Nor yours. It was a decision made necessary by circumstance, and one I tolerate, but do not enjoy. Not at all. You need not worry about keeping me interested, my love. All my heart is yours, and yours alone.” He bent to her and kissed her softly, but didn’t allow that to melt into something deeper and more passionate.

“We will find our time,” Pony promised him as they broke the embrace. “A time and place for me and for you, when we do not need to act for the betterment of the whole world. A time when you can be Elbryan Wyndon, and not Nightbird, and when our love can safely bring us children.”

They held the pose for a long while, staring at each other, both taking such great pleasure and comfort in the other’s mere presence. Finally the tip of the sun came above the eastern rim and broke the trance.

“Show me,” the ranger bade her, stepping back.

Pony fell back into her crouch, spent a long moment steadying herself, mentally preparing herself, then went into a routine of attack and defense, her sword whipping expertly through the air. She had spent years in the King’s army perfecting these maneuvers, and her swordplay now was nothing short of spectacular.

But it was typical, Elbryan knew, so indicative of the fighting style common throughout the land, a style mimicked by goblins and powries. Pony’s hips turned repeatedly as she brought her weight behind each slashing cut, wading forward and then scampering back in defense.

When she finished, she turned, her face red from the effort, her smile wide with pride.

Elbryan walked up beside her, drawing out Tempest “Strike that branch,” he bade her, indicating a low limb three feet away.

Pony settled, then stepped ahead, one, two, sword going high and back, then rushing forward.

She stopped in mid-swing as Tempest stabbed past her, sticking deep into the branch. She had taken a full step before Elbryan had even started the movement, and yet he had beaten her to the mark easily.

“The lunge,” he explained, holding the pose, his body fully extended, right arm out straight, left arm turned down behind his trailing shoulder. He retreated suddenly, settling back into a defensive posture in a mere second. “Your weaving and slashing maneuvers are excellent, but you must add the lunge, that sudden, swift stab that no powrie, no opponent, can expect or deflect”

In response, Pony assumed the ranger’s stance, balancing herself perfectly, knees out over-her feet, legs angled perpendicular to each other. She stepped out suddenly with her right leg, left arm dropping, right arm extending, mimicking Elbryan’s move almost perfectly.

The ranger didn’t even try to hide his surprise, or his approval. “You have been studying me,” he said.

“Forever,” Pony answered, falling back to defensive posture.

“And you almost got it right,” Elbryan remarked, deflating her obvious pride.

“Almost?”

“Your body led the way,” the ranger explained. “And yet it is your sword which should pull you forward.”

Pony looked down at her blade skeptically. “I do not understand.”

“You will,” Elbryan said with a grin. “Now come along. Let us find a better area where we might properly execute bi’nelle dasada.”

They found a proper clearing soon after, Elbryan going off to the side to prepare himself, affording Pony some measure of modesty as she undressed. Then they met on the field with their weapons, the ranger leading the dance, Pony attuning herself to his every move.

For a long while Elbryan watched her, gauging her fluidity and grace, marveling at how easily she picked up the dance. Then he let himself fall into his own meditative trance, his own routine, let the song of bi’nelle dasada flow through his body.

For a short while Pony tried to keep up, but soon she was only watching, awestruck by the beauty, the interplay of muscle, the continually shifting but always perfect balance.

When he finished, he was covered in sweat, as was Pony, the gentle wind tickling their skin. They stood regarding each other for a long while, and it seemed to each of them as if they had just achieved a level of intimacy no less than lovemaking.

Elbryan reached up and tenderly stroked Pony’s cheek. “Every morning,” he said. “But take care that Belli’mar Juraviel does not learn of this.”

“You fear his reaction?”

“I do not know if he would approve,” the ranger admitted. “This is among the highest rituals of the Touel’alfar, and only they have the right to share it”

“Juraviel admitted that you were not n’Touel’alfar,” Pony reminded him.

“And I feel no guilt,” the ranger replied, somewhat convincingly. “I will teach you—I only wish the decision to be kept mine alone.”

“To protect Juraviel,” Pony reasoned.

“Go and dress,” Elbryan said with a smile. “The day will be long and arduous, I fear.”

Pony walked back to the brush at the side of the field, satisfied with her morning’s work, though truly exhausted. For all these weeks she had desired to begin the sword-dance, and now that she had completed her first experience with it, she was surely not disappointed.

Somehow, the sword-dance felt to her like the training she had received with the magical stones, a gift, a growth, moving her to her potential, moving her closer to God.

PART TWO

THE PECKING ORDER

Once again, Uncle Mather, I am amazed by the resilience of people pushed into a desperate situation. As it was in Dundalis, I have found here a group willing to fight and to die—men and women, young children even, and older folks who should be spending their days telling stories of their long-past adventures. 1 have seen some terrible suffering, and yet have heard little in the way of complaint—other than the sounds of stomachs rumbling for lack of food.

And with the common suffering comes an altruism that is truly heartwarming and inspiring. As it was with Paulson, Cric, and Chipmunk, who gave their lives for a battle that really wasn’t for them to fight, as it was with gallant Bradwarden, who certainly could have chosen a different path, it is now with Belster and Tomas, Roger Lockless and all the others.

I have my fears, though, mostly for an unintentional rivalry that may spring up between myself and the leaders of this band. When I led the fighters in the forest back to the refugee encampment after our great victory, 1 sensed true tension with Tomas Gingerwart, who, until my arrival, acted as one of the leaders of the forest band, perhaps the strongest voice of all. A calm conversation quickly cured that potential ill, for Tomas has been seasoned by years and experience. As soon as he was assured that he and I both fought for the same goal—the benefit of the people under his care—the rivalry was no more.

But not so, I fear with another of the band whom I have not yet even met, an impetuous young fellow named Roger. By Belster’s words, Roger is young and proud, and has ever been insecure in his position among the refugees, even to the point that he considered Belster and the folk from the northland as potential rivals. What will he think when he meets Pony and me? How will he react when he sees the respect afforded us, particularly from those who knew us in the north, or from those who followed us in the battle in the forest?

In truth, Uncle Mather I think it ironic that these displaced folk think of me as a hero. For when I see their faces, every one, the expressions of men and women put to the test for perhaps the first time, I see the truest heroism.

Because that is something that cannot be judged by the quality of training and the quality of weapons, Uncle Mather. Simply because I was trained by the Touel’alfar and carry with me weapons of great power am I any more heroic than the woman who throws herself between danger and her children, or the farmer who trades plowshare for sword to defend his community? Am I more heroic because my chances of winning the battle are greater?

I think not, for heroism is measured in strength of heart, not strength of arm. It is a marker of the conscious decisions, the selflessness, the willingness, to sacrifice everything, in the knowledge that those who follow you will be better off for your efforts. Heroism is the ultimate act of community, I think, the sense of belonging to something bigger than one’s own mortal coil. It is rooted in faith: in God, or even in the mere belief that the whole of the goodly folk is stronger when each individual part cares for the others.

It is an incredible thing to me, this resilience, this inner strength, this human spirit. And in admiring it, I realize that we cannot lose this war, that in the end, even if that end be a thousand years hence, we will triumph. Because they cannot kill us, Uncle Mather. They cannot kill the resilience. They cannot kill the inner strength.

They cannot kill the human spirit.

I look into the faces of the men and women, the children, too young for such trials, the aged, too old for such battle, and I know this to be true.

—ELBRYAN WYNDON

CHAPTER 10

The Holiest of Places

The terrain became more difficult by noon on the day after the fight in the valley. Master Jojonah tried to keep the spirits of his comrades high, reminding them of the good they had done, of the suffering they had prevented by intervening. But all of the monks were tired from their nighttime trials, particularly concerning the further use of magic, and, given the rough terrain, magic this day would have proven a great help.

One thing that neither Jojonah nor Brother Francis would compromise on, though, was the use of the quartz gemstones for scouting. Exhausted as they were, the monks simply could not afford to let down their guard, not in this wild region. Master Jojonah did end the ride early, before the sun had set, and called for his brothers to sleep well and long, to gather their strength that they might attack the road more vigorously the next day.

“We would have had the strength to travel much later,” Brother Francis pointedly told the master, as usual, planting himself by Jojonah’s side as if keeping a wary eye on the older man, “had we not engaged in an affair that was not our own.”

“It seems to me that you enjoyed the rout of the monstrous force as much as any, brother,” the Master responded. “How can you doubt the wisdom of our actions?”

“I’ll not deny the pleasure I gamer in destroying enemies of my God,” Brother Francis replied.

That high-browed proclamation raised Jojonah’s eyebrows.

“Yet,” Brother Francis went on before the portly monk could reply, “I know what Father Abbot Markwart dictated.”

“And that is all that matters?”

“Yes.”

Master Jojonah silently groaned over the brother’s blind faith, a fault so prevalent in the Abellican Order these days, a fault that he, too, had been guilty of for so many years. Master Jojonah, like all the masters and immaculates of St.-Mere-Abelle, had known that the ship hired to carry the brothers to the isle of Pimaninicuit would never be allowed to leave the harbor at All Saints Bay, and that all aboard her would be killed. Like all the others—all except for Avelyn Desbris—Jojonah had accepted that grim outcome as the lesser of two evils, for the monks simply could not have allowed any with such knowledge as the location of Pimaninicuit to sail away. Similarly, Jojonah knew that Brother Pellimar had been allowed to die of an infection from a wound he had suffered on the voyage to that island—though hard work by the older monks with a soul stone certainly could have saved him—because the man could not keep his mouth shut concerning that all-important voyage. But again, at the time, Pellimar’s demise had seemed to Jojonah the lesser of two evils.

In reflecting on his own decision, Master Jojonah could not fully blame the zealous Brother Francis now. “We saved many families last night,” he reminded. “And for that, I cannot be sorry. Our mission has not been compromised.”

“Your pardon, Master Jojonah,” came a call from the side of the wagon.

Both men turned to see a trio of younger monks, Brother Dellman among them, cautiously approaching.

“I have detected a presence in the area,” Brother Dellman explained. “Not a goblin, not a monster at all,” the young monk quickly added, seeing the sudden and frantic reaction. “A man, shadowing our every move.”

Master Jojonah sat back, not too concerned, and more interested at that moment in studying the young man who had delivered the news. Brother Dellman was going out of his way to make himself quite useful of late, was working harder than any other in the caravan. Jojonah liked the potential he saw there, in the young man’s eyes, in the idealistic attitude.

“A man?” Brother Francis echoed, seeing that Master Jojonah was making no move to reply. “Of the Church? Of Palmaris? Of the village?” he snapped impatiently. Francis, too, had noticed Dellman’s work of late, but he wasn’t sure of the young monk’s motives. “Who is it, and where has he come from?”

“Alpinadoran, obviously,” Brother Dellman replied. “A huge man, with long flaxen hair.”

“From the village, no doubt,” Brother Francis said with a huff aimed directly at the master. “Perhaps you spoke too soon, Master Jojonah,” he added curtly.

“He is a man,” the older monk argued. “Just a man. Probably trying to find out who we are and why we saved his village. We will send him away and that will be the end of it.”

“And is he a precursor?” Brother Francis said. “A spy sent to unveil our weaknesses? Never has Alpinador called itself an ally of the Abellican Church. Need I remind you of the tragedy at Fuldebarrow?”

“You need remind me of nothing,” Master Jojonah replied sternly, but Brother Francis’ point was well-taken. Fuldebarrow was an Alpinadoran town, larger than the one from the previous night, wherein the Church, the Abbey of St. Precious of Palmaris, had tried to establish a mission. All had gone well for nearly a year, but then, apparently, the Abellican missionaries had said or done something to offend the Alpinadoran barbarians, probably some insult to the god-figure of the northern people. None of the monks were ever found—physically at least. St. Precious had turned to St.-Mere-Abelle for help in the investigation, and using their magical talents, soul stones to locate the spirits of the dead, the masters of the larger abbey discovered that the missionaries had been brutally executed.

But that incident was nearly a hundred years old, and sending missionaries into any heathen territory was ever a dangerous course.

“Let us be rid of this spy efficiently,” Brother Francis said, rising to his feet. “I will—”

“You will do nothing,” Master Jojonah interrupted.

Brother Francis straightened as if slapped. “It is curious that I was not able to contact Father Abbot Markwart before the fight at the village,” he remarked, the implications obvious, given his sly look Jojonah’s way. “Distance is supposed to be irrelevant where hematite is concerned.”

“Perhaps you are not as powerful with the stones as you believe,” Master Jojonah said dryly. Both men knew better, though. Both knew that Master Jojonah, who possessed a small but effective sunstone, the stone of antimagic, had interfered with Brother Francis’ attempt to enlist the Father Abbot against the notion that they would defend the Alpinadoran village from the monsters.

“What are we to do with this troublesome shadow, then?” Francis demanded.

“What indeed?” was all Master Jojonah could answer.

“He knows of us, and thus he looms as a threat,” Brother Francis pressed. “If he is a spy, as I believe, then he will likely send a powerful force against us, and letting him live now will not seem so merciful in light of the dozens of men who will pay for our generosity with their lives.” He paused, and it seemed to Jojonah that he was almost pleased by that prospect, as if he had just convinced himself that it would be better to let the man live.

It was a passing thought for Brother Francis, though. “Or even if he is not a spy,” the fiery monk went on, “he remains a threat. Suppose he is captured by the powries. Do you doubt that he will divulge information about us to the monsters in the false hope of mercy?”

Master Jojonah looked to the three younger monks, all of them wearing startled expressions at the increasingly heated exchange. “Perhaps it would be better if you left us now,” the master bade them. “And you, Brother Dellman, well done. Back to the gems with you, the soul stone this time, that you might watch our uninvited guest more closely.”

“Uninvited and unwanted,” Brother Francis said under his breath as the three younger monks moved away, passing Braumin Herde, who was coming to join Francis and Jojonah.

“Do not underestimate this Alpinadoran,” Brother Braumin remarked as he neared. “Were it not for the soul stone, we would never have known he was shadowing our every move, though even as we speak he is less than fifty yards from our encampment.”

“Spies are practiced at such tactics,” Brother Francis remarked, drawing a sour expression from both Jojonah and Braumin.

“What do you believe?” Master Jojonah asked of Braumin.

“He is from the village, I would guess,” the immaculate replied, “though I place less sinister value on that notion than does my brother.”

“Our mission is too vital for us to let down our guard,” Francis argued.

“Indeed it is,” Master Jojonah agreed. He eyed Brother Braumin directly. “Possess the man,” he instructed. “Convince him that he should be gone, or, if that should fail, use your power to walk his physical body far, far from here. Let him regain his physical consciousness back in the deep Timberlands, too exhausted to return anytime soon.”

Brother Braumin bowed and started away, not thrilled by the prospect of possession, but relieved that Brother Francis did not get his way. He had not journeyed all these miles to play a role in the murder of a human.

Brother Braumin went to Dellman first, and bade the man to pass the word that all activity with quartz should cease, and that Dellman should forgo his searching with the soul stone—possession was tricky enough without the prospect of another disembodied spirit floating about! Then Braumin went to his wagon and prepared himself.

Andacanavar crouched low in the brush, confident that he was too well concealed for any of the nearby monks to locate him. Visually, at least, for the ranger had no experience with magic, other than that of the Touel’alfar, and did not know the potential of the ring stones.

But Andacanavar was sensitive to his environment, extremely so, and he did indeed sense the presence about him, an intangible presence, the feeling that he was being watched.

How strong that sensation became when Brother Braumin’s spirit moved right up to the ranger, when Brother Braumin’s spirit tried to move right into the man!

Andacanavar looked all about, eyes darting to every shadow, to every conceivable hiding place. He knew he was not alone, and yet all of his physical senses showed him nothing.

Nothing.

The intrusion grew stronger; the ranger almost cried out, despite his better judgment. That near outburst surprised him, and led him to the horrifying and inescapable conclusion that some other will was forcing itself over him.

Andacanavar had participated in the communal gatherings of the Touel’alfar, the joining of the entire elven community into a single harmony. That had been a beautiful thing, a mental sharing, a most intimate experience. But this . . .

Again the ranger almost cried out; but he stopped himself, understanding that the intruding will likely wanted him to yell out and surrender his position.

The ranger searched inside himself, tried to find something tangible, something identifiable. He recalled the communal elven song, a hundred voices joined as one, a hundred spirits blended in harmony. But this . . .

This was rape.

The ranger fell low to the ground, growling softly, fighting back in the only manner he understood. He put up a wall of sheer rage, a red barrier, denying all action. Andacanavar was completely in control of his will, on every level. He used the discipline of bi’nelle dasada, the sword-dance, used in his years of training in Caer’alfar. And through that grim determination, that sheer strength of will, the ranger identified his spiritual enemy, located the intruding will. A picture formed in Andacanavar’s mind, a map of his own thought process, and he mentally placed an enemy marker whenever a trail on that map was accessed.

The enemy, the will of Brother Braumin, soon showed clear to the man, and then suddenly he and the monk were on equal footing, an open battle of wills, with the advantage of surprise no more. Brother Braumin, disciplined and trained in the stones, fought well, but the ranger was the stronger by far, and the monk was soon expelled, and soon in retreat.

Andacanavar was truly frightened by this strange experience, this unknown magic, but, with his typical courage, he would not let the opportunity pass. He felt a channel, a pathway left by the departing spirit, and he sent his thoughts along it, soaring free of his body.

Soon he was in the monk encampment, and then in one of the wagons. There sat the source of the intrusion, a man, a monk of about thirty winters, sitting cross-legged, deep in meditation.

Without hesitation, Andacanavar continued along the mental pathway, following the spirit right back into the monk’s body, resuming the battle. Now the battleground was more difficult, a terrain far more familiar to his enemy, but the ranger pressed on, focused his will. Only one thought slowed him, and that only temporarily: if he dominated this body, would it leave his own open to intrusion?

The ranger had no way of knowing, and the hesitation almost ended his fight.

But then, using the same determination that had sustained him through all these years and all these trials of the unforgiving land of Alpinador, Andacanavar pressed on tenfold, driving hard into the monk’s mind, pushing the monk away wherever he found him, pushing, pushing, stealing every pathway, every corner, every hope and every fear.

It was not a good feeling, was too strange and too out of place, and, for the noble ranger, was simply wrong. Despite any rationalization that he had been protecting his very soul, or any that reminded him of his duty to his fellow Alpinadorans, Andacanavar could not rid himself completely of the guilt. Possessing another’s body, whatever the reasons, assaulted the ranger’s sense of right and wrong profoundly.

But he persevered, and took some comfort in the small and smooth gray stone he held in his unfamiliar hand. This stone was the conduit, Andacanavar recognized, the pathway between the spirits, and with it in his possession, both physical and spiritual, he felt confident that the portal to his own corporeal body was closed to any others. Acclimating himself to the new coil, he dragged himself to the back of the wagon, peering out into the encampment, listening carefully to any passing conversations. He remained there for some time, was greeted by and returned the salutation of many other monks—and truly the ranger was glad that the elves had bothered to teach him the language of Honce-the-Bear! Then, gaining confidence, he dared to exit the wagon, walking openly in the midst of the foreigners.

He didn’t have a difficult time in determining rank; in this group, it was apparently based on age, and Andacanavar had always been good at determining a man’s years. Between these impressions and the respectful manner in which others greeted him, he confirmed his belief that he was in the body of one of high stature among the monks.

“Master Jojonah wishes to speak to you,” one young man offered and another later confirmed, but of course Andacanavar had no way of knowing who this mysterious Master Jojonah might be. So he continued to wander about the encampment, gathering what information he could find. He soon realized that he was being followed—not by any corporeal being, but by the displaced spirit. Again and again the disembodied spirit tried to get back in, and though Andacanavar repelled the assaults, the ranger understood that he was growing weary and would not be able to hold out for long.

He spotted a much older man then, and guessed him to be the leader of the group, perhaps the one the others had spoken of. Beside the man, wearing an angry expression, was another monk of about the same age as the one he had possessed.

“Finished already?” Master Jojonah asked, coming over to him.

“Yes, Master Jojonah,” Andacanavar answered respectfully, hoping that his tone, and his guess about the man’s identity, were correct.

“And are we rid of the spy?” the other monk asked sharply.

Andacanavar resisted the urge to punch the surly man in the face. He stared at the monk long and hard, purposefully ignoring the question in the hope that the pair would further elaborate.

“Brother Braumin?” Master Jojonah prompted. “The Alpinadoran is gone?”

“What would you have me do?” Andacanavar asked sternly, pointing his ire at the younger of the two, for it seemed obvious to him that this man and the one he had possessed were not on good terms.

“What I would have you do is irrelevant,” Brother Francis answered, casting a telltale sidelong glance at Master Jojonah.

“Since you have had no time to walk the Alpinadoran far away from here, I assume you imparted a convincing suggestion that he should depart,” Master Jojonah said calmly.

“Perhaps we should have invited him in,” Andacanavar dared to respond. “He knows the lay of the land, no doubt, and might have been able to better guide us.” The ranger eyed Brother Francis as he spoke, and recognized a budding suspicion there, for the man wore an expression now of total surprise and even of horror.

“I considered that course,” Master Jojonah admitted, defusing his hotheaded companion’s mounting rage. “But we must adhere to the Father Abbot’s decree.”

Brother Francis snorted.

“If we brought him in, he would ask questions,” Master Jojonah went on, ignoring Francis so completely that Andacanavar recognized that the older monk was quite used to this young monk’s impertinence.

“Questions we cannot afford to answer,” Jojonah continued. “We will pass through Alpinador quickly, and better not to involve any of the northmen in our quest. Better not to open any old wounds between our Church and the barbarians.”

Andacanavar didn’t press the issue, though he was indeed relieved to learn that this powerful contingent was not in the northland for any reasons hostile to Alpinador.

“Go back and look over our scouting friend,” Master Jojonah instructed, “and see that your suggestion is being followed.”

“I will do it,” Brother Francis interrupted.

The ranger wisely held back his initial reaction, for that reply would have been too sharp and insistent, even desperate. He had no desire to battle yet another spirit this day. “I am capable of finishing the task assigned to me, Master,” he said to the man.

The other monk’s expression showed the ranger his slip; that title was reserved, he realized now, for the older man alone. Brother Francis went from angry to suspicious to incredulous, staring hard through narrowed eyes at the ranger in the monk’s body. Andacanavar tried to cover his miscue, turning quickly to the older man, the true master, but he found Jojonah wearing a similar doubting expression.

“Pray give me the stone, brother,” Master Jojonah said.

Andacanavar hesitated, considering the implications. Could he get back to his own body without that stone? Would the master use it to discover the truth of the ruse?

As though it sensed the ranger’s sudden hesitance, the disembodied spirit took that opportunity to attack once more.

The ranger knew it was time to leave.

Master Jojonah and Brother Francis leaped forward to grab the body of faltering Brother Braumin as his eyes flickered and his legs buckled. Brother Francis went right for the hematite, pulling it free of the man’s hand.

But Andacanavar’s spirit had no trouble locating the ranger’s body, or in reentering. He was up and moving almost immediately, though he wondered where he might hide from probing spiritual eyes.

Back in the camp, Brother Braumin steadied himself, then bent over, hands on knees, gasping for his breath.

“What happened?” Master Jojonah asked.

“How did you fail against one who is not even trained—” Brother Francis started to demand, but Jojonah cut him short with a glare.

“Strong,” Brother Braumin remarked between gasps. “That one, that Alpinadoran, is strong of will and quick of thought.”

“You would have to say that,” Brother Francis said dryly.

“Go out yourself with the soul stone,” Brother Braumin snapped at him. “It would do you well to find humility.”

“Enough of this!” Master Jojonah demanded. He lowered his voice as he noticed that many others were gathering about. “What were you able to learn?” he asked Braumin.

The younger monk shrugged. “He learned from me, I fear, not the other way around.”

“Wonderful,” remarked a sarcastic Francis.

“What did he learn?” Master Jojonah demanded.

Again Brother Braumin could only shrug.

“Ready the teams,” Master Jojonah instructed. “We must be far from this place.”

“I will find the spy,” Brother Francis offered.

“We will search for him together,” Master Jojonah corrected. “If this man defeated Brother Braumin, hold no illusions that you are a match for him.”

Brother Francis fumed, trying to find some retort. He turned away, as if to depart.

“Shall you join in the search?” Master Jojonah asked bluntly.

“I am seeing no need for that,” came a resonating voice, and all the monks turned as one to see the giant Alpinadoran striding confidently into their camp, crossing through the ring of wagons without so much as a sidelong glance at those monks standing guard. “I am in no mood for any more of this spiritual dueling this day. Let us speak openly and plainly, as men.”

Master Jojonah exchanged incredulous looks with Brother Francis, but when they turned to Brother Braumin, the only one who had made any true contact with the ranger, they found that he was not surprised. Nor did he look overly pleased.

“He is a man of honor,” Master Jojonah said with some confidence. “Would you agree?”

Brother Braumin was too preoccupied to reply. He had locked stares with the Alpinadoran, the two sharing an almost primal hatred. They had battled intimately, seen each other’s soul bared in hatred. For Andacanavar, this man had tried to violate him; for Brother Braumin, this man had proven himself the stronger in a way so personal that it brought him shame.

So they stood and stared at each other, and all the others around them, even Brother Francis, let the moment linger, recognizing the need for it.

Then Brother Braumin moved past his turmoil, reminding himself that the man, after all, had only been defending himself. Gradually, the monk’s visage softened and he gave a slight nod. “My attempt to convince you seemed the safer way,” he apologized. “For you most of all.”

“I’d be finding a horde of giants less threatening than what you tried to do to me,” Andacanavar replied, but he, too, gave a nod, a forgiving gesture, and turned his attention to Master Jojonah.

“My name is Andacanavar,” he said. “And my land is beneath your boots. Many are my titles, but for your own purposes, you might be thinking of me as the protector of Alpinador.”

“A haughty title,” Brother Francis remarked.

The ranger let the comment pass. He found it curious that though the other young monk was the one who had tried to steal his body, he liked that man, and certainly respected him, more than this one. “I am no spy,” he began, “for there is nothing sinister in my motives. I followed you from the valley for I have seen your strength and cannot be letting you walk the land free. Such power as you have shown could rain disaster on my people.”

“We are not enemies of Alpinador,” Master Jojonah replied.

“So I have learned,” said Andacanavar. “And so I have come to you openly, walking into your camp as a friend, perhaps an ally, with my weapon on my back.”

“We have asked for no help,” Brother Francis remarked in a stern tone, drawing a glare from Master Jojonah.

“I am Master Jojonah,” the older monk quickly interjected, wanting to shut up the troublesome Francis, “of St.-Mere-Abelle.”

“Your home is known to me,” the ranger said. “A great fortress, by all the tales.”

“The tales do not lie,” Brother Francis said grimly. “And each of us here is well-versed in the arts martial.”

“As you say,” the ranger conceded, again turning his focus to Master Jojonah, who seemed by far the more reasonable man. “You know I came among you, using his body,” he explained. “And in so doing, I learned that you mean to pass right through my land. I might be helping you on that matter. None knows the way better than Andacanavar.”

“Andacanavar the humble?” Brother Francis remarked. “Do you name that as one of your titles?”

“You know that you are offering insults a bit too freely,” the ranger replied. “Perhaps you should be careful, else those lips get ripped off.”

Too proud to stand for such a threat, Brother Francis steeled his gaze and took a bold stride forward.

The ranger exploded into motion, too quickly for any of the monks to even cry out. He pulled a small axe from his belt, then lurched to the side so he could throw it in an underhand motion. The axe spun end over end, flying right between the legs of startled Brother Francis, then soared on, embedding itself deep into the sideboard of a wagon some twenty feet behind Francis.

The stunned monk, all the monks, turned about to regard the throw, then turned back to Andacanavar, every one of them wearing an expression of greater respect.

“I might have thrown it a bit higher,” the ranger said with a wink. “And then your voice’d be sounding a bit higher.”

Brother Francis did well to prevent himself from trembling, both from rage and fear. His face was white, though, revealing his true emotions.

“Move back, Brother Francis,” Master Jojonah scolded in no uncertain terms.

Francis looked at the older man, matched Andacanavar’s sly grin with an angry stare. Then he did move back in place, feigning a frustrated rage, though in truth—and everyone knew it—he was glad that Master Jojonah had intervened.

“You see, I have also had a bit of training in what you call the arts martial,” the ranger explained. “But I am hoping to keep my skills for powries and giants and the like. Your Church and my people have not been friends—and I am seeing no reason to change that now—but if your enemies are the powries, then name Andacanavar among your allies. If you want my help, then know I will get you through my land along the safest and swiftest path. If you do not want my help, then say it now and I leave you.” He gave Brother Braumin a sly look, and chuckled as he finished, “And know that I can walk myself far, far away, and am in need of no help from the lot of you.”

The young monk blushed deeply.

Master Jojonah looked to his two companions and, predictably, found two different silent messages coming back to him. He turned to the huge stranger, knowing that ultimately this was his own decision to make. “I am not at liberty to tell you our destination,” he explained.

“Who’s asking?” replied a grinning Andacanavar. “You are going north and west, and intending to leave my land. If you’re planning to hold that course, I can show you the swiftest and easiest way.”

“And if we do not mean to hold that course?” Brother Francis interjected. He glared at Master Jojonah as he spoke, making clear his position concerning the stranger.

“Oh, but you do,” the ranger replied, holding firm his grin. “You are heading for the Barbacan, for Mount Aida, by my guess.”

Supremely disciplined, none of the three monks standing before the ranger offered any hint concerning his blunt assumption, but the openmouthed expressions worn by many of the younger monks surely confirmed Andacanavar’s suspicions.

“That is only your guess?” Master Jojonah asked calmly, figuring the man must have heard as much while in Brother Braumin’s body. Andacanavar had just become a more dangerous person, the old monk realized, and lamented, for he feared that he might have to let Brother Francis have his way and kill this noble man. “And just a guess?”

“My reasoning,” Andacanavar clarified. “If you are meaning to strike at the backs of the monsters that are attacking your homeland, then you are too far to the north and east. You should have gone back to the west before you ever set foot in Alpinador. But you would not have made such a mistake, not with your magics as guide. And so you are heading for the Barbacan, it seems plain to me. You want to know about the explosion there, about the great cloud of gray smoke that covered the land for more than a week and even put some of its ash on my homeland.”

Jojonah’s fears fast shifted to curiosity. “Then there truly was an explosion?” he asked bluntly, despite his fears of giving away too much information.

Beside him, Brother Francis nearly choked.

“Oh, but the biggest explosion the world has known since I have been in it!” the ranger confirmed. “Shook the ground under my feet, though I was standing hundreds of miles away. And a mountain of clouds rolled up, debris from a whole mountain blown into the sky.”

Master Jojonah digested the confirmation, then found himself in a truly terrible dilemma. Father Abbot Markwart’s edicts on this matter were clear enough, but Jojonah knew in his heart that this man was no enemy, and might indeed prove to be of great assistance. The master looked around at his entire entourage—for all the monks were gathered about by that time—finally settling his gaze on Brother Francis, who, of course, would likely prove the most troublesome.

“I have seen into his heart,” Brother Braumin put in after a long, uncomfortable silence.

“Too much so for my own liking,” the ranger remarked dryly.

“And for my own,” the monk replied, managing a weak smile. He turned back to Jojonah and, putting aside his inner turmoil with the man, a conflict he knew to be illogical, said, “Let him lead us through Alpinador.”

“He knows too much!” Brother Francis argued.

“More than we know!” Brother Braumin shot back.

“The Father Abbot—” Brother Francis began in threatening tones.

“The Father Abbot could not have foreseen this,” Brother Braumin was quick to interrupt. “A good man is Andacanavar, a powerful ally, and one who knows the way. A way we could easily lose in this jagged terrain,” he added, speaking loudly so all could hear. “One errant turn in a mountain pass could defeat us, or cost us a week of backtracking.”

Brother Francis started to respond, but Master Jojonah held up his hand, indicating he had heard enough. The monk, feeling very old indeed, rubbed his hands over his face, then looked at his two companions, then at the ranger. “Dine with us, Andacanavar of Alpinador,” he bade the man. “I’ll not confirm our destination, but will tell you that we must indeed be out of your land to the north and west, and as soon as is possible.”

“A week of hard driving,” the ranger said.

Master Jojonah nodded, though he knew that with their magic they could cut that time by more than half.

By noon of the next day, Master Jojonah no longer held any doubts about the wisdom of letting Andacanavar lead the caravan. The road remained rough, for western Alpinador was an unforgiving place, a land of ice-broken stones and jagged mountains, but the ranger knew his way well, knew every trail and every obstacle. The monks, after their long rest, eased the trails with magic, lightening wagons with levitational malachite, clearing debris from the road with strokes of lightning, and of course they continued to bring in the wild animals.

It took Andacanavar a while to catch on to this subtle trick. At first he wondered what trickery the monks were using to hunt the game, but when the caravan left a pair of deer behind them on the trail, both animals nearly dead from exhaustion, the ranger was truly perplexed—and far from happy. He went back to the deer and examined them.

“What do you call this?” he asked of Brother Braumin when the monk, on Jojonah’s instructions, joined the curious ranger on the trail.

“We use the energy of the wild animals,” the monk explained honestly. “Like food for our horses.”

“And then you leave them to die?” the ranger asked.

Brother Braumin shrugged helplessly. “What are we to do?”

The ranger gave a great sigh, trying hard to sublimate his anger. He pulled a large and thick knife from a sheath on the back of his belt and methodically and efficiently killed both deer, then knelt in the dirt and offered a prayer for their spirits.

“Take that one,” he instructed Brother Braumin, while he lifted the larger animal by the hooves and slung it over his shoulder.

The two caught up to the wagons soon after, Andacanavar dropping his carcass right in front of Jojonah’s team. The master called for a halt and went out to the man.

“You take their life energy and leave them to die?” the ranger accused.

“An unpleasant necessity,” Master Jojonah admitted.

“Not so necessary,” the ranger came back. “If you have to kill them, then use them, all of them, else you are insulting the animal.”

“We are hardly huntsmen,” Master Jojonah replied. He gave a sidelong glance as Brother Francis moved up to join them.

“I will show you how to skin and dress them,” Andacanavar offered.

“We have no time for that!” Brother Francis protested.

Master Jojonah bit his lip, not knowing how to proceed. He wanted to berate Francis—they could not afford to lose this very valuable guide—but feared that the damage was already done.

“Either you find the time to do it or you kill no more of my animals,” the ranger replied.

“These are your animals?” asked a doubtful Brother Francis.

“You are on my land, that much I told you,” the ranger replied. “And so I am claiming guardianship on the animals.” He turned to face Jojonah squarely. “Now, I’ll not stop you from hunting; I have done as much myself. But if you are to take the animal, you cannot let it waste to death on the road. That’s an insult, and cruel by any measure of decency.”

“Lectured on cruelty by a barbarian,” Brother Francis remarked with a snort.

“If you need the lesson, take it where you find it,” Andacanavar replied without missing a beat.

“We need no food, or skins,” Master Jojonah said calmly. “But the energy is vital to our team. If these horses cannot get us to our destination and back again, then we are stranded.”

“And is it necessary for you to take so much from each animal that it hasn’t enough left to live?” the ranger asked.

“How are we to know when to stop?”

“Suppose I can show your men that?”

Master Jojonah smiled widely. He had never liked this killing of innocent animals. “My friend, Andacanavar,” he said, “if you could instruct us on how we might complete our most vital mission without leaving a single animal on the trail dead behind us, I would be forever grateful.”

“So would more than a few deer,” the ranger replied. “And as for these you have already killed, know that you will be eating well tonight, and you will find a use for the skins when you get more to the north, for even in high summer the night wind blows a bit chill up there.”

Andacanavar then showed the monks how to skin and dress the deer carcasses. A short while later the caravan was on the move again, and several more deer were brought in. The ranger monitored each animal carefully as the monks transferred the energy, and as soon as he saw the creature going into distress, he called a halt to the process, and then the animal, weary but very much alive, was allowed to wander back into the forest.

Only Brother Francis showed any signs of dissent, and it seemed to Master Jojonah and Brother Braumin that even pouting Francis was a bit relieved to be rid of the unpleasant practice.

“A fine trick if you do it right,” Andacanavar said to Master Jojonah as they rode along. “But finer it would be if you brought in a moose or two. That would get your horses running!”

“A moose?”

“Big deer,” the ranger explained with a wry smile.

“We have brought in some big—” Master Jojonah stared to say, but Andacanavar cut him short.

“Bigger,” he said, and hopped down from the wagon and ran off into the brush.

“He is an active old man,” Brother Braumin remarked.

The ranger returned to the wagons nearly an hour later. “You tell your spirit-walking friends to go and look down that way,” he said, indicating a shallow dell west of the trail. “Tell them to look for something big and dark, with a rack of antlers twice as wide as a man is tall.”

Both Jojonah and Braumin gave doubtful looks.

“Just you tell them,” Andacanavar insisted. “Then you will see if I am lying.”

A short while later, when a huge bull moose wandered onto the trail under the control of the soul stones, both monks offered silent apologies for their doubts.

And how the horses ran when they left the tired moose by the side of the road!

By day they rode, long and hard, and by night all of the monks gathered about their fires, listening to the ranger’s tales of the north. Andacanavar’s jovial manner and spirited stories won them all over, even Brother Francis, who did not even bother to carry through with his threat to contact the Father Abbot to lodge a complaint.

And so it was on the fourth day of their travels together, when the ranger announced that he would leave as they set their camp, that a pall came over the caravan.

“Bah, you should not be so despairing,” Andacanavar told them. “I will show you a road to the Barba—” He stopped and caught himself, giving awry grin. “If that is where you are going, I mean,” he added slyly.

“I cannot confirm,” Master Jojonah put in, and he, too, was grinning. He had full confidence in Andacanavar now, had seen the man’s heart and knew it to be akin to his beliefs. Of course the man knew where the monks were heading—where else would someone go this far into the Wilderlands?

“A road straight and sure,” the ranger went on, “and, if you are not finding any powries or giants blocking the way, you will get there, and soon enough.”

“By my maps, our destination is many, many miles from Alpinador’s western border,” Brother Francis remarked, his tone toward the ranger more respectful now. “We have a long road ahead of us, I fear.”

Andacanavar held out his hand, and Brother Francis turned over the parchment, a map of the immediate region. The ranger lifted an eyebrow as he considered it, for it was quite detailed and fairly accurate.

“Your maps are telling you true,” Andacanavar agreed. “But we put Alpinador’s western border behind us before we set camp the night before the last. So take heart, my friends, for you are almost there—not that I would be taking heart if I was heading into the place where the demon is said to roost!” He bit the tip of one finger then, and with his blood drew another line on the map, the road to the Barbacan, ending it with an X to mark their present location.

He handed the map back to Francis, and with that, and a final bow, Andacanavar left them, running into the underbrush, laughing all the while.

“Were it not for his stature, I’d think him an elf,” Brother Braumin remarked. “If there were such a creature as an elf.”

Andacanavar’s last words concerning their present position came as a relief to offset the monks’ sadness at losing their most excellent guide. They ate their evening meal—wonderful venison again—said evening prayers and slept well, then were on the road again, anxiously, before the next dawn.

The land remained rugged—less mountainous, but more heavily forested. Still, using the blood line on the map as a guide, the monks soon came upon a wide and clear road, not just a narrow trail. All wagons stopped there, with the caravan’s leaders going out to investigate.

“This swath was cut by the monstrous army on their march to the south,” Master Jojonah reasoned.

“Then backtracking it should get us right to the source of the monstrous army,” said Brother Braumin.

“A dangerous course,” remarked Brother Francis, looking all about. “We are in the open.”

“But a swift course, no doubt,” Brother Braumin replied.

Master Jojonah thought about it for only a short while, considering most of all that Andacanavar had put them on this trail. “Have the spirit scouts out far and wide,” he instructed. “Both our wagons and our horses could use the reprieve of a smooth road.”

Brother Francis put every quartz and hematite to use, sending monks out far and wide for fear that they were riding right into an enemy encampment.

Two days later they had still not encountered a single monster, though they had put a hundred miles and more behind them. Now before them they saw the towering mountains that ringed the Barbacan, and all the monks feared they would have a terrible time indeed in getting the wagons through those barriers.

But the road continued on, to the base of the mountains, and right up into the mountains, climbing through a wide pass. Setting a camp in that place was more than a bit disturbing, but again no monsters came forward to challenge them, and those monks with the quartz stones discovered that there weren’t many wild creatures about, either. The land seemed strangely dead, and eerily silent. By mid-morning of the next day the end of the mountains was in sight, with only a single ridge blocking their view beyond. Master Jojonah called for a halt, then motioned for Brothers Braumin and Francis to accompany him.

“We should go in spiritually,” Brother Francis noted.

It was a good suggestion, a prudent suggestion, but Master Jojonah shook his head anyway. He had a feeling that what lay ahead was incredibly important, and he felt that it should be viewed physically, both body and soul. He motioned the pair to his side, asked the other immaculates to join them, and started the climb.

The younger monks followed the group, not so far behind.

When Master Jojonah crossed the last barrier, coming to a point where he could view the wide valley that was the heart of the Barbacan, his spirits both sagged and soared. The monks filtered away from each other, hardly noticing each other’s movements, stunned by the scene, for the devastation looming before them was total. Where once had stood a forest, there was now a field of gray ash littered with charred logs. All the valley was gray and barren, and the air hung thick with the reek of sulfur. It seemed to them all a preview of the end of the world, or a premature glimpse of the place their Church defined as hell. Most shaken of all were the younger monks as they, too, came over the ridge, several crying out in despair.

But when that initial despair passed into a grim acceptance, other, more positive, thoughts found their way into every mind. Could anything have survived this blast? Perhaps their suspicions, their hopes, of a “beheaded” monstrous army were true, for if, as believed, the demon dactyl had called the Barbacan its home, if the demon dactyl had been here at the time of the explosion, then the demon dactyl was surely gone.

Even Brother Francis was too stunned to speak for a long, long time. Gradually he made his way back to Master Jojonah’s side.

“Can we take this scene of devastation as proof enough that the demon dactyl is destroyed?” the master asked.

Francis looked down into the ash-filled bowl. It wasn’t hard to discern the source of the explosion: a flat-topped mountain standing alone in the middle of the ash field, a thin line of smoke still wisping from its top. “I do not believe this to be a natural occurrence,” Francis said.

“There have been volcanoes before,” Master Jojonah countered.

“But at this critical time?” Brother Francis asked doubtfully. “Dare we hope that a volcano erupted at the precise moment we most needed its help, and at the precise location of the enemy leader?”

“You doubt divine intervention?” Master Jojonah asked. He sounded serious, though he, too, held great doubts. There were fanatics in the Order who seemed to expect God’s thumb to slip down from the heavens and squash the opponents of the Church at every turn; Jojonah had heard one young monk standing at the sea-wall of St.-Mere-Abelle during the powrie invasion invoking God repeatedly, literally calling out for that punishing thumb. Master Jojonah also believed in the power of God, but he thought of it as an analogy for the power of good. He believed that good would win out in the end of every great struggle, because, by its very nature, good was a stronger force than evil. He suspected that Francis held similar feelings on the subject, for, despite his other shortcomings, the man was a thinker, a bit of an intellectual, who always edged his faith with logic.

Francis eyed him slyly now. “God was on our side,” he said. “In our hearts and in the strength that guided our weapons, and surely in the magic that crushed our enemies. But this . . .” he said, opening his arms dramatically as he scanned the devastated valley. “This may have been the work of God, but it was precipitated by the hand of a godly man, or was the result of the demon dactyl’s overextending its call to the earth magic.”

“Likely the latter,” Master Jojonah replied, though he hoped differently, hoped that Brother Avelyn had played a part in this.

Brother Braumin, coming to join the pair, heard the last few comments and now stared long and hard at Brother Francis, surprised by the man’s reaction. He turned his perplexed expression to Master Jojonah, and his superior only smiled and nodded, for he was not quite as surprised. At that moment Master Jojonah discovered Brother Francis’ redeeming qualities and found that there might indeed be something about the man that he liked. He paused for a bit to silently wonder if Brother Francis might be steered in a new direction.

“Whatever happened here came from that mountain,” Brother Francis reasoned. “Mount Aida, by name.”

The other two looked at him curiously.

“That is what the Alpinadoran named it,” Brother Francis explained. “And indeed, that name corresponds to many old maps that I studied. Aida, the lone mountain within the ring, the lair of the demon.”

“It will not be easy to get to it,” Brother Braumin remarked.

“Could we have expected differently?” Brother Francis asked with a laugh.

Again the two others only looked to each other and shrugged. It seemed to them as if this explosion might have rid the world of the dactyl demon, and might have rid Brother Francis of a few internal demons, as well.

They let it go at that, though, taking Francis’ good mood as a blessing. They could only hope it would endure.

The journey across the ash field was not as difficult as they had feared, for though the gray stuff had settled thick in many places, it had been blown clear in many others. As they neared the mountain, the lead driver made a horrible discovery.

His cry brought the monks running, to find several bodies encased in ash, lying along the side of the twisting trail.

“Powries,” Brother Braumin explained, going over to examine them. “And a goblin.”

“And that one is . . . was, a giant,” said another monk, pointing ahead on the trail to a huge leg protruding from a berm of ash.

“So our enemies were here,” Master Jojonah noted.

“Were,” Brother Francis emphasized.

They went on to the very base of the mountain and ringed the wagons there. Master Jojonah instructed half of them to set the camp, the other half to begin a thorough search of the area, looking particularly for any way in, or up, the mountain. With torches and a single diamond in hand, a group of monks entered one winding cave that very night, snaking their way into Aida. They returned in less than an hour with news that the tunnel led to a dead end, the way blocked by a solid wall of stone.

“No doubt it traveled farther before the explosion,” Brother Dellman told Master Jojonah.

“Let us hope that not all of the tunnels have so collapsed,” Jojonah replied, trying to sound hopeful. In looking at blasted Aida, though, the monk had to temper his optimism.

Brother Dellman led his troupe into a second tunnel, and when that one again abruptly ended, the young monk, undaunted, headed into a third.

“He has promise,” Brother Braumin remarked to Jojonah as Dellman started off that third time.

“He has heart,” Master Jojonah agreed.

“And faith,” said the other. “Great faith, else he would not attack his tasks with such determination.”

“Is there any more determined than Brother Francis?” Master Jojonah reminded.

Both men looked over to Francis, who was busy marking some parchments, detailing the nuances of the Barbacan.

“Brother Francis, too, has faith,” Brother Braumin decided. “He just follows it down errant paths. But perhaps he will find a truer way; it seems as though his time with the honorable Alpinadoran did him well.”

Master Jojonah offered no reply, just sat staring at Francis. It did indeed seem as if some of Andacanavar’s jovial spirit had rubbed off on the man, but Jojonah wasn’t counting Francis as a convert just yet.

“Where do we search next if we find no tunnels open into the mountain’s heart?” Brother Braumin asked. “And if the flat top yields no valuable information?”

“Then we search with the hematite,” the master replied.

“I had thought we would do that first.”

Master Jojonah nodded, expecting as much, for he, too, had thought that the initial search of Aida would be more easily accomplished if the monks used the soul stones. He had changed his mind and their course, considering Brother Braumin’s experience with Andacanavar. Jojonah couldn’t be certain that the demon dactyl’s spirit wasn’t lingering about this place, and if the unmagical Alpinadoran could use such a spiritual connection to find his way into their midst, what might the demon dactyl do?

“Let us use our wits and our bodies,” the old monk replied to Braumin. “If they do not suffice, then we will utilize the soul stones.”

The younger man, trusting fully in Master Jojonah, was satisfied with that. “When will Brother Francis make contact with Father Abbot?” he asked.

“I bade him to wait until the morning,” Master Jojonah explained. “I do not think it prudent to open channels to one’s spirit in this forsaken place.”

That explained much to Brother Braumin, particularly concerning Francis’ fine mood, and he let the matter drop. He put a hand on Jojonah’s large shoulder, then walked off, for there was much work to be done.

After three hours the monks at camp began to grow nervous about Brother Dellman and the missing party. After four, Master Jojonah considered it might be time to put the hematites to use. He was about to give in and do just that when the monks scouting just west of the camp shouted that they saw torchlight.

Master Jojonah saw it soon after, a single monk exiting the tunnel in the foothills of Aida, moving with all speed back to the camp.

“Brother Dellman,” Braumin explained to Jojonah as the man came closer, running full speed down the slope, nearly losing his balance and pitching headlong more than once.

“Gather together, and ready for enemies!” Master Jojonah called.

The monks went into a practiced drill, handing off the appropriate stones to the appropriate wielders. Others strapped on weapons, or went to secure the horses.

Brother Dellman stumbled into camp, gasping, trying to catch his breath.

“Where are the others?” Master Jojonah asked him immediately.

“Still . . . inside,” Dellman replied.

“Alive?”

The young monk straightened and tilted his head back, gulping air, calming himself. When he looked back at Jojonah, the master’s fears lessened considerably. “Alive, yes,” he said calmly. “No danger in there, unless the rubble shifts again.”

“Then why are you out here?” Jojonah asked. “And why are you so agitated?”

“We found something . . . someone,” Brother Dellman replied. “A man, or half a man, and half horse.”

“A centaur?” asked Brother Braumin.

Brother Dellman shrugged, never having heard the term before.

“A centaur wears the body of a man, torso, shoulders, arms and head,” Brother Francis explained. “But from the waist down it wears the coil of a horse, four legs and all.”

“A centaur,” Brother Dellman agreed. “He was in the cave when the mountain fell in on him. Tons and tons of stone.”

“You dug him out?” asked Master Jojonah.

“We know not where to begin,” Brother Dellman replied.

“Poor creature,” Brother Braumin remarked.

“Then leave him to his grave,” Brother Francis said callously, seeming quite like the old Francis again. Neither Braumin nor Jojonah missed that fact, and they offered each other a resigned shrug.

“But Brother Francis,” Brother Dellman protested, “he is not dead!”

“But you said—” Master Jojonah started to reason.

“Tons,” Brother Dellman finished for him. “Oh, he should be dead. He should! Nothing could have survived that crush. And surely, he looks as if he should be dead, all withered and broken. Yet the creature lives. He opened his eyes and begged me to kill him!”

The three older monks stood openmouthed, while the younger men about them whispered excitedly.

“And did you?” Master Jojonah asked at length.

“I could not,” Brother Dellman replied, seeming horrified at the very thought. “His pain must be great, I do not doubt, but I could not end his life.”

“God does not give us more than we can bear,” Brother Francis recited.

Master Jojonah gave him a sour, sidelong glance. At times that old line sounded like nothing more than an excuse Church leaders used on common folk, the peasants wallowing in poverty while those same leaders lived in luxury.

But that was an argument for another day, Jojonah realized, and so he made no comment on it. “You did well, and right,” he said to Dellman. “The others remained with this centaur?”

“Bradwarden,” Brother Dellman replied.

“What?”

“Bradwarden,” the monk repeated. “That is his—the centaur’s name. I left the others with him, offering what meager comfort they might.”

“Let us go and see what we might do,” Master Jojonah said. To Brother Braumin, he instructed, “Gather all stones, except duplicates, and take them with us. Brother Francis,” he called loudly, so that all about heard clearly, “you will hold the defense of the wagons.”

Now it was Francis’ turn to wear the sour look, but Master Jojonah wasn’t paying him any heed, the old monk already motioning Brother Dellman back the way he had come, back to see this Bradwarden creature, this somehow immortal being.

The path was not long, and Dellman set a swift pace, so that Jojonah was huffing and puffing by the time they came in sight of the other torches. Jojonah walked by the younger monks reverently, to kneel before the twisted, emaciated body.

“You should be dead,” Master Jojonah said matter-of-factly, doing well to hide his horror and his revulsion. Only the creature’s human torso and the front half of its equine part was exposed, with the rest of it buried, squashed, under a huge slab of rock that climbed right up out of the low corridor and into the collapsed mountain. The creature was bent weirdly, back in on itself, with its eyes facing the very stone that had crushed its lower half. Where once Bradwarden’s arms had bulged with strong muscles, they were slack now, withered, as though the centaur’s body was consuming itself for lack of food. Master Jojonah moved very close and crouched as low as his portly form would allow, studying and sympathizing.

“Oh, but be sure that I’m feeling like I am dead,” Bradwarden replied, his agony reflected clearly in his normally resonant but now shaky voice. “Or at least, heading that way. Ye canno’ know me pain.” He managed to turn his head about then, to glance upon the newcomer, and he tilted his head curiously at the sight, eyeing Jojonah closely, then gave a pained chuckle.

“What do you see?” the master asked him.

“Do ye have a son, then?” Bradwarden asked.

Master Jojonah looked back over his shoulder to Brother Braumin, who held his hands out helplessly. Why this creature, at this time and in this predicament, would ever ask such a question was beyond his understanding.

“No,” Master Jojonah answered simply. “Nor a daughter. My heart was given to God, and to no woman.”

The centaur gave a chuckle. “Ah, but what ye’ve missed,” Bradwarden said with a sly wink.

“Why should you ask that?” Master Jojonah inquired, for he wondered suddenly if it might be more than coincidence.

“Ye remind me o’ one I knew,” Bradwarden replied, his tone revealing fond memories for the old friend.

“A monk?” Jojonah pressed, more urgently now.

“A mad friar, by his own admission,” the centaur replied. “A bit too friendly with the drink, but a good man he was—or is, if he found a way out of this cursed place.”

“And did you know his name?” asked Master Jojonah.

“Me own brother, he was,” the centaur went on, talking more to himself than to the others, and seeming as if he were in some distant place, delirious, perhaps. “By deed, if not by blood.”

“His name?” Brother Braumin prompted loudly, moving close and bending near Bradwarden’s face.

“Avelyn,” the centaur calmly replied. “Avelyn Desbris. A most excellent human.”

“He must be saved at all cost,” came a voice behind them. All the monks turned about to see Brother Francis, a diamond glowing brightly in his palm, standing at the back of their line.

“You were instructed to command the defense of the encampment,” Master Jojonah said to the man.

“I take no orders from Master Jojonah,” came the reply, and Jojonah realized then that Father Abbot Markwart had taken Francis’ body and come among them. “We must extricate him from this place,” he continued, looking to the huge slab.

“Ye’re not big enough to lift a mountain,” Bradwarden said dryly. “As I wasn’t big enough to hold it up while me friends ran off.”

“Your friend Avelyn?” Markwart asked impatiently.

“Me other friends,” the centaur replied. “I’m not for knowing—” He stopped and grimaced, for his movement in turning about to face the men had caused the rock to shift slightly. “No, ye’re not for lifting this,” he groaned.

“We shall see,” said the Father Abbot. “Why are you still alive?”

“Not for knowing.”

“Unless you are no mortal creature,” Markwart went on, his tone sly and accusing. He moved past the others to crouch beside Master Jojonah.

“An interesting thought,” Bradwarden replied. “Always was told I was a bit headstrong. Might be that I just refused to die.”

Markwart was not amused.

“Now me daddy, he died,” the centaur recounted. “And me mum, as well, a score and more years ago. She took a hit o’ the lightning—now that’s an odd way to die! So, no, I’d be guessing that I’m not immortal.”

“Unless an immortal spirit has found its way into your body,” Markwart pressed.

“Are not all spirits immortal?” Master Jojonah dared to interrupt.

Markwart’s glare ended that discussion before it could begin. “Some spirits,” he said evenly, looking at Bradwarden, but offering the words as much to Jojonah, “can transcend physicality, can keep a body animated, though it should be dead and still.”

“Only spirit in me is me own, and a bit o’ the boggle,” the centaur assured him with a strained smile and a wink. “And a bit more o’ the boggle might be easing me pain, if ye got any.”

Markwart’s expression didn’t change in the least.

“I’m not for knowing why I’m not dead,” Bradwarden explained seriously. “Thought I was, when the rock bent me legs and slid down. And suren that me groaning stomach spent a week and more o’ tellin’ me to die.”

Father Abbot Markwart was hardly listening then. He had slipped another stone into his hand, a small but effective garnet, a stone used to detect the subtle emanations of magic, and he was using it now to survey the trapped creature. He found his answer almost immediately.

“You have magic about you,” he announced to Bradwarden.

“That, or luck,” said Master Jojonah.

“Bad luck,” the centaur remarked.

“Magic,” the Father Abbot said again, forcefully. “About your right arm.”

It took quite an effort for Bradwarden to turn his head enough so he could view his upper right arm. “Oh, by the damned dactyl and all its sisters,” he grumbled when he saw the red armband, the piece of cloth that Elbryan had tied about him. “And the ranger thought to be doing me a favor. Two months o’ suffering, two months o’ hunger, and the damned thing won’t let me die!”

“What is it?” Master Jojonah asked.

“Elven healing cloth,” Bradwarden replied. “Seems the damned thing is fixing me wounds as fast as the damned mountain’s giving them to me! And even the lack o’ food and drink won’t take me!”

“Elven?” Brother Braumin gasped, reflecting the feelings of all in attendance. Bradwarden deciphered their expressions and was surprised to find that they were surprised.

“Don’t ye be telling me that ye’re not for believing in elves?” he said. “Nor centaurs, I’m guessing? And how about powries, or maybe a giant or two?”

“Enough,” Father Abbot Markwart bade him. “Your point is well-taken. But we have never encountered an elf, nor a centaur, until this time.”

“Then yer world’s become a better place,” Bradwarden said, offering another wink, though it ended in a pained grimace.

Markwart rose then and motioned for the others to follow him away from the centaur. “It will be no easy task in getting him out of there,” he said once they were out of the range of Bradwarden’s hearing.

“Impossible, I’d say,” remarked Brother Braumin.

“We can levitate the stone using malachite,” Master Jojonah reasoned. “Though I fear that all of our strength combined may not be enough to budge such an obstacle.”

“I fear more that when we do lift the stone, the pressure will be relieved so that the centaur’s lifeblood will pour from him too fast for his elven armband, and our efforts, to compensate,” the Father Abbot pointed out.

“But still, we must try,” said Brother Braumin.

“Of course,” Markwart agreed. “He is too valuable a prisoner, too great a source of information—not only for what happened here, but for the fate of Brother Avelyn—for us to let him die.”

“I was thinking more of compassion for his predicament,” Braumin dared to add.

“I know you were,” Markwart replied without hesitation. “You will learn better.”

The Father Abbot stormed away then, motioning for the others to follow. Brother Braumin and Master Jojonah exchanged sour looks, but had little choice in the matter.

On orders from Markwart, who was tiring from the possession and needed a reprieve, they did not make the attempt until late the next day, when they were all rested and mentally prepared. Markwart came back into the body of Brother Francis then, and led the procession, clutching a malachite and a hematite.

In position, all the monks of the caravan, except for Master Jojonah, who also held a hematite, joined in communion within the depths of the soul stone, then channeled their combined energy into the malachite, and when that energy had reached its apex, Father Abbot Markwart released it, aiming it at the slab over Bradwarden.

Master Jojonah only then realized the great risk that Markwart had taken—for the monks of the caravan and not for his own body, which was safely back at St.-Mere-Abelle. As the stone slab groaned under the sudden release of pressure, many smaller stones and clouds of dust fell down into the corridor, and Jojonah feared that all the tunnel might collapse. They should have taken a few days to shore it up, he realized, but that lack of preparedness only emphasized for him the sheer desperation of the Father Abbot to find Avelyn Desbris.

The monks pressed on and the slab shifted again. Bradwarden cried out and went into convulsions, and Jojonah was fast to him, hooking his arms under the broad shoulders of the centaur and pulling with all his might.

He found, to his horror, that he couldn’t budge the huge centaur. Even in his emaciated state, Bradwarden weighed well over four hundred pounds. Into the hematite went Jojonah, not to attack the centaur’s wounds, as they had planned, but to intercept the thoughts of the other monks, pleading with them to lend some of their energy to the centaur’s form that he might drag the huge creature free.

It got tricky then, and Jojonah feared that the slab would tumble back down, but Markwart, so incredibly powerful with the stones now, led the monks in the effort, shifting some of the levitational forces onto the centaur.

Jojonah pulled him free, then fell back into the hematite, going at the centaur’s wounds with fervor. He was hardly conscious of the movement as Markwart and the others grabbed both him and Bradwarden and dragged them on their way, rushing out of the unstable tunnel.

And then Master Jojonah was no longer alone in his efforts to save the creature, as Markwart’s spirit, and Brother Braumin’s and several others, joined him, attacking Bradwarden’s every wound.

More than five hours later Master Jojonah lay on the ground just outside Aida, thoroughly exhausted, with Brother Braumin beside him. There they slept, and only woke up late the next morning, to find Brother Francis—and it was indeed Francis—standing over them.

“Where is the centaur?” Master Jojonah asked.

“Resting, and more comfortable than we might have hoped,” Brother Francis replied. “We fed him—tentatively at first, but then he ate pounds of meat, half our store of venison, and drank gallons of water. Strong indeed must be the magic of that armband, for already he seems more solid.”

Master Jojonah nodded, sincerely relieved.

“And we have found a way up the mountain,” Brother Francis added.

“Is there still a need?”

“You will be interested in what we have there discovered among the ashes,” Brother Francis said sternly.

Master Jojonah held his next question, instead pausing to take a measure of the man. Whatever progress Francis might have made seemed to have been erased now—probably by the visit of Father Abbot Markwart. The man’s expression was cold again; the laughter in his eyes was no more. All business.

“I need to rest, I fear,” Master Jojonah said at length. “I will talk to Bradwarden this day; we can climb Aida tomorrow.”

“No time,” Brother Francis replied. “And none are to speak to the centaur until we return to St.-Mere-Abelle.”

Master Jojonah didn’t even need to ask where that order had come from. And he came to understand more clearly Brother Francis’ shift of mood. When they had first viewed the blasted Barbacan, Francis had proclaimed that the devastation was either the work of a godly man or an overextension of the demon dactyl’s magic. Now it seemed clear that Brother Avelyn had indeed been involved, and Master Jojonah did not doubt for a second that the Father Abbot had made it clear to Francis that Brother Avelyn was no godly man.

“We go up the mountain this day,” Brother Francis went on. “If you cannot make it, then Brother Braumin will go in your stead. When that duty is finished, we are back on the road.”

“It will be dark before you get back down,” Brother Braumin said.

“We will ride day and night until we are returned to St.-Mere-Abelle,” Brother Francis answered.

The course seemed quite silly to Master Jojonah. The answers were here, of course, or perhaps nearby. To go all the way back to St.-Mere-Abelle made no sense—unless he factored in Father Abbot Markwart’s profound distrust of him. The discovery of an eyewitness had changed everything, and Markwart wasn’t about to let him take control of this very delicate situation. Jojonah looked to Braumin then, both men wondering if the time had come to make a stand against the Father Abbot, against the Church itself.

Master Jojonah shook his head slightly. They could not win.

He was not surprised, but was surely pained, when he returned to the wagons to find Bradwarden in chains. Still, the centaur’s renewed vigor surprised him and gave him hope.

“Ye might at least let them give me me pipes,” the centaur begged.

Master Jojonah followed Bradwarden’s longing gaze to a set of dusty bagpipes lying on the seat of a nearby wagon. He started to say something, but Brother Francis cut him short.

“He will have food, and he will have healing, and nothing more,” the monk explained. “And as soon as he seems fully recovered, the armband will be taken.”

“Ah, but Avelyn was a far better man than the lot o’ ye put together,” Bradwarden remarked, and he closed his eyes and began humming a quiet tune, pausing once to offer a sly look and mutter, “Thieves.”

Master Jojonah, eyeing Brother Francis all the while, walked over and took up the bagpipes, then handed them to the centaur.

Bradwarden returned a respectful look and a nod, then took to playing, hauntingly beautiful music that had all the monks, except stubborn Francis, listening intently.

Master Jojonah somehow found the strength to accompany Francis and six others up Aida that afternoon. The top of the mountain was now a wide black bowl, but the ash and molten stone had hardened enough for the monks to walk across it without much difficulty.

Brother Francis led them directly to the spot: a petrified arm sticking from the black ground, fingers clutched as though they had held something.

Master Jojonah bent low and examined the arm and hand. He knew them! Somehow, he knew who this was, somehow he felt the goodness of this place, an aura of peace and godly strength.

“Brother Avelyn,” he gasped.

Behind him the others, except for Francis, nearly fell over.

“That is our guess,” Brother Francis replied. “It would seem that Avelyn was in league with the dactyl, and was destroyed when the demon was destroyed.”

The obvious falsehood overwhelmed Master Jojonah. He rose and spun on Brother Francis powerfully, and nearly struck the man.

But Jojonah held his blow. Father Abbot Markwart would persist with a campaign of lies against Avelyn, he realized, for if it was discovered that Avelyn had given his life in destroying the dactyl, as Jojonah knew to be true, then Markwart’s many claims and position in the Church might be in jeopardy. That was why, Jojonah realized, conversation with the centaur was to be limited until the creature was safely back at St-Mere-Abelle, under Markwart’s control.

Master Jojonah forced himself to calm down. This fight was only beginning; now was not the time to wage the battle openly.

“What do you think he was holding?” Brother Francis asked.

Jojonah looked back to the arm and shrugged.

“There is little magic about this man,” Brother Francis explained. “A couple of stones, perhaps—we will know that when we exhume the body—but not enough strength to account for the hoard that Avelyn stole.”

Exhume the body. The notion screamed out at Jojonah as simply wrong. This place should be marked as a holy shrine, a place of renewing faith and finding character. He wanted to scream out at Francis, to punch the man in the mouth for even uttering such a blasphemous thought. But again he reminded himself that this was not the time to wage the battle, not that way.

“The stone about the arm is solid,” he reasoned. “Blasting it will prove no easy task.”

“We have graphite,” Brother Francis reminded him.

“And if there is a crevice or chasm beneath the body, such violent intrusion will likely drop all the stones away from us forever.”

A panicked expression crossed Brother Francis’ face. “Then what do you suggest?” he asked sharply.

“Search with the hematite and the garnet,” Master Jojonah replied. “It should be no difficult task in determining if there are any stones about this man, and what they might be. Put a brilliant diamond light into the crack about the arm, then let your spirit enter that place.”

Brother Francis, not recognizing the larger reasons Father Abbot Markwart might have for destroying this potential shrine, thought about it for a few moments, then agreed.

He also agreed to let Master Jojonah spiritually accompany him into the crevice, since the Father Abbot was too weary to return to his body anytime soon, and Jojonah was the only one who could identify Brother Avelyn; Francis had only seen the man a couple of times, for Avelyn had deserted the abbey shortly after Francis had entered it.

Soon after, the identity was confirmed, along with the knowledge that only one stone, a sunstone, was anywhere near the man, though Master Jojonah sensed the residual magical emanations of another stone, the giant amethyst. The master said nothing of the amethyst to Francis, and had no trouble convincing the younger monk that a simple sunstone, which were already in abundance at St-Mere-Abelle, was not worth the trouble, risk, and lost time of exhuming the body.

With Francis leading, they left Avelyn then.

Master Jojonah was the last to turn to go, pausing at the sight, reflecting on his own faith and remembering the young monk who had inadvertently taught him so very much.

When they got back to camp, Jojonah pressed a diamond into Brother Braumin’s hand, whispered directions to him, and bade him go and see the sacred place. “I will delay Brother Francis long enough for you to return,” he promised.

Brother Braumin, not quite understanding, but recognizing from Jojonah’s tone the importance of the journey, nodded and turned to go.

“And Brother Braumin,” the master said, turning the man about “Take Brother Dellman with you. He, too, should see this man, and this place.”

Brother Francis was in a foul mood indeed when he learned they would be delayed in leaving, for a wagon had somehow broken a wheel.

Still, they were on the move before the dawn. The centaur, seeming fit again—though Francis hadn’t yet dared to remove the armband—and playing his pipes, trotted behind Brother Francis’ wagon, chained to the frame and with several monks keeping close guard on him.

Neither Brother Braumin, Master Jojonah, nor Brother Dellman spoke a word that night and all the next day, their voices stolen by an image they would carry for the rest of their lives, and by a barrage of profound reflections on their purpose and their faith.

CHAPTER 11

Roger Lockless, I Presume

Wincing in agony, Roger bit hard on the piece of wood he had stuck between his teeth. He had torn a sleeve from his shirt, tied it tight about his leg, just below the knee, and knotted it about a second piece of wood. Now he turned that wood, tightening the tourniquet.

He nearly swooned more than once, flitting in and out of consciousness. If he passed out now, he would surely bleed to death, he reminded himself, for the bite of the Craggoth hound was deep, the blood spurting.

Finally, mercifully, the blood flow stemmed, and Roger, cold and clammy, sweating profusely, slumped back against the earthen wall of his cell. He knew this place well, a root cellar close to the town center, and knew there was only one way in or out: a trapdoor at the top of a rickety wooden ladder. Roger stared at it now, lines of meager daylight streaming through. The late afternoon sun, he realized, and he thought that he should try to make his break when the light was gone, under cover of night.

He recognized immediately the foolishness of that notion. He wasn’t going anywhere this night, could hardly find the strength to pull himself away from the wall. Chuckling at the futility of it all, he slumped down to the floor, and then he slept all the night through, and would have remained asleep for many, many more hours if the door to his jail had not banged open and the dawn’s light poured in.

Roger groaned and tried to straighten himself.

A powrie appeared on the ladder, followed by another, Kos-kosio Begulne himself. The dwarf in front went right to Roger and pulled him up to his feet, slamming him hard against the wall.

Roger teetered, but managed to hold his balance, realizing that if he fell over, the dwarf would just hoist him up again, probably even more roughly.

“Who uses the magic?” Kos-kosio Begulne asked, coming up to Roger, grabbing him by the front of his torn and bloody shirt and pulling him low, so his face was barely an inch from the leathery, wrinkled, imposing visage of the dwarf, close enough that Kos-kosio’s foul breath was hot in Roger’s face.

“Magic?” Roger replied.

“Get the hounds!” Kos-kosio Begulne cried.

Roger groaned again at the sound of barking.

“Who uses the magic?” the powrie leader demanded. “How many, and how many stones?”

“Stones?” Roger echoed. “I know of no stones, nor of any magic.”

Another bark came from above.

“I promise,” Roger added, his tone frantic. “I could just lie and give you a name, any name, and you would not know if I spoke truly until, or unless, you found that person. But I do not know of any magic. None!”

Kos-kosio Begulne held Roger close a bit longer, the dwarf growling low—and Roger feared that the fierce powrie would bite his nose off. But then Kos-kosio shoved him back hard against the wall and spun toward the stairs, convinced by the simple logic of Roger’s defense. “Ye tie him up!” the leader barked at the other powrie. “Strangle knot. We wants to make our guest comfortable.”

Roger wasn’t quite sure what Kos-kosio Begulne had in mind, but the other powrie’s grin, wide with evil glee, was not promising. The dwarf produced a thin, rough-edged rope and advanced on him.

Roger slumped to the floor. The dwarf kicked him over onto his belly, then yanked his arms roughly behind his back.

“Nab, put the damned hounds away,” Kos-kosio Begulne commanded yet another powrie who had come to the top of the root cellar’s ladder, leading a Craggoth hound on a short leash. “He’s just a weak human, and won’t be living through much more pain.” Kos-kosio looked back from his perch on the lower rungs, meeting Roger’s glare. “I’m wanting to find a bit more fun with this one before I let him die.”

“Lucky me,” Roger muttered under his breath, and that only got him an even harder tug from the dwarf with the rope.

The “strangle knot,” as Kos-kosio Begulne had called it, proved to be a devilish twist of the rope. Roger’s arms were bound tightly behind his back, bent at the elbow so his hands nearly touched the back of his neck. The nasty cord then looped over both his shoulders and down the front of his body, wrapping painfully underneath his groin and then up his back once more, finally looping about Roger’s throat. So expertly was he tied, and so tightly, that the slightest shift of his arms not only sent waves of pain into his groin, but cut off his air supply, as well.

“Well, human lock-picker, let’s be seeing if ye can get yer way outta this.” The powrie laughed, set a torch in a wall sconce, lit it, and went to the top of the ladder, calling out to some comrades. “Kos-kosio’s not wanting this one to get away!”

“Double lock?” one of the dwarves up above asked.

“Double lock,” the powrie on the stairs confirmed. “And then sit the damned hound on it! And ye get one to come and take me seat before the sun’s too low. I’m not wanting to miss me supper sitting with this smelly human.”

“Quit yer bitching,” the other dwarf replied, and closed the heavy trapdoor with a resounding bang. Roger listened carefully as chains and locks were set in place on the door. He studied the powrie coming down the stairs.

One mistake, the young man silently berated Kos-kosio Begulne. You let this one keep a weapon.

The powrie made straight for Roger. “You just lie still,” the dwarf instructed, and then, to accentuate the point, the nasty creature kicked Roger hard in the ribs.

Roger squirmed—and that only choked him all the more.

Laughing, the dwarf moved across the way and sat down under the burning torch. The wicked creature took off its crimson beret, twirling it about with one finger, letting Roger see it clearly, as if to promise him that his blood, too, would soon enhance the hue. Then the powrie put its gnarly hands behind its head and leaned against the wall, closing its eyes.

Roger spent a long, long while getting his bearings. He fought away the nausea and the pain, then tried to figure a way to get out of the ropes. That would be the easy part, he decided, because even if he got free, even if he then took the dwarf’s weapon and killed the creature, where might he go? The cellar bulkhead was locked and chained, and he didn’t have to be reminded of what lay in wait atop it.

Truly, the task before him seemed daunting, but Roger forced himself to calm and to concentrate, trying to break things down one step at a time.

Sometime in late afternoon the powries changed guards. The new one gave Roger a bit of food and a drink—nearly drowning him in the process—and then took a seat in much the same place as the previous sentry.

Within an hour this one, too, was snoring contentedly.

Determined not to spend another night as Kos-kosio Begulne’s guest, Roger decided that the time to act was upon him. One small step at a time, he reminded himself as he braced his shoulder against the hard wall. He had to angle himself just right, so his weight and not his strength would do most of the work. With a glance at his powrie jailor to make sure the creature was sleeping soundly, Roger closed his eyes and mustered his nerve.

Then he dove against the wall, suddenly, powerfully, hitting with the front of his shoulder, the jolt driving his arm back. Roger’s muscles and weight worked in a coordinated manner then, driving him ahead.

He heard a loud pop as his shoulder dislocated, and waves of pain rolled through his body, nearly laying him low. He fought them away, though, and with his arm thus contorted, the rope was loosened enough for him to slip it over the shoulder.

In a matter of seconds he was lying on the floor, free of the rope, gasping for breath. Then, after a moment’s respite, he went back to work, jamming his shoulder the other way, popping it back in place—a useful little trick the thief had perfected over the years. Again he spent a moment letting the waves of pain subside, and then gathered up the rope and moved to the sleeping powrie.

“Hey,” the dwarf protested a few minutes later, opening its sleepy eyes to see Roger standing before it, the dwarf’s short sword in hand. “And what’re ye meaning to do with that?” the powrie asked, climbing to its feet and drawing a dagger from its boot. Both the dwarf and Roger understood that even thus armed, the man was no match for the battle-seasoned powrie.

Roger hopped backward on his good leg, falling against the far wall; the powrie growled and charged, raising its dagger before it.

As that arm came up, the dwarf realized that a rope was looped about its wrist, a short leash fastened to a root sticking from the earthen wall near to where the dwarf had been sitting.

“What?” the powrie said, even as the loop tightened and held, pulling the dwarf’s arm low, right between its legs, flipping the dwarf over to land heavily on its back.

Roger came off the wall even as the dwarf began its somersault, sliding in beside the prone creature.

“What?” the dwarf bellowed again, just before the pommel of its short sword smashed down on its hard head. The powrie thrashed, trying to pull its arm free, trying to grab at Roger with its other hand.

Roger pounded away with the pommel again and again, until finally the stubborn dwarf lay still. The man nearly fell away from the pain then, and the exertion, flitting in and out of consciousness.

“Not much time,” Roger reminded himself stubbornly, dragging himself to his feet.

The powrie stirred; Roger slammed it again, and then once more. “Not much time,” he said again, more insistently, shaking his head at the sheer resilience of the hardy dwarf.

Now things got more complicated; Roger played through the entire scenario, trying to figure every obstacle and every item he would need to overcome them. He took the dagger from the dwarf’s hand and the belt from around its waist, and reset the rope to better secure the creature. Then he moved to the ladder, trying to get a measure of the bulkhead’s strength. At the center of that trapdoor, on the inside, was a support beam, a strong log. Roger went at this first, or rather, at the wood above it, scraping a hollow area wide enough to loop the rope over the beam. Then he began an expert assault on the boards, whittling at their supports on either end. At one point he heard the growl of the wary Craggoth hound, and had to pause for a long while before the vicious dog would quiet down.

One scratch at a time, one broken splinter, one loosened peg. Again Roger had to stop, this time because his leg was throbbing so badly he could not remain on the ladder. And then again he had to wait, for the powrie was coming back to consciousness and needed to be clunked on the head one more time. Stubbornly Roger went back to work, and finally the boards to either side of the central support were loosened.

The moment was upon him; he hoped he wouldn’t faint away from the pain at a critical juncture.

He went back to the dwarf and gathered more tools, then spent a long moment replaying the expected scenario. He checked his gear one final time—the short sword and the dagger, the post from the dwarf’s belt buckle, the leather laces from the dwarf’s boots, and finally, one of those smelly boots—and then took a deep steadying breath and moved back to the ladder. He pressed slightly on each of the loosened bulkhead boards, trying to get a better feel of where the hound might be. Of course, if there was more than one dog, or if there were any powries in the immediate area up above, the game would end quickly, and likely, painfully, Roger realized, but he decided he had to take the chance. In his mind, he had nothing to lose, for Kos-kosio Begulne would never let him go, and Roger held no illusions about his captivity: as soon as the powrie leader decided he was no longer useful, he would be tortured to death.

He had already looped the rope over the beam from right to left, but then, realizing that the hound was more to the left, he reversed the direction. Down the ladder Roger went, positioning the dazed powrie at the base and to the left-hand side.

Back up on the ladder, in place below the trapdoor, Roger rubbed his hands anxiously, reminding himself over and over that his timing had to be perfect. Using splinters from the worked boards, he set the noose in place just under the right-hand board. Then he took up the boot in one hand and put his other hand firmly against the right board, up through the noose.

A final deep breath and Roger pushed hard, partially dislodging the board, enough so he woke the hound fully and offered it an opening through which it could attack.

And attack it did, jaws snapping right for the boot that Roger pushed up into its face. As soon as the dog latched on, Roger, holding the other end of the boot in both hands, jumped from the ladder, drawing the stubborn hound in through the opening, in through the noose.

The snare worked perfectly, tightening about the hound as it came falling through, hooking about the dog’s neck and under one paw about the shoulder. Down they went, Roger in a tumble—a painful tumble!—and the hound dropping to the end of the rope length. The sudden jerk lifted the powrie at the rope’s other end to its knees and left the hound dangling, one of its back feet just brushing the floor.

The Craggoth hound bit hard on the boot, shaking its head violently side to side, seemingly oblivious to the fact that it was hanging. Roger was there in a split second, taking the opportunity to loop the leather shoelace about the creature’s closed jaws, wrapping it tightly many times and then tying it off.

“Bark now,” he taunted, then flicked his finger against the hound’s nose. With a last quick check on the powrie, and one more slug to the head for good measure, Roger struggled back up the ladder.

All was quiet outside, but considering the pain in his leg, Roger didn’t think he would have much luck trying to slip through the narrow opening he had broken in the trapdoor. He did get his hands out, though, enough to feel along the chains to the two padlocks. Always pleased by his own cleverness, smiling Roger took the narrow post of the powrie’s buckle in hand and went to work.

Nightbird waited for the signal whistle, then moved quickly and quietly up to the tree in which his small friend was perched. From this vantage point they could see most of Caer Tinella, and Juraviel’s estimate of the number of monsters within that town seemed conservative to the ranger.

“Do you have any idea where they would hold him?” he asked.

“I said that I heard them speak of him, not that I actually saw him,” the elf replied. “He could be in any building, or more likely, considering the events of last night, he could be dead.”

Nightbird wanted to argue, but held his tongue, for he found that he could not logically disagree with Juraviel. An entire day had passed—he and the elf couldn’t risk coming into Caer Tinella in broad daylight—giving Kos-kosio Begulne plenty of time to sort out the details of the disaster in the forest and to lay the blame for it at the feet of his valuable prisoner.

“We should have come right in,” Juraviel went on. “As soon as the fight was over, with still two or three hours of darkness before us.”

“Pony had to tend the wounded,” the ranger replied.

“She is not here anyway,” the elf reminded. Nightbird had hoped she would accompany them, but Pony was still exhausted from the overuse of magic. After their sword-dance that morning, she had slept through most of the day, and would likely sleep well again that night.

“But this is,” the ranger answered, holding up the hematite. “Roger Lockless might need it.”

“More likely, Roger Lockless needs burying,” the elf said dryly. The ranger didn’t appreciate the sarcasm, but again he said nothing, except to motion ahead and tell Juraviel to lead on.

The elf was gone in an instant, and a few seconds later another whistle moved the ranger even closer. They held their next position for some time, as a large group of powries and giants filtered out of the town, heading more to the west than the north.

“The fewer left in town, the better our chances,” Juraviel remarked, keeping his voice to a tiny whisper now that they were so close.

The ranger nodded and motioned for Juraviel to move along. The next hop put them at the railing of a corral; the next after that put them right beside a barn on the northeastern edge of town. Now they moved together, both holding bows. They froze when they heard voices within the barn, some goblins complaining about work and one grumbling about a broken chain.

“He could be in there,” Juraviel said softly.

The ranger didn’t think that a reputedly wise powrie leader would be foolish enough to put so valuable a prisoner on the outskirts of the town, but he wanted to leave an open path out of Caer Tinella anyway, and so he gave a little tug on his bowstring and nodded toward the barn.

Juraviel led the way around the side, coming up on the front corner. They passed a pair of doors at the level of the ranger’s head, used for throwing hay bales out to the cows, but there were no handles on the outside and so they paid the portal no heed—none, at least, until the two doors swung out, one slamming Nightbird about the shoulders, forcing him to fall back, the other swinging right above Juraviel’s head. The poor goblin who had swung the doors didn’t realize that a human was blocking one from opening all the way, didn’t even realize that anybody was outside, until Juraviel, ducking and turning under the swinging door, lifted his bow and put an arrow right between the creature’s eyes. The elf skipped right in, fluttering up with his wings. He grabbed the fast-dying goblin by the front of its ragged tunic and propped it in place.

Nightbird groaned and grumbled, finally getting around the awkward door, only to see Juraviel patting a finger frantically against pursed lips and pointing inside.

The ranger kept his calm and moved to the edge of the opening, peering around. He saw one other goblin, working with a block and tackle and a chain. There may have been others, for the inside of the barn was too cluttered by stalls and bales, a wagon and many other items, for the ranger to be sure. Leaning Hawkwing against the wall, he drew out Tempest and eased beside the goblin, then up to the tier inside the window. Silent as a hunting cat, the ranger made his careful way right behind the goblin working the block and tackle.

“Do you need help?” he asked.

The goblin spun, eyes wide.

Tempest cut it down.

But there was indeed another goblin in the barn, and it came racing out of a nearby stall, trying to run right past the ranger. It jerked and stumbled as an arrow hit it, then staggered again, nearly going to its knees and slowing enough for Nightbird to catch up. The strong ranger grabbed the thing about the head, clamping his hand over its mouth, and pulled it down to the ground.

“Where is the prisoner?” he whispered in its ear.

The goblin squirmed and tried to scream out, but Nightbird grabbed it all the tighter, jerked its head back and forth. Then Juraviel was beside them, the elf holding his bow up beside the goblin’s head, his arrow creasing the creature’s temple. The goblin calmed considerably.

“If you yell out, you die;” the ranger promised, and he eased his hand away.

“It hurts us! It hurts us!” the goblin moaned pitifully, and the two friends could hardly blame it, for it carried one of Juraviel’s arrows in its shoulder, another in its thigh. Still, the ranger pressed his hand over the creature’s mouth once more.

“The prisoner,” he prompted, easing his hand away. “Where is the prisoner?”

“Kos-kosio Begulne have many prisoners,” the goblin countered.

“The new prisoner,” the ranger clarified. “The one Kos-kosio Begulne hates most of all.”

“Nasty arrow from nasty elf!”

“Tell me,” the ranger growled, “or my friend will put another arrow into you!”

“In the ground,” the goblin squeaked. “In a hole in the ground.”

“Buried?” the ranger asked anxiously. “Did Kos-kosio Begulne kill him?”

“Not buried,” the goblin replied. “Not dead yet. In a room in a hole.”

The ranger looked to Juraviel. “To store food,” the ranger explained, figuring out the riddle. “We did as much in Dundalis when I was a boy.”

“A root cellar,” the elf agreed, and both of them turned back to the prisoner.

“Where is this hole?” Nightbird asked, giving the goblin a shake.

The goblin shook its head; the ranger tightened his grip. “You will tell—” Nightbird started to say, but Juraviel, glancing out a small window beside the barn’s front door, the one facing the town proper, interrupted him.

“Time is short,” the elf explained. “The powries are astir.”

“Last chance,” Nightbird said to the goblin. “Where is the hole?”

But the goblin feared Kos-kosio Begulne more than it feared anything these two could do to it. It squirmed and started to cry out, and when the ranger clamped his hand over its mouth, it promptly bit him, struggling wildly to get away. It could not break free of the ranger’s strong hold, though, so it tried to bite again, and started to cry out, however muffled the call might be.

A well-aimed thrust of Juraviel’s dagger-sized sword ended that; the creature slumped to the floor and died.

“And how are we to find Roger Lockless now?” Nightbird asked.

“The goblin would not have told us more, even if it knew more,” the elf replied. “It knew that I would kill it as soon as the information was divulged.”

The ranger looked at his companion curiously. “And if we had promised its life in exchange?” he asked.

“Then we would have been lying,” Juraviel replied evenly. “Speak not to me of mercy where goblins are concerned, Nightbird. I’ll not suffer a goblin to live. Nor should you, who lived through the massacre of Dundalis, and through all the horrors since then.”

Nightbird looked down at the dead goblin. Juraviel was right about the wicked race, of course, though as soon as they had taken the goblin prisoner and demanded information, it somehow seemed to change things. Goblins were horrid things, evil and merciless. They lived to destroy, and would attack humans on sight—any humans, including . . . especially, children—as long as they believed they could win the fight. The ranger had never felt guilty about killing them, but if he had given this one his word that if it offered the information it would not be killed . . .

It was a perplexing thought, but one that would have to wait for another time, the ranger realized when he moved over to glance out the window beside the door. Juraviel hadn’t been lying; a large group of powries and other monsters was moving through the town, heading generally north. The ranger got the distinct impression they were searching for someone.

“What are you doing?” he asked the elf when he turned about to see Juraviel scampering about the barn, retrieving torches and their sconces.

Juraviel didn’t bother to answer. Using rope, he secured the sconces to a board, then put the board across a beam in line with the front window, laying the torches in loosely over a thick blanket of hay.

“A diversion for the way out,” the ranger reasoned.

“If indeed we come this way,” the elf added.

Nightbird only nodded and did not press the point, trusting in his friend. In a few moments they set out, going through the same hay window that had brought them into the barn, carefully closing the doors behind them. They crept to the front edge of the building and peered around. Many enemies were about, mostly powries, and most of these were carrying blazing torches.

“Not the most promising of situations,” the ranger offered, but he did see a way to get closer to the town center. Now, using the cat’s-eye, he led the way, moving to the side of another building, then cutting through a narrow alley between it and another. Around the next corner, they came upon a powrie.

Tempest slashed down, angling in from the shoulder, cutting deep into the side of the creature’s neck; Juraviel’s sword stabbed in under the bottom rib, slanting upward to steal the creature’s breath. Still, despite the coordinated and perfect attacks, the dwarf gave a stifled cry as it died.

The two companions exchanged nervous glances at the sound. “Move along, and quickly,” the elf bade his friend.

Stepping fast, the ranger was looking down more than up, searching for some bulkhead that would indicate a root cellar, while Juraviel skittered off to the side, trying to keep track of any nearby monsters. That was why the normally alert Nightbird was surprised indeed when he heard a voice above him.

“Looking for something?” it casually asked.

Up went the ranger’s eyes, up went his sword, but he halted the swing abruptly when he realized that it was no powrie, no goblin or giant talking, but a human, a skinny and short man reclining on the narrow ledge above a back door. The ranger quickly scanned the form, noting the wound on his leg, the scab and bruises on his face and on the one arm that was exposed. And yet, despite his obvious pain and the precarious, at best, perch, the man held himself easily, comfortably, with an air of confidence and ease. There could be only two answers to this riddle, and it seemed unlikely to the ranger that any human was in league with the powries.

“Roger Lockless, I presume,” Nightbird said quietly.

“I see that my reputation has spread wide indeed,” the man replied.

“We must be on the move,” a nervous Juraviel remarked, coming out of the shadows. One look at the elf, and Roger, eyes going wide and mouth dropping open, overbalanced and tumbled from the ledge. He would have hit the ground hard, but the ranger was there below him, catching him and easing him to his feet.

“What is that?” Roger gasped.

“Answers will wait,” the ranger replied sternly.

“We must be quick,” Juraviel explained. “The monsters tighten their perimeter about us. They are searching door-to-door.”

“They would not have caught me,” Roger said with all confidence.

“Many powries,” said the elf, “with torches to light the night as if it were day.”

“They would not have caught me,” Roger said again.

“They have giants to look on rooftops,” Juraviel added.

“They would not have caught me,” the unshakable thief repeated a third time, snapping his fingers in the air.

A baying split the night air.

“And they have dogs,” the ranger remarked.

“Oh, that,” said Roger, deflating fast. “Get me away from this cursed place!”

The three started back down the alley, but it became obvious that Roger could not move quickly, could hardly support himself. Nightbird was right beside him, hooking the man’s arm across his strong shoulder for support.

“Find me a walking stick,” Roger begged.

The ranger shook his head, realizing that a walking stick wouldn’t help much. He ducked low suddenly, pulling Roger’s arm farther across his shoulders and hoisting him across his back.

“Lead on,” the ranger bade Juraviel. “And with all speed.”

The elf skittered to a corner, peered around it, then ran off almost at once, sprinting to the next building, and then the next in line. They heard a shout, the resonating voice of a giant, and though they couldn’t be certain that the monster was even calling out about them, Juraviel, and then the ranger right behind him, broke into a dead run. The elf fitted an arrow to his bowstring as he went, and when they neared the barn, he slowed, took aim, and let fly, the arrow diving through the window beside the door, knocking hard into the loose board Juraviel had put in place and dropping the burning torches into the bed of hay. Before the three had even gone past the front corner of the barn, the light inside increased dramatically. Before they were out the other side, running along the fence of the corral, the flames burst through the front window and were licking through cracks in the roof.

They passed the corral and were soon into the woods, the ranger in front now and running with all speed, despite the man slung over his shoulder. They could hear the wild commotion back in Caer Tinella, powries, goblins, and giants running all about and calling out orders, most screaming for water, others for a chase of the escaping human. And then they heard, more pointedly, the howling of several hounds closing on their trail.

“Run in, straight to the others,” Juraviel instructed. “I will rid us of the troublesome dogs.”

“Not so easy a task,” Roger gasped as he bounced about.

“Not for one who has no wings,” the elf replied with a wink, though Roger’s balance was too precarious for him to notice.

Juraviel doubled back then, and the ranger ran on, disappearing into the forest night. The elf waited a moment, gauging the flight of his friend and the sound of the approaching dogs. He picked a tall and wide oak, the ground around it relatively free of brush. He scampered all about its base, making the scent thick, then used his wings to lift him to the lowest branch, carefully rubbing his smell on the bark all the way up. Then he ascended again to a new perch, and then again higher, and was halfway up when the leading hound reached the tree’s base. It sniffed and whimpered, then stood up with its forepaws on the trunk and howled excitedly.

Juraviel called down to it, taunting it, and then for good measure put an arrow into the ground right beside the hound.

More hounds arrived, sniffing and circling, taking up the call.

Up higher went the elf, to the very top of the tree, to branches that hardly supported even his lithe form. He paused a moment to revel in the view, all the dark treetops spread far and wide before him. And then, secure that these hounds would remain howling at the scented tree, Juraviel let his wings carry him to a tree farther on, a long flight for an elf. Still, as soon as he found his perch, Juraviel knew he couldn’t stop and rest, and so he flew off again to the next tree in line, and soon, until the calls of the hounds were far behind him. He came down then, needing to give his wings a rest, and scampered away on light feet through the forest night.

Later on, from the edges of the human camp, Juraviel saw that Elbryan and Roger had arrived safely. Many others were gathered about the pair, despite the late hour, listening to the tale of the rescue—or of the escape, to hear Roger tell it. Satisfied about a mission well done, Juraviel moved deeper into the forest, to the thick and soft boughs of a pine tree, and settled down for the night.

He was surprised when he awoke, before the dawn, to find that both Elbryan and Pony were already awake and gone from the camp.

The elf gave a smile, thinking that they needed some time alone with each other, a respite for lovers.

He wasn’t far from the truth, for Elbryan and Pony were indeed intimate that morning—but not in the way Juraviel imagined. They were out in a secret clearing, performing bi’nelle dasada.

That morning, and every morning thereafter, and each time they danced, Pony followed Nightbird’s movements a bit longer. It would be years before she could find his level of perfection, if ever, she knew, but she took heart, for each day brought improvement— each day her lunge went a bit faster and a bit farther, her aim a bit more sure.

As the days passed, the ranger noted a change in the dance, subtle but definite. At first he worried that taking Pony under his guidance was perverting this very special gift of the Touel’alfar, but then he realized that the shift, far from undesirable, was a wonderful thing. For each day, he and his companion grew a bit more in tune with each other, each sensing the other’s movements, learning to supplement and compliment every routine with the proper support.

Indeed their dance was beautiful, a sharing of heart and soul and, mostly, of trust.

CHAPTER 12

Unexpected Guests

This cannot be! It makes no sense whatsoever, Abbot Dobrinion Calislas of St Precious Abbey in Palmaris kept telling himself, trying to convince himself through logic, despite the very real reports from reliable monks, that Father Abbot Dalebert Markwart, the leader of the Abellican Church, was waiting for him in the chapel of his abbey.

“Markwart is too old to be traveling to Palmaris,” Abbot Dobrinion said aloud, though no one was nearby to hear. He fumbled with his robes as he stumbled down the circular stairs from his private quarters. “And surely he would have given notice of his visit long in advance. Such men do not move helter-skelter about the countryside!

“And such men should not come unannounced!” Dobrinion added. He was no fan of Father Abbot Markwart; the two had been at odds for several years concerning the canonization process of one of St. Precious’ former monks. Though it was the second oldest abbey in all the order, behind St-Mere-Abelle, St Precious boasted of no saints from its order, a tragic oversight that Abbot Dobrinion was working hard to correct—and one that Father Abbot Markwart had opposed from the very moment Brother Allabarnet’s name had been entered.

Dobrinion’s voice rose as he finished the frantic thought, the abbot opening the heavy door of the chapel at the same time. His round cheeks flushed, for he feared that the man standing before him, Father Abbot Dalebert Markwart, had heard him.

And it was indeed Markwart, Abbot Dobrinion knew without doubt. He had met the man on more than a dozen occasions, and though he had not seen Markwart in more than a decade, he recognized him now. He glanced around at Markwart’s entourage, trying to make some sense of it all. Only three other monks were in the chapel, and one of them was of St Precious. The other two, both young, one slender and nervous, the other barrel-chested and obviously strong, stood near the Father Abbot in similar poses, their arms crossed in front of them, one hand clasping the other wrist. A defensive position, Dobrinion noted, and it seemed to him that these two were more like bodyguards than escorts. On previous occasions when the Father Abbot had traveled, whether it was Markwart or any of his predecessors, the entourage was huge, no less than fifty monks, and a fair number of them masters, or even abbots. These two were neither, Dobrinion knew, for they were hardly old enough to even have attained half the years of an immaculate.

“Father Abbot,” he said solemnly, dipping a respectful bow.

“My greetings, Abbot Dobrinion,” Father Abbot Markwart replied in his nasal voice. “Forgive my intrusion into your excellent abbey.”

“Indeed,” was all that the sputtering, flustered abbot could reply.

“It was necessary,” Markwart went on. “In these times . . . well, you understand that we must often improvise with an enemy army marching about our lands.”

“Indeed,” Dobrinion said again, and he wanted to pinch himself, thinking that he sounded incredibly stupid.

“I am to be met here by a caravan,” the Father Abbot explained, “which I diverted on its return to St-Mere-Abelle, for there is little time.”

A caravan from St-Mere-Abelle this far out? Dobrinion thought And I knew nothing about it!

“Master Jojonah leads it,” Father Abbot Markwart said. “You remember Jojonah; you and he went through your training together.”

“He was two or three years my junior, I believe,” Abbot Dobrinion replied. He had met Jojonah subsequently at Church gatherings, and had once spent a night drinking heavily with the man, and with a hawkish master by the name of Siherton.

“Are any other masters with this caravan?” he asked. “Siherton, perhaps?”

“Master Siherton is dead,” Father Abbot Markwart said evenly. “He was murdered.”

“Powries?” Dobrinion dared to ask, though it seemed from Markwart’s tone that the man did not want to elaborate.

“No,” Father Abbot said curtly. “But enough of that unpleasant situation; it was a long time ago. Jojonah is the only master on the caravan, though he has a trio of immaculates beside him. They are twenty-five strong, and have with them a most extraordinary prisoner. What I require from you is privacy, for myself, for my fellows of St.-Mere-Abelle, and most of all, for the prisoner.”

“I will do all that I can—” Abbot Dobrinion began to respond.

“I am sure that you will,” Markwart cut him off. “Have one of your trusted lessers instruct these two—” He indicated the young monks flanking him. “—concerning our accommodations. We will not likely be here for long. No more than a week, I should guess.” His face grew very serious and he advanced on Dobrinion, speaking in low, even threatening, tones. “I will have your assurances that there will be no interference,” he said.

Abbot Dobrinion rocked back on his heels, studying the old man, surprised by all of this. For St-Mere-Abelle to even be operating in this region without Dobrinion’s knowledge and approval was contrary to Church etiquette. What was this mysterious mission all about, and why hadn’t he been informed? And what of this prisoner? With hematite, the Father Abbot surely could have contacted him sooner!

Abbot Dobrinion did well to sublimate his anger. This was the Father Abbot, after all, and Honce-the-Bear was embroiled in a desperate war. “We will do as we are instructed,” he assured his superior, bowing his head respectfully. “St. Precious is yours to command.”

“I will take your quarters for the duration of my stay,” Father Abbot Markwart said. “My lessers will help you to move your necessary items to other accommodations.”

Dobrinion felt as though he had been slapped in the face. He had been the abbot of St Precious for three decades, and that was no small position. St. Precious was the third largest abbey in the Abellican Church, behind St.-Mere-Abelle and St Honce of Ursal. And because Palmaris was on the edge of the true civilized lands, there was perhaps no abbey more influential to its congregation. For the thirty years of his rule, Abbot Dobrinion had been pretty much left alone—St-Mere-Abelle was too concerned with the Ring Stones and with general Church doctrine, and St. Honce too embroiled in politics with the King. Thus, Abbot Dobrinion’s only rival for power in all the wide northern reaches of Honce-the-Bear was Baron Rochefort Bildeborough of Palmaris, and that man, like his predecessor, in addition to being a close friend to Dobrinion, was quiet and unassuming. Rochefort Bildeborough was a man easily appeased as long as his personal luxuries were secured. Even in the matter of this war that come to Palmaris he had turned over defense of the city to the captain of the city guard, instructing that man to report to Abbot Dobrinion, while he kept himself secure in his palace-fortress, Chasewind Manor.

Thus Abbot Dobrinion was not used to being talked to in such superior tones. But again, he remembered his place in the Abellican hierarchy, a pyramid that placed the Father Abbot at its pinnacle. “As you say,” he replied humbly, bowing one last time and starting away.

“And perhaps we will have time to discuss the matter of Brother Allabarnet,” the Father Abbot said just before Abbot Dobrinion crossed out of the room.

Dobrinion stopped, realizing that he had just been thrown a morsel, a teasing carrot dependent upon his cooperation. His initial thought was to throw that carrot back at the Father Abbot, but he quickly pushed that notion away. Abbot Dobrinion was an old man, and though he was not as old as Markwart, he feared that Markwart would outlive him. By his own estimation, all that he had left to accomplish in his life was to see Brother Allabarnet, a monk of St. Precious, sainted, and that feat would not be easy, perhaps not even possible, without the help of Father Abbot Markwart.

“St Precious?” Brother Braumin’s incredulous tone echoed the emotions of Master Jojonah when Brother Francis announced the new destination.

“The Father Abbot does not wish to lose any time in speaking with the centaur,” Brother Francis went on. “He will meet us in Palmaris. In fact, he was on his way to that place when he contacted me, and I suspect that he is already settled in St. Precious.”

“Are you certain of this?” Master Jojonah asked calmly. “Was it truly Father Abbot Markwart who told you of this change?”

“You imply that others might somehow get into my mind?” the younger monk retorted.

“I recognize that we have been to the lair of the demon,” Master Jojonah explained, again taking pains so that his voice was not accusing. If Father Abbot Markwart had indeed come to Brother Francis with new orders, then Jojonah and all the others had no practical choice but to go along.

“It was the Father Abbot,” Brother Francis said firmly. “Would it appease you if I contacted him again? Perhaps I could loan him my body that he tell you personally.”

“Enough, brother,” Master Jojonah said, waving his hand in surrender. “I do not question your judgment; I only thought it prudent to make certain.”

“I am certain.”

“So you have said,” Master Jojonah replied. “And so our destination shall be St. Precious. Have you determined our course?”

“I have others working with the maps even now,” Brother Francis replied. “It is not too far, and once we have crossed the Timberlands, we should find a fairly easy road.”

“A road choked with monsters,” Brother Braumin put in dryly. “The reports from this area have spoken of abundant fighting.”

“We will move too quickly and quietly for them to ever engage us,” Brother Francis said.

Master Jojonah only nodded. If the Father Abbot wanted them in Palmaris, then to Palmaris they would go, whatever the obstacles. For Jojonah, though, the greatest obstacle of all would likely find them at the end of the trail, in the person of Dalebert Markwart.

With typical efficiency, Brother Francis completed the plotting and the caravan adjusted its course, wheels humming. They were past the Timberland towns in a couple of days, and though they did indeed find monsters along the way, the creatures never knew of their passage, or realized it too late to possibly catch up to the speeding procession.

“A caravan of monks,” Roger Lockless explained. The young man was feeling well again, for Pony had used the hematite extensively on his dog bites and other wounds. He had hardly thanked the woman, though, had just grunted and walked away after their two-hour session. Neither Pony nor Elbryan had seen Roger in the four days since that occasion, until now. “I know monks, and am certain!”

Elbryan and Pony exchanged grim looks, both suspecting that Brother Avelyn might have something to do with this, that these monks might be in search of the stones the companions now held.

“Moving swiftly, so swiftly,” Roger went on, sincerely awed. “I doubt that Kos-kosio Begulne even knew they were in the area—or, if the powrie did learn of their passing, they were too far gone by that point for him to do anything about it. They must be halfway to Palmaris by now.”

Elbryan started to question that, for Roger had only seen this caravan a couple of hours before. The ranger held the thought quiet, though, for he knew that, whether the estimate of the speed was accurate or not, Roger believed what he was saying.

“A pity that we did not learn of this sooner,” Belster O’Comely put in. “What aid might these men of God have given us? What comfort? At the very least, they might have taken our most infirm with them to the safer lands in the south.”

“You would not even have learned of them at all had I not been so vigilant,” Roger replied angrily, defensively, taking Belster’s comment as an insult to his scouting prowess. “How come the great Nightbird knew nothing about them? Or the woman who proclaims to be a great wizardess?”

“Enough, Roger,” Elbryan bade him. “Belster was lamenting the reality, not placing blame. It is indeed a pity that we could not enlist the aid of such powerful allies, for if they were moving as swiftly as you say—and I do not doubt that they were,” he added quickly, seeing Roger’s expression go sour, “then they are likely strong with magic.” The ranger was only half serious, though, for while he would have liked to facilitate the passage of their infirm members to Palmaris, he wasn’t so sure that these monks would have proven themselves allies—at least not for him and Pony.

“They were moving even faster than you believe,” Roger replied. “I cannot describe their true speed. Their horses’ legs were but a blur; one rider at the back of the wagon moved so fast that to my eyes he seemed to be a blend of horse and man.”

That perked up the ears of all the folk of the Dundalis region, all the folk who knew of the Forest Ghost, who had fought beside Bradwarden and taken comfort in his hauntingly beautiful piping. Elbryan and Pony deflated their brightening expressions, though, shaking their heads at the thought. They had seen the end of Bradwarden, so they both believed.

“You are certain that the caravan kept moving?” the ranger asked Roger.

“Halfway to Palmaris by now,” the man replied.

“Then they are no concern of ours,” Elbryan reasoned, though silently he vowed to keep an eye out for the monks. If this caravan had come to the north searching for Avelyn and the stones, and if they had garnered some answers through the use of magic, he and Pony might already be considered outlaws.

The caravan arrived at St Precious with no fanfare, no recognition; Abbot Dobrinion wasn’t even there to greet them. That was Father Abbot Markwart’s pleasure, along with his pair of bodyguards, quietly meeting the brothers from St-Mere-Abelle at the abbey’s back gate.

Master Jojonah wasn’t surprised by Markwart’s choice of traveling companions, Brothers Youseff and Dandelion, the two monks in training to replace the late Brother Quintall as Brother Justice. Of all the lesser students in St.-Mere-Abelle, Jojonah had come to like these two the least. Brother Youseff, a third-year student, was from Youmaneff, Avelyn’s hometown, but there the similarity ended. He was a small and slender man, a vicious fighter who found every advantage in the training arena, no matter how deceptive and unpleasant. His companion, Brother Dandelion, who had only been at the monastery for two years, was physically the opposite of the small man, a huge bear with arms the size of a meaty thigh. Brother Dandelion often had to be restrained in the sparring matches, for once he gained an advantage, he continued to press it to the point of injuring his opponent. In the days of sanity at the monastery, such action might have led to dismissal, but in these dark times, the Father Abbot only chuckled at the man’s enthusiasm. Markwart had many times dismissed Jojonah’s complaints about Brother Dandelion, assuring Jojonah they would find a fitting place for the savage man.

Brother Jojonah often wondered how Dandelion, or Youseff, for that matter, had even passed the grueling process of elimination to get into the monastery. Every class was whittled down from one or two thousand to twenty-five, and it seemed obvious to Jojonah that there had to be many among those other hundreds more fitting in temperament, intelligence, and piety.

But both these young monks had been sponsored by the Father Abbot himself. “The son of a dear friend,” Markwart had said of Dandelion. Master Jojonah knew better. Brother Dandelion had been brought in for his unparalleled physical prowess and for no other reason. He was Markwart’s replacement for Quintall, one of the personal bodyguards surrounding the Father Abbot.

As for Youseff, Markwart had explained that Youmaneff, with the loss of Avelyn, was not represented at all in St-Mere-Abelle, an oversight that had to be corrected if the abbey meant to retain tight control over the small town.

Master Jojonah could only shake his head and sigh; it was all moving beyond his control.

The caravan was put up in the courtyard, with all the monks shown to their quarters, conveniently separated from the brothers of St. Precious. Master Jojonah found himself in a quiet room in a far corner of the great structure, removed from all the others of his troupe, particularly Brother Braumin, who was all the way to the other side of the abbey. The closest to Jojonah was Francis—to keep an eye on him, the master knew.

Still, that very night, Jojonah managed to slip away, meeting quietly with Brother Braumin on the triforium, a decorated ledge twenty feet above the floor of the abbey’s great chapel.

“I suspect he is in the lower dungeons,” Master Jojonah explained, running his hands over the details of a statue of Brother Allabarnet, whom the monks here called Brother Appleseed. Jojonah could feel the love that had gone into this artwork, and that, he subconsciously understood, was the true work of God.

“In chains, no doubt,” agreed Brother Braumin. “A great sin rests on the shoulders of the Father Abbot if his treatment of the heroic centaur is ill.”

Master Jojonah quieted the man with a waving hand. They could not afford to be caught speaking against the Father Abbot, no matter how great their ire.

“Have you inquired?” Brother Braumin asked.

“The Father Abbot tells me little now,” Jojonah replied. “He knows where lies my heart, though my actions do not overtly oppose him. I am scheduled to meet with him in the morning, at first light.”

“To speak of Bradwarden?”

Jojonah shook his head. “I doubt that subject will be breached,” he explained. “We are to talk of my departure, I believe, for the Father Abbot has hinted that I will move on ahead of the caravan.”

Brother Braumin caught the note of dread in Master Jojonah’s voice, and his thoughts went immediately to Markwart’s dangerous lackeys. Might the Father Abbot have Jojonah killed on the road? The thought assaulted Braumin’s sensibilities, seeming so utterly ridiculous. But try as he might, he could not dismiss it. Nor did he speak it aloud, for it was obvious to him that Jojonah was aware of the situation.

“What do you wish of me?” asked Brother Braumin.

Master Jojonah chuckled and held up his hands in defeat “Stay the course, my friend,” he replied. “Keep true in your heart. There seems little else before us. I do not agree with the direction of our Order, but the Father Abbot does not stand alone. Indeed, those who follow the present course far outnumber those of us who believe the Church has strayed.”

“Our numbers will grow,” Brother Braumin said determinedly, and in light of the vision he had found at the top of blasted Mount Aida, he truly believed the words. That sight, Avelyn’s arm and hand protruding from the blasted rock, had tied together all the words for Braumin, all the stories of Avelyn and the hints that the current Church was off course. In viewing Avelyn’s grave, he knew the direction of his life, and that direction would likely bring him into great conflict with the leaders of the Church—a fight Brother Braumin was ready to wage. He squared his shoulders determinedly as he finished with all confidence, “For our course is the most godly.”

Master Jojonah would not disagree with the simple logic of that statement. In the end, good and truth would prevail—he had to believe that, for it was the most basic tenet of his faith. How many centuries might it take to turn the Abellican Church back to its proper course, though, and how much suffering would the present course facilitate?

“Keep true in your heart,” he said again to Braumin. “Quietly spread the word, not against the Father Abbot or any others, but in favor of Avelyn and those of like heart and generous spirit”

“With the centaur as prisoner, it may go beyond that,” Brother Braumin reasoned. “The Father Abbot might force our hand, to stand against him openly or to forever remain silent.”

“There are degrees of silence, brother,” Master Jojonah replied. “To your room now, and fear not for me. I am at peace.”

Brother Braumin spent a long while staring at this dear man, his mentor, then he bowed low, even moved to Jojonah’s hand and kissed it, then turned and left.

Master Jojonah spent another hour and more up on that quiet triforium, looking at the statues of saints past, and at the newest construction, the likeness of Brother Allabarnet of St Precious, who more than a century before had walked the wide land planting apple trees, that settlers might find abundance. The canonization process for Allabarnet was sponsored by Abbot Dobrinion, who dearly wanted to see it through before he died.

Master Jojonah knew well the tales of kindly Allabarnet, and thought the man truly deserving. But given the current conditions of the Church, those stories of generosity and sacrifice would probably work against him.

Master Jojonah’s fears about Bradwarden’s condition were all too true, for the centaur had been brought to the lower catacombs of St. Precious, and there, in the dark and damp, was shackled to the wall. Still dazed from his brutal experiences in the collapsed mountain, and thoroughly exhausted from the run south, during which the monks had enacted magic spells upon him to make him run faster, Bradwarden was in little condition to resist physically.

And mentally; Bradwarden was caught exhausted and off his guard when Father Abbot Markwart, hematite in hand, came to him that very first night.

Without a word to Bradwarden, the Father Abbot fell into the power of the soul stone, released his mind from its physical bonds and invaded the thoughts of the centaur.

Bradwarden’s eyes went wide when he felt this most personal of intrusions. He struggled against the chains, but they would not yield. He fought back mentally—or at least he tried to, for he had no idea where to even begin.

Markwart, this wretched old human, was there in his mind, probing his memories.

“Tell me of Avelyn,” the Father Abbot prompted aloud, and though Bradwarden had no intention of offering any answers, the mere mention of Avelyn conjured images of the man, of the trip to Aida, of Pony and Elbryan, of Belli’mar Juraviel and Tuntun, of Symphony, and of all the others who had fought the monsters about Dundalis.

Only gradually did Bradwarden begin to temper and control his thoughts, and by that time the Father Abbot had learned so very much. Avelyn was dead and the stones gone, but these other two, this Elbryan and Pony, had left the devastation of Aida, or at least had left the tunnel wherein the centaur had been trapped, very much alive. Markwart focused on these two as the inquisition continued, and discovered that they were both from a small Timberland town called Dundalis, but had both lived the bulk of their years outside of Dundalis.

Pony, Jilseponie Ault, had lived in Palmaris.

“Ye’re a wretch!” Bradwarden fumed when at long last the mental connection was broken.

“You might have offered the information an easier way,” the Father Abbot replied.

“To yerself?” the centaur balked. “Ah, but Avelyn was right about ye, about all o’ yer stinkin’ Church, now wasn’t he?”

“Where did this woman, Jilseponie, live when she was in Palmaris?”

“Ye’re calling yerselves men o’ God, but no good God’d approve of yer works,” Bradwarden went on. “Ye took from me, ye thievin’ wretch, and for that I’ll see that ye pay.”

“And what of these diminutive creatures?” Father Abbot Mark-wart calmly asked. “Touel’alfar?”

Bradwarden spat at him.

Markwart lifted another stone, a graphite, and slammed the bedraggled centaur against the stone wall with a burst of electricity. “There are easy ways, and there are difficult ways,” the Father Abbot said calmly. “I will take whatever path you open for me.”

He started for the low, open archway that led to the main area of the catacombs. “You will speak with me again,” he threatened. Both Markwart and Bradwarden understood the limitations of that threat. The centaur was strong of will and would not be caught by surprise again, and Markwart would find no easy task in getting into his mind.

But Bradwarden feared that he might have already surrendered too much information about his friends.

“You cannot begin to comprehend the importance of this!” the Father Abbot roared at Abbot Dobrinion the next morning, the two men alone in Dobrinion’s study—though it was the Father Abbot who was sitting at Dobrinion’s large oak desk.

“Palmaris is a large city,” Abbot Dobrinion said calmly, trying to appease the man. Markwart hadn’t told him much, just that he needed information on a young woman, perhaps twenty years of age, who went by the name of Pony, or Jilseponie. “I know of no one named Pony—except for one stable boy who earned that as a nickname.”

“Jilseponie, then?”

Abbot Dobrinion shrugged helplessly.

“She came from the north,” Father Abbot Markwart pressed, though he hadn’t wanted to reveal even this much to the potentially dangerous Dobrinion. “An orphan.”

That hit a chord with the Abbot. “And can you tell me what she looks like?” he asked, trying hard not to let on that he might know something.

Markwart described the woman, for Bradwarden had unintentionally offered him a very clear picture of her, the thick golden hair, the blue eyes, the thick lips.

“What is it?” Markwart demanded, seeing the recognition flash across Dobrinion’s chubby face.

“Nothing, perhaps,” the abbot admitted. “There was a girl—Jill, she was called—who came from the north, orphaned in a goblin raid. But that was perhaps a decade ago, perhaps more.”

“What happened to her?”

“I married her to Master Connor Bildeborough, nephew of the Baron of Palmaris,” Abbot Dobrinion explained. “But it did not consummate and the girl was declared an outlaw for her refusal. She was indentured to the Kingsmen,” Dobrinion declared, thinking that might be the end of it, and hoping it would be, for he was not pleased at all by the Father Abbot’s actions, nor by the man’s desperate and secretive attitude.

The Father Abbot turned away and rubbed a hand across his pointy chin, only then noticing that he had not shaved in many, many days. The woman had been in the army—that, too, fit with the centaur’s recollections.

The pieces were falling into place.

Markwart, and not Dobrinion, remained in the abbot’s study after their discussion had ended. The next in line to see him was Brother Francis, and the Father Abbot’s orders to the monk were simple and to the point: keep everyone, even Abbot Dobrinion, away from the centaur, and keep Bradwarden exhausted. They would meet later that day in the dungeon, to continue the interrogation.

When Francis left, Master Jojonah entered. “We must discuss your treatment of the centaur,” he said without even formally greeting his superior.

Father Abbot Markwart snorted. “The centaur is none of your concern,” he replied casually.

“It would seem that Bradwarden is a hero,” Master Jojonah dared to say. “He, along with Avelyn Desbris, saw to the destruction of the dactyl.”

“You have it wrong,” the Father Abbot retorted, working hard to keep the anger from his voice. “Avelyn went to the dactyl, that much is true, and Bradwarden and these other two, Elbryan and Pony, accompanied him. But they did not go there to do battle, but rather to form an alliance.”

“So the destroyed mountain would indicate,” Master Jojonah said sarcastically.

Again Markwart snorted. “They overstepped the bounds of magic and of reason,” he declared. “They reached into that crystal amethyst which Avelyn stole from St-Mere-Abelle, and with it, combined with the hellish powers of the demon dactyl, they destroyed themselves.”

Master Jojonah saw the lie for what it was. He knew Avelyn, perhaps better than anyone else at St-Mere-Abelle, and knew that Avelyn would never have gone over to the side of evil. How he might convey that message over the ranting of the Father Abbot, he did not know.

“I have a mission for you,” Markwart said.

“You hinted that I would return to St-Mere-Abelle ahead of the rest,” Master Jojonah replied bluntly.

Markwart was shaking his head before the man finished. “You will leave ahead of us,” he explained. “But I doubt that you will see St-Mere-Abelle before us. No, your course is south, to St. Honce in Ursal.”

Master Jojonah was too surprised to even respond.

“You are to meet with Abbot Je’howith to discuss the canonization of Allabarnet of St. Precious,” the Father Abbot explained.

Master Jojonah’s expression was purely incredulous. Father Abbot Markwart had been the primary opponent of the process; were it not for his protests, Allabarnet would already be named a saint! Why the reversal? the master pondered, and it seemed to him that Markwart was trying to strengthen his ties with Dobrinion, and also to conveniently get him out of the way.

“In these trying times, a new saint might be just what the Church needs to reinvigorate the masses,” the Father Abbot went on.

Master Jojonah wanted to ask how any such process could be nearly as important as the very real issues before them, including the continuing war. He wanted to ask why a lesser monk couldn’t carry this message to Ursal. He wanted to ask why Markwart was reversing himself on this issue.

But all of those questions ran into the same solid wall, Jojonah realized. Father Abbot Markwart was following his own agenda, one bent on retrieving the stones Avelyn had stolen and discrediting the renegade monk at any costs. As he looked at the man now, it seemed to him that Markwart was spiraling down, down, into depths of blackness, that every word the Father Abbot spoke carried him further from the path of God.

“I will go and pack my belongings,” Master Jojonah said.

“Already done,” Father Abbot Markwart replied as the man turned to leave. “They await you at the abbey’s back door.”

“Then I will go and speak with—”

“You will go straightaway to the back door,” the Father Abbot said calmly. “All the arrangements have been made, all the supplies secured.”

“Magic stones?”

“My friend,” Markwart said, standing and moving around the side of the desk, “you will be traveling through civilized lands. You will need no magical assistance.”

Master Jojonah felt as though he was at a pivotal moment in his life. To go all the way to Ursal without any magical assistance, and on a mission that could become so very complicated, given the sheer paperwork of the canonization process, could keep him out of St.-Mere-Abelle, where he felt that he was desperately needed, for a year and more. Yet his only recourse would be to challenge Markwart here and now, perhaps to make it a public display, calling the man out concerning his beliefs, demanding proof that Brother Avelyn Desbris had gone to Aida to work with the dactyl demon.

His allies would be few indeed, Master Jojonah realized. Brother Braumin would stand behind him, perhaps even young Dellman. But what of Abbot Dobrinion, and thus the hundred and fifty monks of St. Precious?

No, Markwart had beaten him to that, Jojonah understood. He was leaving to discuss a situation near and dear to the heart of St. Precious, the sainthood of one of their own. Dobrinion wouldn’t go against Markwart, not now.

Master Jojonah spent a long time staring at this wrinkled old man, his onetime mentor who had become his nemesis. But he had no answers and no recourse—or perhaps, he feared, it was just a lack of courage. How old he felt at that moment, how beyond his days of action!

He went to the backdoor of the abbey, then walked, for Markwart had not even secured donkey or cart, down the roads of Palmaris, exiting by the southern gate.

CHAPTER 13

The New Enemy

Late in the afternoon of his tenth day with the refugee band, Elbryan sought out Oracle for the first time in more than a week. The passing of the monkish caravan had unnerved him, but so had a new detail that was presented that very morning: Roger Lockless walking back into the refugee camp at the head of fifteen former prisoners of Kos-kosio Begulne. The young man, learning in his scouting that the prisoners had been moved from Caer Tinella to Landsdown, took the opportunity to slip into the less defended town and bring the men out.

Still, despite the powrie leader’s error in moving the prisoners to the weaker community, disaster had almost found Roger in the woods, for another Craggoth hound remained with the prisoners and was hot on his trail, and only the arrival of Juraviel had allowed Roger and the fleeing prisoners to get away into safety.

That was a detail Roger was quick to omit when he described the events of the previous night to an excited and thrilled gathering of refugees.

The ranger saw a new problem here, a deeper and potentially more devastating problem, and so he went to his uncle Mather to sort things out.

It is as I feared, Uncle Mather he began when the image appeared to him in the mirror in the near dark gloom. The rivalry with Roger Lockless heads toward disaster. Just this morning he came into the camp at the head of fifteen people, prisoners of the powries whom he had freed the previous night. Of course we all rejoiced at their appearance, but in speaking with them afterward, I came to understand just how great a chance Roger had taken, with his life and with theirs, in going after them. For though we all desire to relieve the powries of their every prisoner there seemed to be no pressing need for such a desperate act at this time. The prisoners were safe enough, by all indications, for the moment at least, and we might have formulated a wider-reaching plan that would have facilitated not only their escape, but the downfall of Kos-kosio Begulne and his evil brethren, as well.

But I understand what drove Roger into the town last night, and so does Pony. By his erroneous thinking, he has lost his rank among his people. Where they used to look to him, he sees them looking to me.

The ranger paused and contemplated that meeting when Roger had first returned. He considered the man’s bluster, the way Roger puffed out his chest when he spoke, the way he looked, particularly at Pony, when he recounted his daring efforts. “Pony,” Elbryan said with a great sigh.

He looked back to the mirror, to the perceived ghostly image within its edges. Pony, he repeated. Roger has taken a fancy to her. Or perhaps he merely views her responses as the greatest indicator of his worth. Pony is my partner as all know well, and if he can win her approval, then perhaps he believes they all will rank him above me.

With the realization of Roger’s “crush” on Pony, the ranger saw just how dangerous the situation might soon become. Roger, with his obvious talents, could be an incredibly valuable addition to their group, but with his immaturity, he might bring disaster upon them all.

“He and I will fight,” Elbryan said quietly, aloud. “I fear it will come to that.”

The ranger left the room soon after, to see that night had come in, the fires of the encampment burning brightly not far away. He approached at once, and was accosted by loud voices before he drew near.

“We should strike at them,” Tomas Gingerwart, full of fire, argued. “And hard! Drive them from our lands and back to their dark mountain holes.”

Elbryan came into the ring of firelight to see most heads nodding agreement with Tomas’ assessment. He noted Pony, sitting to the side of Tomas, a distressed look on her face.

All the talk paused then, in deference to the ranger, all eyes turning his way, as if awaiting his judgment. As soon as Elbryan and Tomas locked stares, they both understood that they would be on opposite sides of the debate.

“They are without prisoners,” Tomas said. “The time to strike is upon us.”

Elbryan paused for a long while, truly sympathizing with the man, remembering his own feelings, that desperate need for revenge when his home of Dundalis had been burned to the ground. “I understand—” he started to say.

“Then put the warriors in line,” Tomas growled back at him, a response echoed many times over throughout the group.

“Yet I fear that you underestimate the strength of our enemies,” the ranger went on calmly. “How many of us, of our friends, will die in such a raid?”

“Worth it,” cried one man, “if Caer Tinella is freed!”

“And Landsdown!” cried another, a woman from that more southern settlement.

“And if they are not?” the ranger calmly asked. “If, as I fear, we are repelled, slaughtered on the field?”

“What then for those who cannot fight?” Pony added, and that simple logic, that reminder of the larger responsibility, defeated many retorts.

Still, the argument went on and on, and ended out of exhaustion and not agreement. Elbryan and his side could claim a minor victory, though, for no battle plans were yet being drawn. They were all excited now, the ranger realized, about the arrival of three new powerful allies, the victory in the forest fight, the safe return of Roger Lockless, and Roger’s subsequent stealing of the rest of Kos-kosio’s prisoners. Now, in the security of these new developments, the folk dared to think of reclaiming their homes and punishing the murderous thieves who had come to Caer Tinella and Landsdown. Hopefully, as things settled down once more, logic would replace emotion.

Pony understood and agreed with the rationale, and so she was quite surprised later on, when she and Elbryan met with Juraviel in a pine grove some distance to the south of the encampment, and the ranger announced, “The time to strike hard at our enemy is upon us.”

“You just argued against such a course,” the woman retorted.

“Our enemies are wounded and disorganized,” Elbryan went on, “and a furious attack upon them now might send them running.”

“Might,” Juraviel echoed grimly. “And it might cost us many of our warriors.”

“Our entire existence is a risk,” the ranger replied.

“Perhaps we should consider sending those too infirm to fight to the south, to Palmaris, before we plan an attack on Caer Tinella and Landsdown,” the elf reasoned. “We might even find allies in the southern cities.”

“We have allies in the southern cities,” said Elbryan. “But they are concerned for their own borders, and rightly so. No, if we can hit Kos-kosio Begulne hard now and drive him from the towns—”

“That we might hold them?” the elf put in sarcastically, for the mere thought of their ragtag band holding a defensible position was ludicrous.

Elbryan put his head down and sighed deeply. He knew that Juraviel was playing a vital advocate role here, more to help him see through his formulating ideas and work out the finer points than to discourage him, but talking to the Touel’alfar and their pragmatic, if stilted, way of looking at the world was always a bit discouraging to one who saw the world through human eyes. Juraviel didn’t understand the level of frustration in Tomas and the others, didn’t understand how dangerous that frustration might soon become.

“If we drive Kos-kosio Begulne and his powries from the two towns,” the ranger began slowly, deliberately, “it is possible, even likely, that many of their allies will desert the dangerous powries, perhaps even abandon the war altogether. Neither goblins nor giants have any love for powries—they hate the dwarves at least as much as they hate humans—and it is only the strength of the powrie leader, I believe, that is now binding them into a singular force. And even though giants and goblins have been known to ally in the past, there has never been a great fondness between them, by any reports. Giants have been said to eat goblins on occasion. So let us discredit this powrie leader, this binding force, and see what may transpire.”

Now it was Juraviel’s turn to sigh. “Always are you looking for the greatest possible advantage,” he said quietly, his tone edged with resignation. “Always pushing yourself and those around you to the very limits.”

A wounded Elbryan looked at the elf curiously, surprised that Juraviel would criticize him so.

“Of course,” the elf went on, perking up and a sly smile widening on his angular face, “that is exactly what the Touel’alfar taught you to do!”

“We are agreed, then?” Elbryan asked anxiously.

“I did not say that,” Juraviel replied.

Elbryan gave a frustrated growl. “If we do not hit at them, if we do not take advantage of our advantage—and it will prove a fleeting thing, I believe—then we will likely find ourselves in exactly the same desperate situation we just wriggled our way out of. Kos-kosio Begulne will regroup and reinforce and come back at us, forcing another fight in the forest, and sooner or later one of those battles will turn against us. The powrie leader is outraged, no doubt, by the defeat in the forest and the loss of his prisoners.”

“He might even suspect that Nightbird has come to the region,” Pony added, drawing curious looks from the elf and the ranger.

“I remember the name, and so do you, if you pause long enough to think about it,” Pony explained. “Kos-kosio Begulne remembers us from Dundalis.”

Juraviel nodded, recalling the ambush the monsters had once set for Nightbird, destroying a pine vale that the ranger dearly loved to draw him out of the forest. That ambush had been turned back against the monsters, though, like every tack they took against the ranger and his cunning and powerful friends.

“It is even possible that the monkish caravan which Roger spoke of was running from something,” Elbryan went on.

“We could use our temporary advantage to slip around the towns and flee to the south,” Juraviel reasoned. He did not miss the look, almost one of alarm, that passed between Pony and Elbryan at that notion.

“What else?” the elf asked bluntly.

“Anything that would make the monks, with their powerful magic, flee so, must be a considerable force,” Pony put in, but she was far from convincing to the perceptive elf.

“Still more rationale that we should simply flee to the south, as did the monks,” Juraviel pressed. He noted again the look between his companions. “What else?” he asked again. “There is something more to the passage of the monks. I know you too well, Nightbird.”

Elbryan laughed in concession to that point. “Pony and I cannot remain in the area,” he admitted. “Nor would we dare to go south.”

“Brother Avelyn’s stones,” Juraviel said.

“It might be that the monks Roger spoke of were looking for us,” said Pony. “Or at least looking for the stones that I hold in my possession. When Brother Justice was searching for Avelyn, he used this stone,” she explained, fishing a red garnet out of her pouch and holding it up for Juraviel to see. “This stone detects the use of magic, thus Avelyn’s conjuring powers led Brother Justice right to him.”

“And you feel that your use of magic has put the monks on your trail,” Juraviel reasoned.

Pony nodded. “It is possible, and too important for us to take any chances.”

“The last act of Brother Avelyn’s life was to entrust us with the sacred stones,” Elbryan put in determinedly. “We will not fail him in this.”

“Then perhaps the three of us should be on our way now,” Juraviel said. “Are these stones, then, more important than the refugees we now lead?”

Elbryan looked to Pony, but she had no answers for him. “In the measure of history, they may well be,” the ranger said.

A noise from the brush, a gurgling, angry sound, brought all three on their guard. Juraviel moved fast, lifting his bow as he disappeared into the flora, then returning a moment later, a furious Roger Lockless beside him.

“You are naming rocks as more important than the people you pretend to lead!” the young man fumed. As he spoke he moved farther from Juraviel, obviously not comfortable near the diminutive creature.

“You need not fear him,” Pony remarked dryly, thinking it ridiculous that Roger would act so skittish around one of the two who had rescued him from Kos-kosio Begulne’s cruel grasp. She recognized that the young man’s hesitance to embrace Juraviel was wrought of more than fear. “Belli’mar Juraviel, indeed all the Touel’alfar, are allies.”

“So I’ve come to understand your meaning of the word,” Roger snapped at her.

Pony started to respond, but Elbryan stepped in front of her. “As I was explaining,” he said evenly, staring hard at the young man, “these stones are as vital—”

“More vital, you said,” Roger interrupted.

“Do not underestimate their importance!” Elbryan yelled right back in his face. The ranger noted Juraviel’s disapproving expression then and calmed himself down. “The stones represent much more than even the great power stored within them,” Elbryan went on, his voice controlled and even. “They may well be more important than my life, or Pony’s, or yours, or the lives of all the people of our band.”

“Those are your foolish thoughts—” Roger started to yell back, but Elbryan cut him short with an upraised hand, a movement so quick and so forceful that the end of the young man’s sentence came out as a startled gurgle.

“However,” the ranger went on calmly, “having said all of that, and truly believing it, I cannot leave this situation as I have found it. I must get these people to the safety of the southland, or at least make certain that the road there is clear ahead of them.”

“You name yourself as leader,” Roger accused.

“Thus you wish to strike, and strike hard, against Kos-kosio Begulne,” Juraviel reasoned, ignoring the petty turn of Roger’s argument. “If we hit them hard in the two towns and scatter them to the forest, the whole of this band can flee south in relative safety, without Nightbird guiding them.”

“For there, Nightbird would not be wise to go,” said Pony. “And yet,” she added, looking squarely at her lover, “you just argued against that very course.”

“I did,” Elbryan agreed. “And I still do argue against a fight that will send all of the warriors, even the majority of them, against the towns.”

Pony started to ask what he might be talking about, but then she caught on. Elbryan had just gone into Caer Tinella to rescue Roger, and so now he was thinking of going back, with just his most powerful friends about him, and tilting the balance of power.

Juraviel, also catching on, nodded. “I will go into Caer Tinella this night and gather information,” he agreed.

“I can go,” said Roger.

“Juraviel is better suited to the task,” Elbryan was quick to respond.

“Have you forgotten that I was in Caer Tinella just two nights ago?” Roger protested. “That I returned with the prisoners?”

The other three watched him closely, noting how he emphasized that personal pronoun.

“If the prisoners were still in there, you could not even think of attacking the town!” Roger finished.

Elbryan nodded, conceding the point. Roger’s action had indeed set the stage for this possible strike. But still, especially after speaking with the freed prisoners and hearing of their desperate run through the dark forest, Elbryan remained convinced that Belli’mar Juraviel was better suited for the task. Juraviel had told him that one hound, at least, might still be alive, and if that creature had come forth on the trail, none of them, not Roger nor the prisoners, would have likely returned. “Juraviel is the choice,” the ranger said calmly.

Pony noted the young man’s expression and realized that Elbryan had just further compromised Roger’s standing and hurt his inflated pride.

“Can you fly from treetop to treetop when the hounds sniff your trail?” Elbryan asked bluntly before Roger could begin to protest.

Roger chewed his bottom lip; both Elbryan and Pony thought he would strike out at the ranger. He only stamped his foot, though, and turned to leave.

“Stop!” Pony cried, surprising all three. She was coming to understand Roger, and while she did not dislike him, she recognized that he was young and too full of pride and self-importance for his own good.

Roger spun about, eyes wide and blazing with anger.

Pony took out a gemstone, carefully concealing it in her hand so he could not see it clearly, and walked up before him. “What you have overheard is private,” she explained.

“Now you deign to order me?” Roger asked incredulously. “Are you my queen, then? Should I kneel?”

“You should be wise enough, even at your age and with your lack of experience, to recognize friend from enemy,” Pony scolded. She wanted to go on, laying bare to Roger his shortcomings concerning their relationship, but she realized that such lessons must be truly learned, and not explained, to be fully appreciated. “Yet I see that you cannot, that for some reason you have decided that we are not your friends. So be it.”

The woman reached into another pouch, and Roger backed off a step. Not far enough, though, for Pony’s hand came out and up fast, and with a yellow-hued weed she marked an X on Roger’s forehead. Then she lifted her hand with the gem before him and spoke a series of phrases that sounded very much like some ancient incantation.

“What have you done to me?” Roger demanded, nearly falling over as he continued his retreat.

“I have done nothing to you unless you betray us,” Pony replied calmly.

Roger’s face screwed up with confusion. “I owe you nothing,” he said.

“As I owe you nothing,” Pony replied sternly. “Thus I have just evened our relationship once again. In your eavesdropping, you heard things which do not concern you, and as such, it is your responsibility to forget them.”

Roger had no answer, other than to shake his head.

“Or to remain silent on the issue, at the very least,” Pony went on. “However, if you cannot, you will find a most unpleasant consequence.”

“What are you talking about?” Roger asked, and when Pony smiled wickedly, the young man looked past her to speak to Elbryan. “What has she done to me?” he demanded.

Elbryan honestly didn’t know, and so his shrug was sincere.

“Tell me!” Roger yelled in Pony’s face.

Elbryan closed his eyes as Roger started to reach up for Pony, fully expecting that his love would knock the foolish little man out cold. Roger, though, did not carry through with the movement, and simply stood before Pony, fists clenched in frustration.

“I have put a curse on you,” Pony said quietly. “But a curse with a contingency.”

“What do you mean?” he asked, his angry tone showing a hint of fear.

“I mean that as long as you do the right thing and remain silent about that which you should not know, nothing ill will befall you,” the woman calmly explained. Her expression changed abruptly, grew dark and ominous, and she closed the distance between herself and Roger and rose up tall and terrible on her toes, towering over the small man. “Betray us,” she warned in a voice so grave that it raised the hairs on the back of Elbryan’s neck, and sent shivers through Roger’s body, “and the magic I have put on you will melt the brains in your head so that they will flow out of your ears.”

Roger’s eyes widened. He knew little of magic, but those displays he had seen were certainly impressive enough for him to believe that the woman was capable of carrying out her threat. He stumbled backward, nearly fell over, turned and ran away.

“Pony!” Elbryan scolded. “How could you do such—”

“I did nothing except mark his forehead with dandelion,” the woman replied. “I’ve done as much to your chin in the buttercup game we played as children.”

“Then—” Elbryan stopped and chuckled, somewhat surprised by his companion.

“Was that really necessary?” Belli’mar Juraviel asked dryly.

Pony’s expression was dead serious as she nodded in response. “He would have betrayed us to the others,” she explained. “And I do not wish it to become public knowledge that we two are outlaws in the eyes of the Abellican Church.”

“And is our secret so terrible?” Elbryan put in. “I learned long ago to trust these people.”

“Like Tol Yuganick?” Pony retorted, referring to a man who had betrayed her and Elbryan and all the folk of Dundalis before the journey to Aida.

Elbryan had no answer to that, but Pony, recognizing that her cynicism had stung her lover, continued. “I, too, trust Belster and Tomas and all the others,” she admitted. “But Roger would have told the story in a way to bolster himself, and that, I fear, might have put us in an unfavorable light. Who knows what tales might then be spun when the folk are safely in Palmaris?”

Elbryan, who was also beginning to understand Roger Lockless, couldn’t disagree with that.

“You did well,” Juraviel decided. “The time is too critical for us to take such a chance. Young Roger may have had difficulty recognizing the right course, but I think that you painted for him a fairly clear signpost.”

Elbryan snorted. “And here I was for all my life believing that morality was somehow tied to conscience.”

“And so it is,” Pony replied.

“Ideally,” Juraviel added. “But do not underestimate the power of fear. Your own Church has used the threat of an afterlife in fiery brimstone to keep its congregation in line for more than a thousand years.”

“Not my Church,” Elbryan replied. “Not the Church that Avelyn espoused.”

“No, the Church that pursued the renegade monk, as much to silence his radical ideals as to retrieve the gemstones, do not doubt,” Juraviel replied without hesitation.

Elbryan looked to Pony, to find her nodding her assent with the elf’s every word. He gave a chuckle, unable to argue the point. “The Church that pursues Pony and me,” he remarked.

“The monks that came through were heading south—and quickly, so Roger said,” Pony put in. “I have used the garnet, but can detect no magic in the area, so I assume that Roger’s guess about their speed was correct.”

“I hope that they continued right past Palmaris,” Elbryan added. “But in any case, our time here is limited. I hope to make the most of it”

“Caer Tinella and Landsdown,” Belli’mar Juraviel said.

Elbryan’s face was dead serious, even grim, as he nodded and gave his reply. “We will meet with you back here at dusk, perhaps to attack before the next dawn.”

“As you wish, my friend,” the elf said. “I am off to scout out the towns, then. Prepare the attack—and do reconcile, a bit at least, with Roger Lockless. He has done great things for these people, to hear Belster O’Comely speak, and I would guess that he has great things ahead of him, if he does not let his pride hinder him.”

“We will take care of Roger,” Pony answered.

“Paint the signpost clearly,” Juraviel said with a laugh and a snap of his fingers, and then he was gone, disappearing into the underbrush so completely that Pony blinked and rubbed her eyes, wondering if they had deceived her. Elbryan, though, more accustomed to the Touel’alfar, and more knowledgeable in the ways of the forest, was not surprised.

“It is him,” Kos-kosio Begulne insisted. “I’m knowin’ ’is ways, the bastard!”

Maiyer Dek pondered the words for a long time, as he always did when speaking of anything even remotely important. The huge fomorian was quite impressive for one of his race, both physically and mentally. Though not as sharp-witted as his powrie peer, not even as wise as Gothra, who had ruled the goblins, Maiyer Dek understood his shortcomings and so took his time, examining everything slowly and deliberately.

The giant’s silence did little for the anxious Kos-kosio Begulne’s already foul mood. The powrie paced the floor of the great barn, picking his nose with one hand, the other slapping repeatedly against his hip.

“There might be other humans like Nightbird,” the giant offered. Kos-kosio Begulne snorted at the notion. “If that’s so, then we’d’ve been kicked all the way back to Aida by this time!”

“One other, then,” the giant replied.

“I’m hopin’ not,” the powrie answered. “And I’m thinkin’ not. This one be him. I can smell the bastard. It’s Nightbird come a’calling, don’t ye doubt. So are ye to give me yer prisoners, or aren’t ye?”

Again Maiyer Dek went into a long, drawn-out consideration. He and the other three giants who had accompanied him had just returned from the southland, where they had waged a huge battle against the Kingsmen, just to the west of Palmaris. Many giants had died in the fight, and many more humans, and Maiyer Dek and his surviving cohorts had taken a host of men prisoner. “Traveling foodstuffs,” the giant leader called them, and indeed, ten of the two-score men they had taken were eaten by the time the cruel fomorians got to Caer Tinella. Now Kos-kosio Begulne wanted the remaining thirty as bait for the Nightbird, and in truth, Maiyer Dek wasn’t overly fond of human flesh. But still, the giant remembered vividly the disastrous battle in the pine vale the last time he and his fellow leaders had baited this man called Nightbird. Did Kos-kosio Begulne really want to bring him in?

“Ye got to give ’em to me,” Kos-kosio Begulne said suddenly. “We got to settle with Nightbird now, afore half the force leaves us. Already the goblins’re rumbling about going home, and me own folks long for the Weathered Isles.”

“So go, all of us,” replied the giant, who had never been too keen on coming south to Honce-the-Bear in the first place. Before the dactyl had awakened, Maiyer Dek had enjoyed a comfortable existence in the mountains north of the Barbacan, with a tribe of fourscore giants—including twenty females for his whims—and plenty of goblins about for good hunting and better eating.

“Not yet,” the powrie retorted sharply. “Not until the damned Nightbird’s paid for our troubles.”

“You never even liked Ulg Tik’narn,” the giant said without even his customary pause.

“Not the point!” Kos-kosio Begulne shot back. “He was a powrie leader, and a good one! Nightbird killed ’im, so I’m meaning to kill Nightbird.”

“Then we go?”

“Then we go,” the powrie agreed. “And once we’re past the human lands, me and me folk’ll not protect the goblin scum from yer belly.”

That was all Maiyer Dek needed to hear.

By the time Juraviel returned from the towns, Elbryan and Pony had the folk in full agreement with delaying the attack—a difficult proposition given the success of the fight in the woods and the return of Roger and the other prisoners. All of the folk were eager to be done with this adventure, to be sitting in a comfortable common room exaggerating their fireside tales, and if going through Caer Tinella and Landsdown meant they might soon be in the safety of Palmaris, then they were more than ready for the fight.

Pony was still with them, working out details should the attack on Caer Tinella or Landsdown commence, when Elbryan returned to the pine grove.

As soon as the ranger saw Juraviel come down from the tree, he knew something was wrong.

“They have fortified,” the ranger reasoned.

“Indeed,” Juraviel answered with a nod of his head. “There are three new scout towers about the edge of the town, north, southwest, and southeast, and an impromptu barricade has been erected about the whole of the place, a barrier of barrels, torn walls, anything they could find. It seems solid enough, standing near to the height of a man, but not too thick.”

“Enough to slow down a charge,” the ranger said.

“Perhaps a bit,” Juraviel admitted, though he was not too concerned or impressed with the fortification. “Still, with the new ally that has arrived, I doubt that they feel the need to fortify.”

“Another group of powries?” Elbryan asked.

“Giants,” Juraviel replied. “Including the biggest and ugliest of those big and ugly brutes I have ever seen. Maiyer Dek, he is called, and even the powries, even Kos-kosio Begulne himself, gives him great respect. His armor is special, I fear, perhaps even magical, for it seems almost to have an inner fire.”

Elbryan nodded; he had battled with giants similarly outfitted—and he remembered the name of Maiyer Dek from the Timberlands. The armor was earth magic, forged by the demon dactyl for its elite soldiers.

“We cannot allow these people to go against Caer Tinella,” the elf went on. “We might skirt the town in the dark of night, or we might hit at Landsdown, whose garrison does not seem as formidable. But to send these people, untrained warriors all, against giants, particularly this new monstrosity, would be folly. Even your own plans to do battle pose a great risk.”

Elbryan had no argument against the simple logic. He had fought enough giants to understand the possibility for complete catastrophe. “If we flee around the towns, they will likely catch our trail,” he reasoned. “We would never get all the way to Palmaris ahead of them.”

“A wider berth, then?” the elf asked, but he suspected that the ranger wouldn’t be easy to convince.

“We can send them,” Elbryan replied tentatively.

“But you still wish to go to the town and wage your fight,” Juraviel reasoned.

“If this giant, Maiyer Dek, is as powerful and as revered as you indicate, perhaps he and I should speak,” the ranger explained.

“Speak?” Juraviel echoed doubtfully.

“With weapons,” Elbryan clarified. “How great a blow do you suppose it will prove to our enemies if Maiyer Dek and Kos-kosio Begulne are both slain?”

“Great indeed,” the elf admitted. “I do not know what holds the giants and goblins together with each other and even more so with the powries, if not the strong leadership of those two. But still, think wisely, my friend. It will be no easy task to even get to the giant and powrie leaders, and even if you can, even if you somehow find a way to fight them without their minions swarming over you, you may find yourself overmatched. Turn your own question about: What will the refugees do without Nightbird to lead them?”

“They did well enough without Nightbird to lead them until very recently,” the ranger reminded. “And they will have Juraviel.”

“Whose business this is not!”

“Who chose to come to the aid of the humans,” Elbryan replied with a wry grin.

“Who chose to follow his protégé, Nightbird, to make sure the young man did not act foolishly,” the elf corrected, smiling widely; and Elbryan knew from that smile that he had Juraviel on his side. “I have too many years invested in your training—and you carry an elven sword and a bow made by my own father—to let you get yourself killed.”

“Some call it foolish, others daring,” the ranger said.

“Or perhaps they are one and the same,” Juraviel put in.

Elbryan clapped the elf on the shoulder, and both were still laughing when Pony moved through the pine grove to join them.

“The news from the towns is good, then?” she reasoned.

“No,” both Elbryan and Juraviel said in unison.

Pony rocked back on her heels, caught by surprise, given their jovial attitudes.

“We were just discussing the folly of your Elbryan’s intentions,” Juraviel explained. “To walk into the middle of an enemy encampment and slay both their leaders, though one is a powrie, as tough and stubborn a creature as ever lived, and the other a huge and mighty giant.”

“And you find this amusing?” Pony asked Elbryan.

“Of course.”

The woman nodded, and sincerely wondered if the stress of their existence was finally getting to her companion.

“I’ll not walk right in,” the ranger corrected, staring hard at the elf. “I will sneak, of course, quiet as a shadow, uninvited as death.”

“And dead as a piece of wood,” Juraviel finished, and both started laughing again.

Pony, who understood that there was a measure of truth beneath their levity, was not amused. “Enough foolishness,” she scolded. “You have a hundred warriors pacing anxiously, wondering if they will die this night, awaiting your decree.”

“And my decree—which I will insist upon—is that they stand down,” Elbryan said, his tone serious.

“I am not certain they will listen,” Pony admitted, for in the time the ranger had been away, the talk had again reached a fever pitch, in favor of driving the monsters far away.

“We cannot attack the towns,” the ranger explained, “for the powries have found more giant allies, including one attired in the earth magic armor of the dactyl.”

Pony sighed deeply and hoped that the folk would listen. She remembered that armor from the fight at the Barbacan, and knew that any of the refugees who came against this new ally would fall quickly. She looked to Elbryan and recognized the dangerous expression on his face.

“We need only explain that they must wait another day or two for the fight, until we can discern the power of our new enemies,” Elbryan reasoned.

“But you still plan to go in, and fight, this very night,” Pony stated.

“I wish to find a way to destroy this giant, and Kos-kosio Begulne,” Elbryan admitted. “It would be a great blow to our enemies, and might cause enough confusion for us to scatter the remaining monsters and get these people to Palmaris.”

“Then let us discern how we might accomplish this task,” Pony said calmly, moving before Juraviel and bending low. She took up a stick, handed it to the elf, and cleared away the pine needles from the ground before her. “A map, to start,” she instructed.

Juraviel looked to Elbryan, both surprised that Pony, usually more conservative than the ranger, had so easily agreed, given the new monsters in town. And Juraviel wondered, too, if this turn of events had changed Elbryan’s thinking. Did he still mean to include his love on so dangerous a mission?

The ranger nodded, his expression grim, in answer to that unspoken question. He and Pony had been through too much together for him to even think of excluding her from this important fight. While he had intended to keep Juraviel out of it—an elf’s diminutive weapons were not much use against a giant, after all—he had planned all along to execute the attack with Pony beside him.

The daylight was fast fading by that time, so Pony took out her diamond and brought forth a minor globe of light. In a short while Juraviel had the town of Caer Tinella mapped out.

“I cannot be certain where Kos-kosio Begulne will be,” the elf explained. “But there are only three buildings high enough to hold a giant” He tapped each in turn on the map. “Barns,” he explained. “And this one is the most likely for the giant leader.” His pointer settled on the marker for a large structure near the center of town.

“They had no organized defense, as far as I could tell,” the elf went on. “Other than the barricades and a few posted sentries.”

“Powries are usually prepared,” Pony said. “More likely, their defenses are well-concealed.”

“But this group has had little trouble of late,” Juraviel replied.

“Except for the fight in the forest,” said Elbryan.

“And the theft of prisoners,” Pony added.

“But no real attacks against the town,” the elf explained. “And I doubt they’ll expect one, with the fomorian giants so visible to any who think to attack.”

“But with Roger, who has shown his ability to get into town at will, gone from their grasp, the ring about the leaders, particularly Kos-kosio Begulne, might be tight,” Pony reasoned.

“And that is precisely where I intend to go,” Elbryan added.

“No easy task,” Juraviel said.

“It never is,” the ranger replied.

“But you intend to go anyway,” the elf remarked.

Elbryan looked to Pony. “This very night,” he explained. “I will seek out Belster and Tomas Gingerwart first and tell them of our plans, and of what they should do, depending on whether Pony and I succeed or not”

“And my role?” the elf asked.

“You will serve as my liaison to Belster.” Elbryan explained. “You will learn quickly the outcome of the fight, no doubt, and the sooner Belster is informed, the better he will be able to react.”

Juraviel spent a long while staring hard at Elbryan, at the man who had earned the title of Nightbird from the Touel’alfar. The elf felt that doubting Tuntun was with him then, admitting wholeheartedly that she had been wrong in her initial assessment of Elbryan Wyndon, the “blood of Mather,” as she had so often sarcastically referred to him. Tuntun had never thought that Elbryan would make the grade as a ranger, had thought him stupid and uncoordinated. She had learned differently, though, so much so that she willingly gave her life to save the young man—and elves were not often altruistic toward humans! And if she were here now, Juraviel knew, to witness the calm determination and sincere sense of duty with which Elbryan was approaching this incredibly dangerous fight, she might well call him “blood of Mather” once again, but this time with sincere affection.

“Your role in this battle will be with the stones alone,” Elbryan said to Pony as they made their slow way toward Caer Tinella. Belster and Tomas had agreed that the battle should be delayed while more information was gathered, but did not know that the ranger meant to wage it on his own.

Pony eyed him skeptically. “I have been training hard,” she replied.

“And well.”

“But you do not trust me to fight with sword?”

Elbryan was shaking his head before she finished. “You are between fighting styles,” he explained. “Your head tells you the next proper move, but your body is still trained in the other style. Will you lunge or slash? And in the moment it takes you to decide, an enemy weapon will find you.”

Pony bit her lip, trying to find some logical response. She could do the sword-dance quite well now, but that was in slower motion than she would find in a real fight. At the end of every session, when Elbryan speeded up the process, she could not keep up, caught, as he had said, between her thoughts and her muscle memory.

“Soon enough,” Elbryan promised her. “Until then, you remain most effective with the stones alone.”

Pony didn’t argue.

The pair came upon Juraviel on a hillock overlooking Caer Tinella from the northeast, the high vantage point affording them a view of all the town. It appeared remarkably as Juraviel had described it, the new barricades wrapping all the central structures, but all three found their gazes locked to a huge bonfire burning in the southeastern corner, all the way to the other side.

“I will investigate it,” the elf volunteered.

Elbryan nodded and looked to Pony. “Find them with the soul stone,” he said to her, and then to Juraviel added, “If Kos-kosio Begulne and Maiyer Dek are in the barn, then that is where Pony and I will go. You watch our progress into the town, then return here to gather Symphony, for I suspect that I’ll leave the horse behind. And then you need only wait and watch.”

“You wait,” Juraviel corrected, his tone showing that he did not intend to be dissuaded. “There is nothing ordinary about that bonfire; you would do well to let me discern its meaning before you go into the town.”

“We may only get one chance at these two,” Pony said to Elbryan, nodding her agreement with Juraviel’s assessment “Let us make certain that the time is right.”

“Be quick, then,” anxious Elbryan said to them both.

Before Juraviel could respond, the quiet of night was stolen by a call from the town.

“Another to the flames!” came the thunderous roar, a giant’s voice. “Are you watching, Nightbird? Do you see the men dying because of you?”

All three peered into the distance, focusing on the flames. They saw the silhouettes of three forms, two powries and a man, they seemed, and watched in horror as the man was thrown onto the burning pyre.

His agonized screams rent the air.

Elbryan let out an angry growl, reached around and pulled Pony down from the horse and in the same fluid movement had his bow in hand.

“No, ranger!” Juraviel said to him. “That is exactly what they want!”

“What they think they want,” the ranger retorted. “Lead me with your arrows, straight for the wall!” He drove his heels hard into Symphony’s sides and the great stallion leaped away, thundering down the hillock, charging for the town. Juraviel sped off in pursuit, half running, half flying, and Pony changed gemstones, putting her hematite away.

Nightbird came out of the cover of the trees in full gallop, crossing the small field before the impromptu wall, Hawkwing up and ready. His first arrow took an unsuspecting goblin in the side of the head, throwing the creature right over. His second got another goblin in the chest just as it lifted its arm to throw a spear.

But his element of surprise was gone, and now the wall teemed with enemies, goblins and powries. Roaring, too angry and too desperate to consider a different course, the ranger bent low over Symphony’s neck, spurring the great horse on.

Then both horse and rider stumbled, Symphony nearly going down as a blast of lightning thundered right beside them, smashing into the barricade, splintering wood, throwing goblins and powries all about.

The ranger and his steed recovered quickly, with little momentum lost. Back in full stride, churning the turf, the powerful stallion leaped the six-foot barrier, soaring over the dead and stunned monsters, hitting the ground in a dead run. Arrows buzzed past the ranger as he cut the horse in a tight turn, charging between two buildings. He cut another fast corner, seeing still more enemies rising before him. Down an alley, he broke out into the town square, but turned on his heel again, for the place was swarming with powries, and sped down yet another alleyway.

As he neared one low roof, Nightbird slung Hawkwing over his shoulder, drew out Tempest, and climbed to a standing position, legs far apart and bent for balance. Through the turquoise stone set in the horse’s chest, he communicated with Symphony, bidding the horse to keep a steady run and move in close to the building on their right-hand side.

A goblin was just rising as Nightbird came in. Tempest’s slash nearly decapitated it, and the ranger was quick to withdraw the sword, yanking it free, then stabbing back out, nailing a second goblin under the chin.

Nightbird dropped back to a sitting position, slid Tempest between thigh and saddle and readied his bow once more, firing as he rode. A powrie leaped out in his path, another on the roof to the left. Nightbird focused on the higher target, driving an arrow into its chest even as it launched a spear his way. Symphony took care of the powrie on the ground, running the dwarf down, nearly stumbling, but holding strong.

Nightbird managed to get his bow across to partially deflect the well-aimed spear, and that defensive movement surely saved his life, though the spear struck home anyway, a grazing hit across the shoulder. It hooked his shirt as the fabric tore away, and with a growl Nightbird reached around and pulled it free, thinking to drop it.

He tucked it under his arm instead, lancelike, as he bore down on an open doorway, a powrie charging out to meet him. Up came the powrie’s shield, but not quick enough, and the spear tip glided over the top, catching the screaming dwarf right in the mouth, bashing in its teeth, then sinking deeper, right out the back of the head and into the wood of the doorjamb.

Nightbird let go of the weapon and had not even the time to look back and regard his work.

The powrie, stuck in a standing position, twitched repeatedly as it died.

Nightbird cut a fast corner, then another, angling for the northeastern edge of town. Around yet another bend, he found himself in trouble, for there, blocking the path before him, stood a pair of giants, behemoths no single arrow would fell and that Symphony could not hope to run down.

By the time Juraviel got to the battered barricade, it was clear of monsters, for those few that had survived the ranger’s charge and Pony’s blast were scattered to the streets of Caer Tinella, chasing Symphony’s swift and elusive run. A flutter of his wings sent Juraviel over the wall, to the roof of one of the buildings it connected at this juncture. Across the way stood a goblin, leaping up and down and shouting directions to its comrades on the ground as it spotted the rushing rider.

Juraviel crept up to within five paces, bow in hand. He went down to one knee to better angle the shot, and his arrow caught the goblin right under the base of its skull, driving upward. The creature flipped from the edge of the roof and landed hard on its back, quite dead, in the street.

A movement from behind sent the elf in a spin, another arrow ready to fly. He held the shot, and luckily so, for the form scrambling over the edge of the roof was not that of a goblin or powrie, but of a man, slight of build and climbing nimbly.

“What are you doing here?” the elf whispered as Roger came up to crouch beside him.

“A question I could also be asking you,” the young man answered. His gaze focused on the line of prisoners. “There must be thirty of them,” he said, and he started at once for the southeastern corner of the roof.

Juraviel let him go and did not follow. The more angles from which they struck out at the monsters, the more confusion they would likely cause, and that confusion might be the only thing that would allow foolish Nightbird to get out of this place alive!

Fluttering wings brought the elf silently to another rooftop, farther into the town and more to the north, and from there he found many opportunities. Off went his arrows, one, two, three, hitting powrie and giant, and yet another powrie on the other side, killing none—though his last arrow had hurt the dwarf badly—but bringing screams of outrage and taking the focus, for these nearby groups at least, off his friend. Monsters closed on the building from every direction.

Juraviel went straight up, into the darkness of night, angling his flight slightly so he landed on yet another building. Then he ran to the far edge of that roof, put an arrow into an unsuspecting goblin for good measure, then fluttered off to yet another building, the large central barn.

In his wake he left monsters screaming and howling, and no longer believing that the ranger had come into the town alone.

Symphony’s hooves sent dirt flying wide as the horse angled hard, the ranger trying to pass the giants on the right side. The closest behemoth raised its club, but the ranger was quicker, sliding Tempest back in hand and slashing across, catching the giant’s uplifted arm right below the elbow.

The giant roared in pain and could not finish the attack, and so Nightbird and his horse rushed past and seemed to break clear.

But then yet another giant stepped out to block the path, and the trail was narrower up ahead, giving the ranger nowhere to run. He dropped Tempest across his lap and went back to Hawkwing, fitting an arrow and leveling the bow in the blink of an eye.

He would only get one shot.

He had to be perfect.

The arrow, fired from barely fifteen feet away, got the giant right in the eye, and how it howled! It clutched at its face and spun halfway about, shrieking and screaming.

“Run on!” Nightbird commanded the horse. Out flashed Tempest; the ranger tightened his legs about the powerful stallion, and Symphony, understanding Nightbird’s commands, understanding the desperation of the situation, willingly obliged and never slowed, hitting the behemoth in full gallop.

The ranger got a strike in at the same moment, his sword slashing hard at the side of the tumbling giant’s neck. Down the brute went, and Symphony, stunned, held his balance, Nightbird tugging hard to turn the horse about as the other two came in.

“Keep this one out of the fight,” the ranger bade Symphony, and then he tossed his sword to the ground and took up his bow, diving into a roll from the horse’s back, fitting an arrow as he went and letting fly as he came rolling around back to his feet. The missile drove deep into a giant shoulder, but the behemoth seemed hardly to notice it.

The ranger conjured images of the poor prisoners on the other side of the town, men being roasted alive on the powrie bonfires, and from those scenes he drew rage, and from his rage he drew strength. He reached out for Tempest, and the magical blade, hearing his silent call, flew to his hand and flared with inner power. Nightbird, too focused to even notice the spectacle of his sword, charged straight ahead.

His attack surprised the giants, enough for the ranger to slide in on one knee, ducking beneath the sidelong swipe of one brute. Out flashed his sword, smacking off the behemoth’s kneecap, and as the creature instinctively lifted its leg to grab at the wound, the ranger ran forward, right under the upraised heavy boot, diving past the other leg, out of reach of the second behemoth as it came around the first for a swing.

Nightbird pivoted and struck once and then again, scoring two stabbing hits on the giant’s buttocks. The brute spun and swung wildly, holding its club in one hand, its free hand alternately holding its arrow-stuck shoulder, its slashed knee, its stabbed butt.

The club came nowhere near to hitting the nimble ranger. He dropped into a squatting position, letting it soar over his head, then came up hard, chasing the hand, striking out and hitting again, right on the giant’s wrist.

The behemoth howled; the club went flying free.

But the move had put Nightbird in a sorry position with the second giant, and he could not completely avoid the brute’s swinging club. It clipped him on the shoulder and sent him flying, tumbling right over in the air, coming down headfirst and tumbling again, and then again after that as he hit the ground in a desperate attempt to absorb some of the shock.

He came around in a roll, studying his foe. Truly this was the ugliest giant he had ever seen, with one lip torn away and a garish tattoo of a goblin ripped in half covering its forehead. One ear was also missing and the other sported a large gold earcap. Grinning wickedly, the brute looked to its stung companion, nodding as the behemoth indicated that it was still ready for the fight. The ugly brute slowly stalked in.

Even for the elven-trained ranger, two giants were more than a match.

But at least it would remain only two, Nightbird noted, glancing at Symphony. The giant on the ground was trying to rise, but the horse reared repeatedly over its head, front hooves pounding away.

The giant, blind in one eye, reached out desperately, then tried to rise again as Symphony spun about.

The horse was only lining the brute up for a kick, though, and the giant wasn’t halfway to standing when Symphony lashed out with both rear legs, connecting solidly on the giant’s face and laying it out straight.

Then the horse came right over the head again, front legs tapping a steady beat.

Nightbird didn’t see the last move, too concerned with scrambling away from the closest giant’s sudden rain of blows, overhand chops that could not be ducked. The ground shook with each tremendous impact.

The other giant retrieved its club, but seemed in no hurry to join its companion.

Still, Nightbird heard the pursuit closing from all around and knew he was running out of time.

Pony had not been idle. After her lightning blast rocked the barricade, clearing the way for Elbryan and then Juraviel—and then, though she hadn’t known it, for Roger Lockless—the woman ran down the slope, angling to the north. She tried to keep track of the ranger’s movements within the town, following the sound of shouting monsters and the ringing silverel as Tempest did its work, and she was fairly certain that her love was also making his way around the northern edge.

Pony’s run became a series of short bursts, moving from cover to cover, looking back toward the town, trying to gain some information. She saw the heads of two giants, saw one lurch suddenly and cry out in pain, and knew that Nightbird had come upon them. When a third giant’s head and shoulders appeared, towering above the low buildings, Pony realized that her love was in serious trouble.

The woman fumbled about in her pouch of stones, trying to find one that might help. The ruby was no good, for she hadn’t the time to go to Elbryan’s side. She might use the graphite to skim a lightning bolt off the rooftops, but that, she feared, might also sting her love, especially if he was in close battle.

“Malachite,” the woman decided, pulling forth the green, ringed stone. She would levitate one of the brutes, float him up high into the air, and make the odds a bit more even.

As she pulled out the stone, though, she saw another, the lodestone, and thought it even more clever.

Pony lifted her hand and took aim, focusing her vision through the magic of the gem, seeking out a metallic target at which she could launch her missile.

But there seemed to be nothing; the giants wore no armor and were wielding wooden clubs!

Pony growled and looked deeper, and still found nothing. She was about to change back to the malachite—her heart soared when she saw another giant go down—when at last she found a slight pull coming from the side of the remaining giant’s head, from the area near its ear.

Nightbird leaped ahead and to the side, avoiding yet another downward smash. Out flashed Tempest, a sudden lunge, but the giant was already turning its huge body, moving limbs and torso safely out of reach.

This one was skilled, the ranger realized. He gave a nervous glance to the side, to see the other giant watching.

Then he and the ugly brute went through a second round of attack and counter, again with no decisive winner, though this time Nightbird did score a minor hit. Still, the giant only howled—with laughter and not with pain—and its companion seemed even more bolstered and ready to join.

“Argh, get ye in here!” the ugly behemoth bellowed, but the words ended abruptly as the giant’s head suddenly snapped to the side. The monster’s head came back up straight, but its eyes were no longer seeing the ranger, were suddenly veiled in darkness. Without a movement to brace its fall, the giant dropped face first into the dirt.

The earcap was missing, Nightbird noted. No, not missing, but pushed in, driven right through the giant’s skull and into its brain!

Not missing a beat, the ranger spun on the last giant and roared in victory, and the fomorian fell all over itself, burying a powrie that came around the corner as it tried to get away.

The ranger understood this mystery quite clearly. He said a little thank-you to Pony, whom he knew to be the source, then split the giant’s skull in half with Tempest and pulled the magnetite from the gore.

“Symphony!” he cried, and ran to retrieve his bow.

The great horse whinnied and spun, pausing only to launch another double kick into the prone giant’s face. Symphony came by Nightbird in a canter and the ranger leaped up and pulled himself into his saddle, sliding Tempest under his thigh and putting Hawkwing to the ready in one fluid movement

He shot the powrie the giant had trampled as it stubbornly tried to regain its footing, then ran over the unfortunate dwarf with Symphony for good measure, breaking into the clear behind it, then turning fast down another alley, and the chase was on once more.

Unlike the ranger, Roger Lockless was doing all he could to avoid drawing attention to himself. The nimble thief worked his way carefully from rooftop to rooftop when the buildings were close enough, or down the side of one structure and up the side of another when they were not. Twice he found himself unintentionally on the same roof as an enemy, but both times he kept calm and as quiet as a shadow and moved along without being noticed, for that enemy, be it goblin or powrie, was inevitably distracted by the tumult of the ranger’s passing.

The bonfire guided Roger, leading him unerringly across Caer Tinella until he was perched on a roof no more than twenty feet from the ragged prisoners, a score and a half of them, sitting on the ground, in deep despair, chained together at the ankles. Many monsters were about, and two in particular, a huge giant, the largest Roger had ever seen, and a nervous Kos-kosio Begulne, caught his attention—and, it seemed, caught the attention of all the other monsters in the area.

“Doomed we are!” the powrie wailed. “Nightbird’s come and all the world’s a cursed place!”

The giant shook its huge head and calmly bade the powrie to be quiet “Are you not the one who wanted to bring him in?”

“Ye’re not knowing!” the powrie snapped back “Ye wasn’t there, in the middle o’ the fight, when he killed us in the valley.”

“I wish he had,” the giant said dryly. That gave Roger pause. A giant with wit? The mere thought of it sent a shudder down his spine; a giant’s only weakness was often between its ears.

With a shrug, the young man slipped down the back side of the building, shadowed from the light of the fire, then tiptoed into the line of human prisoners, slipping to a seat right between a pair of very surprised and very beleaguered men. They did well to keep quiet, and Roger, lockpick in hand, went right to work on the shackles.

“Doomed, says I!” the powrie wailed. “Both of us!”

“You’re half right,” the giant said quietly. With a sudden move, Maiyer Dek lifted Kos-kosio into the air and tossed the thrashing powrie onto the burning pyre. The dwarf wailed and scrambled out of the flames, but they stubbornly followed, grabbing at clothes, at hair, eating flesh; even the magical bracers the dwarf had taken from fallen Ulg Tik’narn could not save Kos-kosio Begulne from a horrible death.

All the monstrous gathering was in tumult then, some screaming for the death of the prisoners, others—powries all—for a revolt against the giant.

And in the middle of it all Roger Lockless calmly went about his work, shifting down the line, one man at a time, opening shackles and bidding the men to stay calm until all were free.

“Hear me!” Maiyer Dek roared, and it was impossible for any within a hundred yards to not hear the booming, resonant voice. “This is only one human, one puny human. A hundred pieces of King’s gold and ten prisoners to the one that brings me the head of Nightbird!”

That put the monsters in line, had them leaping and crying out excitedly, had many of them running off to find the fighting.

For just a split second Roger Lockless entertained the thought of those monsters catching and killing Elbryan. With a low growl the young man quickly berated himself for even thinking such things, and silently thanked the ranger for again allowing him the distraction he needed to finish his work here. And while he opened the next shackle, Roger Lockless prayed for Elbryan’s safe escape.

“I am with you, Nightbird,” came a most-welcome voice above the ranger as he turned tight about a building, monsters in close pursuit He heard the twang of an elvish bow, and then the flutter of wings, and a moment later Belli’mar Juraviel was on Symphony behind him, bow in hand.

“You shoot those in front, I will cover flanks and rear,” the elf offered, letting fly another arrow even as he made the statement. His bolt hit the mark, scoring solidly on a giant’s face, but the behemoth only roared and brushed the insignificant hit away. “Though I fear I’ll run out of arrows in an attempt to kill even one giant!” Juraviel added.

It didn’t matter too much, anyway, for none of the monsters behind would get near the fast-running Symphony. Head down, nostrils puffing, the stallion tore up the ground, and the ranger, telepathically linked to the horse through the turquoise, did not need his hands to guide him. Those monsters who came out in front, or at an angle where they might intercept, met with the thunder of Nightbird’s magnificent bow and the pounding of Symphony’s hooves, and the companions ran on, soon turning into the lane that ran the extent of Caer Tinella’s western side, just inside the barricade.

Symphony, and the ranger wholeheartedly agreed, skidded to an abrupt stop.

“We cannot get to them,” Juraviel said, looking past the ranger to the bonfire, and to the dozens of monsters swarming all about the path ahead of them.

Nightbird growled and moved to kick the horse’s flanks.

“No!” Juraviel scolded. “Your run was magnificent and brave, but to go on is purely foolish. And what hope will be left those men if they see Nightbird cut down before them? Over the wall with us, I say! It is the only way!”

Nightbird studied the scene before him, heard the monsters closing from behind and from the east. He could not disagree, and so he grabbed the reins hard and jerked the horse’s head to the west, toward the barricade and the open night beyond.

Out in that darkness, only a few feet from the wall, Pony stood perplexed, desperately trying to find some way to improvise. She didn’t know exactly where the ranger was, though she was fairly sure he had come to this edge of town, and didn’t have the time to use the quartz or the hematite to try and find out. Thus, she could not risk a bolt of lightning or any other substantial magical attack.

But this?

In her hand she held a diamond, the source of light and of warmth. There was a delicate balance in this gemstone’s magic, Pony understood, for within its depths light and dark were not absolutes, but were, rather, gradations of each other. Thus a diamond could bring forth a brilliant shine or a quiet glow. But what might happen, Pony wondered, if she tilted the balance in the other direction?

“This is a wonderful time for experiments,” she whispered sarcastically, but even as she finished the thought, she was falling into the magic of the stone, finding that balance, picturing it as a circular plate perched atop the tip of a knitting needle. If she turned the closest edge of that plate up, she would bring forth light.

She turned it down instead.

The great fire dimmed; all the torches seemed to flicker and lessen, until they were no more than tiny pinpricks of light. At first Nightbird thought a gust of wind must have swept through—just over his head, he guessed, since he had felt no breeze. It made no sense, though, for what wind might so easily defeat so large a fire as the burning pyre?

Then it was dark, just dark, and Symphony, heading still for the western wall, hesitated, unable to see the barricade to make the leap.

“Jilseponie with the stones,” Juraviel reasoned, though the elf feared differently, feared that this darkness might be the trademark of the demon dactyl. Juraviel had met the beast once before, soon after he had left the ranger’s expedition to take some refugees to the safety of Andur’Blough Inninness, and on that occasion the dactyl had been surrounded by a cloud of darkness. Not quite like this one, though; the blackness of the dactyl was more a wave of despair over the heart than a lack of light to the eyes.

“They are blinded,” Nightbird replied, noting the frantic movements of the monsters along the lane. They could no longer see him, he realized, could no longer see the ground at their feet or the walls before them.

“As am I,” Juraviel was quick to answer, and that gave the ranger pause. He had thought, or hoped, that Pony had indeed enacted some enchantment to blind his enemies, but why, then, was Juraviel affected, and why was he still able to see?

“The cat’s-eye,” he reasoned, feeling the gem-set circlet about his head. That had to be the answer, but whatever the case, Nightbird was not going to let this turn of fate go to waste. He communicated with his horse, bade Symphony to turn back down the lane, back toward the fire and the prisoners, and then he guided the stallion with the turquoise, as he had so often done before, letting Symphony “see” through his eyes.

“Hold on tightly,” Nightbird bade the elf, and Juraviel was willing to comply, since he could not put his bow to use anyway.

Down the path they charged, Nightbird working hard to keep Symphony veering around scrambling goblins and powries, and to keep far away from the two giants that were feeling about one of the buildings. They came out of the enchanted area of darkness suddenly, without warning, right before the bonfire. Most of the monstrous host was behind them, but gigantic Maiyer Dek was not, the behemoth standing near the fire, waving a huge sword easily in one hand.

Nightbird managed to look past the giant, to see Roger among the far end of the prisoner line, working furiously on some shackles.

“I have waited too long for this,” the giant said quietly.

“As have I,” the ranger answered grimly, needing the bravado to hold this one’s attention, and the gazes of all those nearby.

“As have I!” came a cry behind the ranger, and Juraviel leaned out to the side and let fly an arrow for Maiyer Dek’s face.

The giant lurched, but in truth he didn’t even have to, for though Juraviel’s bolt headed straight in, it swerved at the last instant, flying harmlessly to the side.

“Impossible,” the elf remarked.

Nightbird groaned softly; he understood, had seen this before. When he had fought Ulg Tik’narn in the woods, for some reason that he could not understand, his arrows and his blows could not strike the powrie.

Apparently Maiyer Dek was similarly armored. And even if the giant was naked, and without a weapon other than its hands, this one would prove a challenge, Nightbird knew without doubt.

“Come along, Nightbird!” the giant roared, and it threw back its head and bellowed with mocking laughter.

That mirth ended abruptly, though, as Maiyer Dek’s comrades started shouting with alarm as all the remaining prisoners, and Roger as well, leaped up and scattered, some pausing to tackle nearby enemies and grab their weapons, others just running full out or climbing the closest barrier.

“What trick is this?” the huge giant roared, glancing all about. “Forget them!” he howled, pointing at the ranger. “Forget them all, but this one! This is the Nightbird! I will have his head!”

Nightbird kicked Symphony into a run—not for Maiyer Dek, for the ranger did not think it wise to tangle with that one at this time, but in a circuitous route of the area, trampling monsters, slashing with Tempest, while Juraviel’s bow went to work once more. The situation now demanded confusion, and the two riders and their magnificent stallion answered that call perfectly.

Nightbird winced as he saw one man chopped down by a powrie hammer, then another squashed by a giant club. But many more were running free, many more were over the wall and scrambling into the cover of the forest. On the top of the wall directly across the fire, Nightbird spotted Roger. The man smiled and offered a salute, and then he was gone.

Back down the lane the darkness enchantment went away. Nightbird spun Symphony about and charged that way, scattering the confused closest monsters. Then he turned the horse sharply to the east, back into the heart of the town, trying to draw attention to himself and take some of the danger from the fleeing prisoners.

Around and around they went, Symphony always seeming to be one stride ahead of the pursuit—which included an outraged Maiyer Dek. Juraviel began to sing a taunting song, accenting each verse with a well-aimed bowshot.

After several minutes, Symphony puffing hard and the monstrous ring tightening about them, the ranger wisely decided that the game was up. He angled the horse for the nearest barricade, the eastern wall, and over they went, into the night. Nightbird thought to go out to the east and south, then swing back to the refugee encampment after a long while. He would have to trust Roger and Pony to get the prisoners away.

His plans changed, though, when he saw the huge form of Maiyer Dek stepping over the southern wall and then running off into the woods.

Perhaps he would get his fight with the giant after all.

“We must keep them guessing,” Juraviel reasoned, lifting off Symphony’s back to fly to a nearby branch.

“You keep them confused,” Nightbird replied. “I have urgent business to the south.”

“The giant?” Juraviel asked incredulously. “He has an enchantment about him!”

“I have seen this magic before,” Nightbird answered. “And I know how to defeat it. He wishes a fight with me, and so he shall have it!”

Juraviel offered no argument as the ranger kicked Symphony into a run.

The pursuit was not organized, was just a mob of scrambling monsters, turning about in circles as often as they moved in any one direction. Many soon gave up the chase altogether, not sure of whom they were supposed to be chasing, and not wanting to get caught out alone against the Nightbird.

Stubborn Maiyer Dek did not turn back, though, just pressed on, calling for the ranger to come out and face him squarely.

Following those calls, Nightbird had little trouble in gaining ground on the giant, and he was pleased to discover that the rest of the monstrous pursuit was nowhere to be seen, that the giant leader, in its rage, had struck out alone. The ranger wondered if he should first seek out Pony. “Sunstone,” he muttered, remembering how Avelyn had brought down the magical defenses of Kos-kosio Begulne, and recalling, too, that he and Pony had not retrieved any such magic from Avelyn’s cache, that the sunstone had been lost in the destruction of Aida.

The ranger looked to his sword, to the gemstone set in the pommel, which was truly a magically constructed mixture of several types of stones, sunstone among them.

Up ahead the huge fomorian came into view, breaking through the last line of brush and pine trees onto a meadow.

“Work for me, Tempest,” the ranger whispered, and he brought Symphony around the area, stepping out of the trees on the opposite end of the field when the giant was halfway across.

Maiyer Dek stopped in his tracks, surprised that the man dared to meet him so openly.

“You came out here after me,” the ranger explained calmly. “And so you have found me. Let us be done with it”

“Done with yourself!” came the thunderous retort. Maiyer Dek glanced all around suspiciously.

“I am alone,” the ranger assured him. “At least, as far as I know. You were trying to follow me, but I followed you.” He passed along some telepathic instruction to Symphony then, bidding the horse to be ready to come to his side should the sunstone fail. Then he slipped down from the saddle, Tempest in hand, and started a slow and steady walk toward the fomorian.

Maiyer Dek’s grin widened with each passing step. The giant suspected there would be trouble back in the town—he had thrown the powrie leader into the bonfire, after all—but wouldn’t they all, giants, goblins, and even the stubborn powries, bow down to him when he walked in with Nightbird’s head! And, to Maiyer Dek’s thinking, there was no way he could possibly lose. He wore the spiked bracers, the gift of the demon dactyl, and with their magic, no weapon could strike him.

So the giant’s surprise was complete, then, when Nightbird rushed across the last fifteen feet, fell into a balanced skip and lunged fast, stabbing him hard in the belly, the glowing Tempest tearing through clothes and leather girdle and slipping nearly half its blade length into Maiyer Dek’s abdomen.

Nightbird pulled the blade right out and slashed across, smacking Maiyer Dek across the kneecap. Then, as the giant’s leg went predictably wide, the ranger darted right between the treelike limbs, falling into a headlong roll as Maiyer Dek’s huge sword swished harmlessly behind him.

He came up in a half turn, legs tucked under him, and leaped back at the giant as it started to turn about, scoring yet another hit, this one deep into the giant’s hamstring. Then he ran out the back side of the behemoth, into the clear again, spinning on his heel to face Maiyer Dek squarely.

The giant was clearly confused and in pain, one huge hand holding tight to its spilling guts.

“You believed that your demon armor would defeat my attacks,” the ranger said. “And so the gift of Bestesbulzibar worked against you, Maiyer Dek, for my magic, the magic of the goodly God, is stronger by far!”

In response, Maiyer Dek roared and charged.

Nightbird leaped straight ahead, sword up as if he meant to block the attack. He could not hope to stop the sheer power of Maiyer Dek’s sword strike, and he knew it, and so at the last moment he leaped out to the side, then charged in behind the swish of the sword, stabbing again at the giant’s wounded abdomen.

Maiyer Dek brought the great pommel of his sword in tight fast enough to partially defeat the attack, and then, in a fluid movement, snapped that sword arm out wide, pommel clipping a dodging Nightbird on his already bruised shoulder and sending him into a roll.

The ranger came up in perfect balance, but truly his right shoulder throbbed from the heavy hit, and Maiyer Dek, recognizing a slight advantage here, was quick in pursuit, but this time with his sword at the ready, and not swinging wildly.

The giant put out a lazy swing, testing the ranger’s defenses. Tempest banged hard against the huge blade, once and then again, forcing it wide.

“You move your skinny blade well,” the giant remarked.

“Except when it is embedded in your belly,” the ranger replied.

Predictably, Maiyer Dek came on ferociously, sword slashing across at just the right height to take the ranger’s head from his shoulders.

But Nightbird was no longer standing, had dropped to his knees, then came up as the blade flashed overhead. Left, right, left went Tempest, then in a straight-ahead thrust, once and again, and then a third time, angled up for the abdomen once more.

Down went the ranger in a desperate dive, the giant reversing its swing for a sudden backhand, and this time with the blade so low that Nightbird had to fall flat on the ground.

Maiyer Dek rushed ahead, lifted his massive booted foot and stamped down, thinking to grind Nightbird into the dirt.

The ranger went over in a roll, then again as the giant continued to stamp at him. Then a third time, and when he came over, he put one leg under him. As Maiyer Dek lifted his foot and turned it yet again, the ranger sprang up, bracing Tempest, pommel in both hands, against his breast, driving it hard into the bottom of Maiyer Dek’s foot before it began its downward momentum.

The blade gored through the leather as if it were paper and drove upward, into flesh and bone. Maiyer Dek tried to pull away, but the ranger stayed with him, driving on.

All the ground shook when Maiyer Dek fell over backward, hitting with a tremendous jolt. The giant felt the ranger then, leaping atop his thigh, running up his torso. He tried to reach out with his empty hand, but Tempest slashed away, taking one finger at the knuckle and gashing the others.

Nightbird sprang to the giant’s massive chest, then leaped ahead, landing right above the behemoth’s shoulder, slashing hard with Tempest at the side of Maiyer Dek’s neck. Then he leaped again, into a backward roll, came up to his feet and ran up above the prone giant, narrowly avoiding the great sword as Maiyer Dek rolled about.

Nightbird was twenty feet away when the giant staggered to its feet. The ranger noted the blood pouring freely down the side of Maiyer Dek’s neck, and knew that the outcome was decided.

“Ah, but you’ll pay for this, little rat!” Maiyer Dek spouted. “I’ll cut you in half! I’ll—” The giant stopped and put its torn hand up to its neck, then brought the hand out in front of its face, staring incredulously at the complete bloodstain. Stunned, Maiyer Dek looked back to the ranger, to see him mounting Symphony, his sword in its sheath.

“You are dead, Maiyer Dek,” Nightbird declared. “The only thing that could save you is the magic of the goodly God, and He, I fear, will show little mercy to one who has committed so many terrible crimes.”

Nightbird turned his horse and rode away.

Maiyer Dek moved to follow, but stopped, again lifting his hand, and then, when he discerned that the blood was verily spouting from his neck, he grabbed at the wound tightly, trying to stem the flow, then ran off for Caer Tinella.

He felt the cold creeping into his body before he ever got off the field, felt the touch of death and saw the darkness growing before his eyes.

CHAPTER 14

Right and Wrong

“Oh, but by yer pardon, master sir,” the woman stammered. “I’m just not knowing what ye’re wanting from poor old Pettibwa.”

Father Abbot Markwart eyed the woman suspiciously, knowing that she was not as dim-witted as she was pretending. It made sense, of course, for she was obviously frightened. She, her husband Graevis, and their son Grady, had been pulled from Fellowship Way, their small inn down in the poorer section of Palmaris.

The Father Abbot made a mental note to speak with Brothers Youseff and Dandelion concerning their rough tactics. Using brute force and threats instead of subtle coercion, they had put the three on their guard, and now garnering any information might prove more difficult indeed. In fact, had he not arrived on the scene to oversee the arrest, Markwart feared that his two overly rough lackeys might have seriously injured the three, might even have killed the son, Grady.

“Be at ease, Madame Chilichunk,” Markwart said with a phony grin. “We are searching for one of our own, that is all, and we have reason to believe that he might be in the company of your daughter.”

“Cat?” the woman asked suddenly, eagerly, and Markwart knew that he had hit a chord, though he had no idea of who this “Cat” might be.

“Your daughter,” he said again. “The one you adopted, who was orphaned in the Timberlands.”

“Cat,” Pettibwa said earnestly. “Cat-the-Stray, that’s what we called her, ye know.”

“I do not know the name,” the Father Abbot admitted.

“Jilly, then,” the woman clarified. “That’s her real name, part of it anyway. Oh, but I’d love to be seem’ me Jilly again!”

Jilly. Markwart rolled the name over in his thoughts. Jilly . . . Jilseponie . . . Pony. Yes, he decided. It fit nicely.

“If you help us,” he said pleasantly, “you may indeed see her again. We have every reason to believe that she is alive and well.”

“And in the Kingsmen,” the woman added.

Markwart hid his frustration well. If Pettibwa and her family knew no more than that old news, they wouldn’t be of much help.

“But as I telled yer fellow priest, I’m not knowing where they sent me girl,” Pettibwa went on.

“Fellow priest?” Father Abbot echoed. Had Brother Justice interrogated this woman already? he wondered, and hoped, for if that was the case, then Quintall must have also discovered the connection between Avelyn and the Chilichunks. “A monk, you mean? Of St. Precious, perhaps?”

“No, I’m knowin’ most of them from St. Precious—me Jilly was married by Abbot Dobrinion himself, ye know,” Pettibwa offered proudly. “No, this one was wearing the darker brown robes, like yer own, and his accent was o’ the eastlands. St-Mere-Abelle, ye said ye were from, and I’d be guessin’ that he was from the same place.”

Father Abbot Markwart was pondering how he might properly identify this man—as Quintall, he suspected—without giving anything away, when boisterous Pettibwa rambled on.

“Oh, and a great big fat man, he was indeed!” she said. “Ye must be feedin’ them well at yer St-Mere-Abelle, though yerself could be using a bit o’ fattening, if ye don’t mind me telling ye so!”

For a moment Father Abbot Markwart was confused, for there wasn’t an ounce of fat on the well-honed muscles of the first Brother Justice. But then, suddenly, he understood, and he could hardly contain his excitement “Brother Avelyn?” he said breathlessly. “Brother Avelyn Desbris of St-Mere-Abelle came to speak with you?”

“Avelyn,” Pettibwa echoed, letting the name roll off her tongue. “Yessir, that’s sounding right Brother Avelyn come a’askin’ about me Jilly.”

“And she was with you?”

“Oh no, but she was long into the army by then,” Pettibwa explained. “But he wasn’t looking to find her, he was asking about where she came from, and how she came to live with me and Graevis. Oh, a nice and cheerful fellow he was, too!”

“And did you tell him?”

“Oh, but for sure,” Pettibwa said. “I’m not one to be angering the Church!”

“Keep that thought close to your heart,” the Father Abbot said dryly. It was all beginning to fit together, and quite nicely, he realized. Avelyn had met this woman, Pony or Jilly, outside of Pireth Tulme after the powrie invasion, and had traveled with her right through Palmaris and to the north, where they had then met the centaur. The woman had survived the explosion at Aida, Markwart believed, and so had this other mysterious fellow, Nightbird, whom Bradwarden had unintentionally described, and they now had the gemstones.

Finding them would not be easy, obviously, but perhaps Markwart could find a way to bring Pony and Nightbird to him . . .

“I could make ye a fine fattening stew,” Pettibwa was saying when the Father Abbot tuned back to the conversation. Of course she was preoccupied with such things, Markwart mused, considering her plump form.

“I may just ask you to do that,” he replied. “But not now.”

“Oh no, couldn’t be,” Pettibwa agreed. “But ye come by the Way tonight, or whenever ye’re getting the chance, and I’ll feed ye well.”

“I am afraid that you will not be returning to the Way this day,” Markwart explained, rising from his seat behind Abbot Dobrinion’s huge desk and motioning to Brother Dandelion, who was standing in the shadows at the side of the large room. “Or anytime soon.”

“But—”

“You said that you did not want to anger the Church,” Markwart interrupted. “I hold you to that, Madame Pettibwa Chilichunk. Our business is most urgent—more so than the health of your pitiful inn.”

“Pitiful?” Pettibwa echoed, growing concerned and angry.

“Brother Dandelion will accompany—”

“I’m not thinking so!” the woman snapped. “I’m no enemy of the Church, Father Abbot, but I’ve got me life and me family.”

Father Abbot Markwart didn’t bother to reply, had grown quite bored with the woman, actually, and quite frustrated, since she really had only confirmed what he already knew. He motioned again to Brother Dandelion and the man stepped up to Pettibwa’s side and took her thick elbow in his hand.

“Ah, but ye just be lettin’ me go!” she yelled at him, tugging away.

Dandelion looked to Markwart, who nodded. Then he grabbed the woman again, more forcefully. Pettibwa tried to pull away, but the big man’s grip was like iron.

“Understand, Madame Chilichunk,” Father Abbot Markwart explained in a deadly serious voice, and moved his wrinkled old face right near the woman, “you will go with Brother Dandelion, whatever tactics he must use.”

“And ye’re callin’ yerself a godly man?” Pettibwa replied, but her anger was gone, replaced by simple fear. She tried to pull away once more, and Brother Dandelion tightened his fingers and popped her hard on the forehead, stunning her. Then the monk cupped his hand over Pettibwa’s, bending her fingers under his grasp, and pressed in, forcing the fingers back on their knuckles.

Waves of pain washed over the woman, stealing the strength from her legs. Brother Dandelion hooked his free arm under her shoulder and easily held her up against his side, keeping the pressure on her fingers every step of the way.

Markwart just went back to the desk, unconcerned with her pain.

As the pair left the room, Abbot Dobrinion entered, looking none too pleased.

“This is how you treat my congregation?” he demanded of Markwart.

“This is how the Church deals with those who will not cooperate,” the Father Abbot coolly replied.

“Will not?” Dobrinion echoed doubtfully. “Or cannot? The Chilichunk family are an honest and decent lot, by every report. If they could help in your search—”

“In my search?” Father Abbot roared in reply, leaping to his feet and slamming the desk “You believe that this is my search alone? Can you not understand the implications of all this?”

Abbot Dobrinion patted his hand in the air as Markwart fumed on, trying to calm the old man. That condescending action only fueled the Father Abbot’s ire, though.

“We have found Avelyn the heretic,” Markwart growled. “Yes, we found him, dead as he deserved in the devastation of Mount Aida. Perhaps his ally, the fiend dactyl, turned against him, or perhaps he merely overestimated his own worth and power, pride was ever one of his many faults!”

Abbot Dobrinion could hardly reply, so stunned was he by the information, and by the sheer outrage in Father Abbot’s voice as he relayed it.

“And that woman,” Markwart went on, pointing a skinny finger at the door Pettibwa and Dandelion had exited, “and her wretched family, may hold answers for us concerning the whereabouts of our stones. Our stones! God-given to St-Mere-Abelle, and stolen by the thief and murderer Avelyn Desbris, curse his evil name! And such a cache, Abbot Dobrinion! If those stones fall into the hands of enemies of the Church, then we shall know war on an even greater scale, do not doubt!”

Dobrinion suspected that Father Abbot might be exaggerating there. He had already spoken to Master Jojonah concerning the stones, and Jojonah wasn’t nearly as worried about them as was Markwart. But Dobrinion, too, was an old man whose time in this world was fast passing, and he understood the importance of reputation and legacy. That was why he was so desperate to see Brother Allabarnet canonized while he presided over St. Precious, and why he was able to accept Markwart’s need to retrieve the stones.

He would have said as much, if he had been given the chance, but the Father Abbot was on a roll then, spouting Church doctrine, telling of Master Siherton, so good a man, murdered by Avelyn, and ranting about how the Chilichunks might be the only clue in getting to this treasonous woman and the cache of gemstones.

“Do not underestimate my desire for this,” Markwart finished, lowering his voice to a threatening tone. “If you hinder me in any way, I will repay you a thousand times over.”

Dobrinion’s face screwed up with incredulity; he was not accustomed to being threatened by one of his own Order.

“As you know, Master Jojonah is already on his way to St. Honce to further Brother Allabarnet’s canonization,” Father Abbot Markwart said calmly. “I can recall him in an instant, and kill this process altogether.”

Dobrinion set his feet firmly in place and squared his shoulders. By his estimation, the old Father Abbot had just crossed a very tangible line! “You are the leader of the Abellican Church,” Dobrinion conceded, “and thus hold great power. But the canonization process is greater still, and an issue for all the abbots, not just the Father Abbot of St-Mere-Abelle.”

Markwart was laughing before the man even finished. “But the stories I could tell of Brother Allabarnet,” he said with a wicked chuckle. “Long-forgotten tales unearthed from the catacombs of St-Mere-Abelle. The journal of the man’s passage through the eastlands, a journey filled with tales of debauchery and womanizing, of excessive drinking and even one case of petty theft.”

“Impossible!” Dobrinion cried.

“Quite possible,” Markwart replied grimly without hesitation. “To fabricate and to make them look authentic.”

“The lie will not stand the test of time,” Dobrinion countered. “Similar lies were told of St Gwendolyn of the Sea, yet they did not defeat the canonization process!”

“They delayed it for nearly two hundred years,” Markwart not so gently reminded. “No, perhaps the lies will not stand the test of time, but neither, my friend, will your old bones.”

Dobrinion slumped where he stood, feeling as though he had been physically beaten.

“I intend to gather my information,” Markwart said evenly. “By whatever means necessary. As of this moment, Graevis, Pettibwa, and Grady Chilichunk are to be held under suspicion of treason against the Church and God. And perhaps I will speak with this Connor Bildeborough, as well, to see if he is a part of the conspiracy.”

Dobrinion started to respond, but decided to hold the thoughts to himself, Connor Bildeborough was the favored nephew, treated practically as son and heir, of the Baron of Palmaris, a man of no small means and influence. But Father Abbot Markwart could find that out for himself, Dobrinion decided. The old wretch might just make a very powerful enemy in the process.

“As you wish, Father Abbot” was all the abbot of St. Precious replied, and he gave a curt bow, turned on his heel and left the room.

Markwart gave a derisive snort when the door closed behind Dobrinion, thinking he had put the man in his place.

Dainsey Aucomb was not the brightest light in the sky, the dashing young man knew, but she was observant enough. And besides, Connor Bildeborough was often able to use her dim wits to his advantage. The Baron’s nephew had come to the Way that night, as he often did—though, in truth, the relationship between Connor and Pettibwa Chilichunk had been more than a little strained since the annulment of Connor’s marriage to Jill. Still, Grady Chilichunk was more than pleased to call the nobleman a friend, and even Graevis couldn’t really blame the man for the failure of the marriage; Jill had refused him his marital rights, after all.

And so Connor continued to frequent Fellowship Way, for though a man of his station was welcomed at the most exclusive taverns in Palmaris, in those places Connor was just another nobleman. Among the common rabble in Fellowship Way, he felt important, superior in every way.

He was surprised, as were many other regular patrons, to find the tavern closed that night. The only light showing through the windows came from two of the guest rooms on the second floor, from the kitchen and from a small room in the back of the building, the room that had been Jill’s but now belonged to Dainsey.

Connor called to her softly as he knocked lightly on the door. “Do come and answer, Dainsey,” he bade her.

No answer.

“Dainsey Aucomb,” Connor said more loudly. “There are many patrons growing restless in the street. We cannot abide that, now can we?”

“Dainsey’s not here,” came the woman’s voice, poorly disguised.

Connor rocked back on his heels, surprised by the note of fear he detected in that voice. What was going on here?

“Dainsey, it is Connor . . . Master Bildeborough, nephew of the Baron,” he said more forcefully. “I know that you are behind the door, hearing my every word, and I demand that you speak with me!”

No answer came back, other than a slight whimpering.

Connor grew more agitated, more frightened. Something very strange had happened, perhaps something terrible. “Dainsey!”

“Oh, go away, I beg ye, Mr. Bildeborough,” the woman pleaded. “I ain’t done nothing wrong, and I’m not for knowing what crimes the mister and missus committed to so anger the Church. No sins on me own door, and me bed’s been slept in by none but meself—well, except for yerself, and just those two . . . three times.”

Connor tried hard to digest all of that. Crimes against the Church? The Chilichunks? “Impossible,” he said aloud, then lifted his hand to bang hard on the door. He stopped himself, though, and reconsidered his course. Dainsey was frightened, and apparently with good cause. If he frightened her more, he doubted he would be able to get any information out of her.

“Dainsey,” he said softly, comfortingly. “You know me, and know that I am a friend of the Chilichunks.”

“The missus isn’t speaking so highly of ye,” Dainsey replied bluntly.

“And you know that story,” Connor said, fighting hard to hold his calm tone. “And know, too, that I do not blame Pettibwa for being mad at me. Yet I still come to the Way, still consider the place as a home. I am no enemy of the Chilichunks, Dainsey, nor of you.”

“So ye’re saying.”

“Consider that I could be in there if I so chose,” Connor said bluntly. “I could have half the garrison with me, and that door would offer you little protection.”

“Dainsey’s not here,” came the reply. “I’m her sister, and know nothing about what ye’re saying.”

Connor groaned and banged his forehead against the door. “Very well, then,” he said a moment later. “I am leaving, and you should be, as well, before those monks now coming down the road arrive.” Staying in place right outside the door, Connor lifted his feet alternately, clunking his boots against the wood, more softly with each step so that it sounded as though he was walking away. Predictably, the door cracked open a few seconds later, and the young man was quick to stick his foot into the opening, bracing his shoulder against the wood and pushing hard.

Dainsey was a spirited lass, and strong from carrying heavy trays, and she gave him a good fight, but finally he forced himself into the room, quickly shutting the door behind him.

“Oh, but I’ll scream!” the frightened woman warned, backing away, taking up a frying pan as she passed it sitting on her night table, spilling the drippy eggs down her side in the process. “Ye keep yerself back!” she warned, waving the pan.

“Dainsey, what is wrong with you?” Connor asked, advancing a step and then quickly retreating and holding up his hands unthreateningly as the pan started swinging. “Where are the Chilichunks? You must tell me.”

“Ye’re already knowing!” the woman accused. “Suren that yer uncle’s part of it all!”

“Part of all what?” Connor demanded.

“Part of the arrest!” Dainsey cried, tears streaming down her soft cheeks.

“Arrest?” Connor echoed. “They were arrested? By town guards?”

“No,” Dainsey explained. “By them monks.”

Connor could hardly speak, so amazed was he by this information. “Arrested?” he asked again. “You are sure of that? They were not just escorted to St. Precious on some minor business?”

“Master Grady, he tried to argue,” Dainsey said. “Said he was a friend o’ yerself and all, but that only made them laugh, and when Master Grady moved to draw his sword, one o’ them monks, a skinny fellow, but so fast, got him good and hard, knocked him right to the floor. And then the old one come rushing in, and he was in a fit—”

“Abbot Dobrinion?”

“No, older than him by a cow’s life,” Dainsey said. “Old and skinny and wrinkled, but wearing robes like Dobrinion, only more decorated. Oh, pretty things, those robes was, even on the old and wrinkled man, even with that ugly look he kept on his face—”

“Dainsey,” Connor said suddenly and firmly, trying to get her back on track.

“He, the old one, he yelled good at that skinny fellow, but then he just looked at Master Grady and telled him that if he did a stupid thing like that again, both his arms’d be torn off,” Dainsey went on. “And I believed him, too, and so did Master Grady! Went all white in the face, trembling all over.”

Connor shuffled over and sat on the bed, thoroughly stunned and trying to sort it all out. He had been in the Way that night a couple of years before when an enormously fat monk, a man of St.-Mere-Abelle, he had heard, and not of St Precious, had arrived and spoken with Pettibwa. That meeting had seemed calm enough, though the man had spoken of Jill, which somewhat upset the normally jovial woman. Still, on that occasion, the monk had been gentle enough and gracious enough.

“Did they say why they had come?” Connor asked her. “Did they mention what crimes the Chilichunks were being accused of? You must tell me, I beg.”

“They asked about the mister and missus’s daughter, that’s all,” Dainsey replied. “They said I was her at first, and then two young ones moved to grab me. But the old one, he said that it wasn’t me, and the mister and missus both said so, too.”

Connor put his chin in his hand, trying hard, and futilely, to digest it all. Jill? They were looking for Jill? But why?

“Then they said the mister and missus must be hiding her, and so they went through the whole place, makin’ a mess o’ everything,” Dainsey went on. “And then they took ’em, all three.”

Connor Bildeborough was not without resources. His network of friends and confidants included people from the palace to the abbey to House Battlebrow, the most notorious brothel—and thus, one of the most powerful houses—in all the city. It was time for him to put that network into action, he realized, time for him to get some answers.

If the Church had come so forcefully for the Chilichunks on a matter concerning Jill, then Connor, too, might find himself under suspicion. These were, after all, dangerous times, and Connor, who had lived all of his thirty years in the presence of the ruling class, understood well how serious the games of intrigue could become.

“You stay here, Dainsey,” he decided. “And keep that door closed, and do not even offer an answer to anyone’s call, except for mine.”

“But how’m I to be sure that it’s yerself come a’calling?”

“We’ll have a secret word,” Connor said mysteriously, and he saw that get Dainsey’s attention. Her face brightened at the thought, the frying pan went back on the night table and she plopped down on the bed right beside him.

“Ooh, but that’s so exciting,” she said happily. “What word, then?”

Connor thought it over for just a moment “Bymegod,” he said with a wicked smile that brought a fierce blush to Dainsey’s cheeks. “You will remember that one, will you not?”

Dainsey giggled and blushed even more. She had heard that phrase before, had been known to say it repeatedly at certain times when she and Connor were alone in her room.

Connor gave her a little tickle under the chin, then rose and went to the door. “Speak to no one else,” he instructed as he left. “And if the Chilichunks return—”

“Oh, but I’ll let them in!” Dainsey cut in.

“Yes, do,” Connor said dryly. “And then tell Grady to find me. Can you remember to do that?”

Dainsey nodded eagerly.

“Bymegod,” Connor said with a wink as he departed.

Dainsey sat on the bed giggling for a long while.

“You believe this to be a game?” Markwart screamed, sticking his face right up to poor Grady Chilichunk, the old man’s bloodshot eyes boring into Grady’s.

Grady was chained to the wall by the wrists, with the shackles up high so that he had to stand on his tiptoes the whole time. And it was hot down there in the cellar of St. Precious, with a fire pit and bellows set up in the low-ceilinged, tight room.

“I never even liked her,” the prisoner sputtered in reply, sweat and spittle flying out with every word. “I asked for no sister!”

“Then tell me where she is!” Markwart roared.

“If I knew, I would,” Grady protested, his voice more controlled, though hardly calm. “You must believe me!”

Father Abbot Markwart turned to the two monks who had accompanied him to the dungeons, Brothers Francis and Dandelion, the huge and vicious younger monk wearing a hooded cloak, an appropriate garment for this dark occasion.

“Do you believe him?” Markwart asked Francis.

“He seems sincere,” Brother Francis answered honestly. His perspective was biased, he knew, because he simply didn’t want to see any more of this interrogation, truly the most brutal questioning he had ever witnessed. He did believe Grady, and hoped that Markwart would, as well.

Grady’s face brightened just a bit, a hint of a smile turning up the corners of his mouth.

“Seems?” Markwart pressed, sounding incredulous. “My dear Brother Francis, on a matter as important as this, do you believe that the appearance of truth is enough?”

“Of course not, Father Abbot,” Brother Francis replied with a resigned sigh.

Father Abbot Markwart turned on Grady. “Where is she?” he asked calmly.

The man whined as he searched for an answer that he could not know.

Markwart nodded to the hooded Dandelion. “We must be certain,” he said, and then he walked away, Brother Francis in tow.

Brother Dandelion was right before Grady in an instant, his huge fist slamming hard into the man’s exposed ribs. “Please,” Grady stammered, and then he was hit again, and again, and again, until his words came out as undecipherable groans.

“And when you are finished,” Father Abbot Markwart said to Dandelion, “do go to an upstairs hearth and take a poker, then lay it in the fire of this room for a bit. We must test this one’s sincerity, after all, and teach him a lesson of obedience to the Church.”

“No!” Grady started to protest, but his breath was blasted away by another heavy punch.

Markwart left the room without looking back. Brother Francis did pause before following, staring back at the spectacle. Grady Chilichunk wasn’t the only one in this room being taught a lesson.

Another punch brought a pitiful groan, and Francis rushed away, skittering to catch up to Markwart.

“You would not really use a heated poker on the poor fool?” he asked.

Markwart’s look stole the blood from his face. “I will do whatever I deem necessary,” he said calmly. “Come along, the old man down the hall is near to breaking, I believe. Perhaps we can invade his thoughts once again with the soul stone.” Markwart paused, studying the expression on the younger monk’s face, recognizing doubts etched there.

“Whenever the business gets unpleasant, all you need do is think of the greater good,” he quietly instructed.

“But if they are telling the truth . . .” Francis dared to argue.

“A pity, then,” Markwart admitted. “But not so much a pity as the consequences if they are lying and we do not probe deeper. The greater truth, Brother Francis. The greater good.”

Still, Francis was having a hard time reconciling his heart with the spectacle. He said no more about it, though, but produced the soul stone and dutifully followed his superior to the next cell in line.

More than an hour later, a painful hour for Grady and Graevis, Francis and Markwart exited the heavy door leading to the narrow stone stairway to the abbey’s chapel. They found Abbot Dobrinion waiting for them on the top step.

“I demand to know what you are doing down there,” the abbot fumed. “These are my subjects, and loyal to the Church.”

“Loyal?” Markwart spat at him. “They harbor fugitives.”

“If they knew—”

“They do know!” Markwart yelled in his face. “And they will tell me, do not doubt!”

The sheer intensity, the sheer wildness, of his tone sent Dobrinion back a couple of steps. He stood staring at Markwart for a long while, trying to get a reading of the man, trying to find out just how far this all had gone. “Father Abbot,” he said quietly at length, once he was back in control of his own bubbling anger, “I do not doubt the importance of your quest, but I’ll not stand idly by while you—”

“While I begin the canonization process for our dear Allabarnet of St. Precious?” Markwart finished.

Again Dobrinion paused, his thoughts whirling. No, he decided, he could not let Father Abbot use that as leverage against him, not in a matter as important as this. “Brother Allabarnet is deserving—” he started to protest.

“As if that matters,” Markwart spat. “How many hundreds are deserving, Abbot Dobrinion? And yet only those chosen few ever even get nominated.”

Dobrinion shook his head in defiance to every word. “No more,” he said. “No more. Choose your course concerning Brother Allabarnet based on the work and life of Brother Allabarnet, not on whether or not the present abbot of St Precious agrees with your campaign of terror! These are good people, good in heart and in deed.”

“What do you know of it?” Markwart exploded. “When enemies of the Church bring St. Precious down around you, or the rot within the Church brings you down inside the walls you thought sacred, or when goblins freely roam the streets of Palmaris, will Abbot Dobrinion then wish he had let Father Abbot Markwart conduct the matters with a just, but iron, hand? Do you even begin to understand the implications of the cache of stolen stones? Do you even begin to understand the power they might bring to our foes?” The Father Abbot shook his head and waved disgustedly at the man.

“I grow weary of trying to educate you, foolish Abbot Dobrinion,” he said. “Let me warn you instead. This matter is too important for your meddling. Your actions will not go unnoticed.”

Abbot Dobrinion squared his shoulders and eyed the old man directly. Truly, some of Markwart’s claims of the potential calamity had shaken a bit of his confidence, but still, his heart told him that this inquisition of the Chilichunks, and of the centaur, could not be a righteous thing. He had no arguments that would stand against Markwart at that time, though. The hierarchy of the Abellican Church did not allow him, as a mere abbot, to seriously question the authority of the Father Abbot, even within the walls of his own abbey. He gave a curt bow, then turned and walked far, far away.

“Who is Dobrinion’s second at St Precious?” Father Abbot Markwart asked Brother Francis as soon as the other man was gone.

“In line for the position of abbot?” Francis reasoned, and then, when Markwart confirmed that to be what he had in mind, Francis shook his head and shrugged. “No one of any consequence, certainly,” he explained. “There is not even a master now in service at St. Precious.”

Markwart’s face screwed up with curiosity.

“They had two masters,” Brother Francis explained. “One was killed on the battlefield to the north; the other died of the red fever just a few months ago.”

“An interesting void,” Father Abbot Markwart remarked.

“In truth, there is no one in St. Precious ready for such a succession,” Brother Francis went on.

Father Abbot smiled wickedly at the thought. He had a master at St-Mere-Abelle who might be ready for such a position, a man whose hand was no less iron than his own.

“Impeaching him of his title will thus prove all the more difficult,” Brother Francis reasoned, thinking he saw where Markwart’s thoughts were leading him.

“What?” Markwart asked incredulously, as though the idea never crossed his mind.

“The College will never strip Abbot Dobrinion of his abbey, given that there is no logical successor at St Precious,” Brother Francis reasoned.

“There are plenty of masters at St-Mere-Abelle ready to assume the role of abbot,” Father Abbot Markwart replied. “And at St. Honce.”

“But history tells us clearly that the College would not strip an abbey of its abbot without another within the abbey ready to assume the title,” Brother Francis argued. “The Twelfth College of St. Argraine was faced with just that prospect, concerning an abbot whose crimes were clearly more egregious than Abbot Dobrinion’s.”

“Yes yes, I do not doubt your understanding of the matter,” Father Abbot Markwart interrupted, somewhat impatiently. He looked in the direction in which Abbot Dobrinion had departed, still showing that smile. “A pity,” he muttered.

Then he started away, but, as in the dungeon, Brother Francis paused before following, surprised, when he considered it more closely, that Father Abbot Markwart would even entertain such thoughts. The impeachment of an abbot was no light matter, most decidedly not! It had only been attempted a half-dozen times in the thousand-year history of the Church, and two of those were prompted by the fact that the abbot in question had been proven guilty of serious crimes, one a series of rapes, including the assault on the female abbess of St Gwendolyn, and the other a murder. Furthermore, the other four impeachment attempts had been in the very early days of the Abellican Order, when the position of abbot was often for sale or an appointment made as a matter of political gain.

Brother Francis gave a deep sigh to steady his nerves and dutifully followed his superior once more, reminding himself that the Church, indeed all the kingdom, was at war, after all, and that these were indeed desperate times.

Brother Braumin Herde was not in good spirits. He knew what was going on in the dungeons of the abbey, though he wasn’t allowed anywhere near the lower levels. And even worse, he knew he was now alone in his stance, should he choose to take one against the Father Abbot. Master Jojonah was long gone, taken from him as his old mentor had warned might happen. Father Abbot Markwart knew his enemies and had the upper hand, a position he had no intention of relinquishing.

So Brother Braumin, avoiding monks of his own abbey for fear that they would run to Markwart to report any discussion, spent his hours among the brothers of St. Precious. They were a more jovial bunch than the serious students of St-Mere-Abelle, he discovered, despite the fact that they had been hearing the sounds of battle not too far to the north for many weeks now. Still, on the whole, St. Precious was a brighter place. Perhaps it was the weather, Brother Braumin thought, for Palmaris was normally much more sunny than All Saints Bay, or perhaps it was the fact that St. Precious was built more aboveground than the larger St.-Mere-Abelle, with more windows and breezy balconies. Or maybe it was the fact that these monks were less secluded, being housed, as they were, in the midst of a huge city.

Or maybe, Brother Braumin mused—and he thought this to be the most likely explanation—the fact that St. Precious was lighter of heart than St.-Mere-Abelle was a reflection of the mood of the respective abbots. Dobrinion Calislas, by all accounts, was a man not unaccustomed to smiling; his great belly laugh was well-reported in Palmaris, as was his love of the wine—elvish boggle, some said—his penchant for games of chance—among friends only—and his love of officiating a grand wedding where no expenses had been spared.

Father Abbot Markwart didn’t smile much, Braumin knew, and on those occasions when he did, those not in his favor grew very ill at ease.

Late that afternoon, Braumin stood in the carpeted hallway outside the door of Abbot Dobrinion’s private quarters. Many times he lifted his hand to knock on the door, only to let it fall silently by his side. Braumin understood the chance he would be taking if he went in to speak with the man now, if he told Abbot Dobrinion of his fears concerning Markwart and of the quiet alliance that had been forged against the Father Abbot. On the one hand, Braumin felt he had little choice in the matter. With Master Jojonah gone, and on a long road that would keep him out of Braumin’s life for years, it appeared, Braumin was powerless to make any moves against Father Abbot Markwart’s decisions, particularly the decision that had sent Jojonah away in the first place. Making an ally of Abbot Dobrinion, who by all indications was not having a good time of it on his own against the Father Abbot, might greatly strengthen the cause for both men.

But on the other hand, Braumin Herde had to admit that he really didn’t know Abbot Dobrinion very well, particularly the man’s politics. Perhaps Abbot Dobrinion and Father Abbot Markwart were bickering over control of the prisoners simply because each wanted the glory of recovering the stones. Or perhaps Abbot Dobrinion’s objections were borne on the wings of simple anger that Markwart had come into St. Precious and usurped a good deal of his power.

Brother Braumin spent nearly half an hour standing in that hall, contemplating his course. In the end Master Jojonah’s words of wisdom proved the deciding component “Quietly spread the word,” his beloved mentor had bade him, “not against Father Abbot or any others, but in favor of Avelyn and those of like heart.”

Patience, Brother Braumin decided. This was the long war of Mankind, he knew, the internal struggle of good and evil, and his side, the side of true goodness and godliness, would win out in the end. He had to believe that.

Now he was miserable and feeling so very alone, but that was the burden the truth in his heart forced upon him, and going to Abbot Dobrinion at this dangerous time was not the proper course.

As it played out in the weeks ahead, Brother Braumin Herde would come to regret this moment when he walked away from Abbot Dobrinion’s door.

CHAPTER 15

Pride

“Maiyer Dek and the powrie, Kos-kosio,” Pony said, feeling very pleased at the out come in Caer Tinella. She, Elbryan, Tomas Gingerwart, and Belster O’Comely were sitting about a campfire in the refugee encampment, eagerly awaiting the return of Roger Lockless and the other scouts, trying to get a full measure of the impact of this night’s raid on the monsters. The news would be good, all of them fully suspected. Several other monsters in addition to the two leaders had been slain, but they, even the three giants, were not overly important, not compared to the giant leader and the powrie leader—and especially given the fact that Maiyer Dek had been the one to kill Kos-kosio, and in full view of many powrie allies! Before the coming of the demon dactyl, giants and powries had rarely allied, indeed had hated each other as much as each hated the humans. Bestesbulzibar had halted that feud, and with the fall of the demon, the alliance had only continued out of necessity, since both armies were deep into the human lands.

But it was a strained thing, an alliance waiting for an excuse that it might turn into a feud.

“If we had convinced Maiyer Dek to join with us, we could not have gotten him to aid us any more than he did,” Elbryan remarked with a chuckle. “My hopes soared when I saw him throw the powrie leader into the fire.”

“And with Maiyer Dek and three of his giant kin dead,” Pony added, “we can expect that the powries, angry at the giants, now have the clear upper hand.”

“Except that goblins are more friendly to giants than to the wicked dwarves,” Tomas Gingerwart noted. “Even though giants often eat them!”

“True enough,” Elbryan admitted. “Perhaps the sides are fairly equal, then, for Caer Tinella was swarming with the wretched goblins. But unless one of great charm can be found among the ranks, and quickly, I suspect the fighting in the town has only just begun.”

“Here’s hoping they kill each other to the last,” Belster O’Comely said, lifting a mug of ale—compliments of Roger Lockless—into the air, then taking a tremendous swallow, draining the mug.

“So they are weaker, and our force has grown by a score ready to fight,” Tomas put in.

“A score ready to help the others get past the towns and to the southland,” Elbryan corrected. “We, all of us, have seen enough battle.”

“To Palmaris!” Belster roared, finishing with aloud belch.

Tomas Gingerwart was not amused. “A month ago, even a week ago, even two days ago, I would have been satisfied with that,” he explained. “But Caer Tinella is our home, and if our enemies are truly weakened, it may be time for us to reclaim the town. That was the plan, was it not? To wait until we took a measure of our enemies and then strike?”

Elbryan and Pony exchanged nervous glances, then looked back to the resolute man, truly empathizing with his desires.

“This is a discussion for later,” the ranger said calmly. “We do not know how strongly the monsters remain entrenched in Caer Tinella.”

Tomas snorted. “You got in,” he said. “How much more devastating might the raid have been if all of our warriors were there to fight beside you?”

“Devastating to both sides, I fear,” Pony replied. “We stung the monsters and freed the prisoners only because of the element of surprise. If Maiyer Dek had seen a greater force approaching, he would have ordered every one of the captured men slain, and the defense of Caer Tinella would have been more stubborn by far.”

Tomas snorted again, not wanting to hear the negative posturing. By his thinking, if Elbryan and Pony, their little unseen friend Juraviel and Roger Lockless, could exact such a toll, then he and his warriors could finish the task

Elbryan and Pony looked to each other again, and silently agreed to let it go at that. They understood Tomas’s feelings, recognized that he had to believe that his home was not lost to him, and they both trusted that the man was sensible enough to listen to their argument if skirting the town and running to the south seemed the more prudent move.

Belster O’Comely, fearing mounting tension, led the discussion in another direction then, pondering the fate of the monstrous army across all the lands. “If we’ve been hitting at them so hard here, then it seems to me that others are taking them down, as well,” he said. “Ho, but I’ll be back in the Howling Sheila in Dundalis in the next spring, I’m betting!” he finished, then filled and drained his mug once again.

“It is possible,” the ranger said earnestly, his optimism surprising Pony. “If the monstrous army disintegrates, the King will wish the Timberlands quickly reclaimed.”

“And Sheila will howl again!” Belster roared, for in his drink-induced state, he had forgotten all pledges to live out his life quietly in the safety of Palmaris. His excitement brought others over to the campfire, most bearing foodstuffs and beverages.

The conversation took a lighthearted turn then, became the retelling of anecdotes from happier times, before the monstrous invasion, and what had started as a serious wait for important information became a sort of victory celebration. Elbryan and Pony said little, preferring to sit back and listen to the chatter of the others, often looking to each other and nodding. They had already arranged a meeting with Juraviel at the break of dawn in the meadow by the pines, and after they heard what the elf had to say, after they came to understand the truth of their enemy’s strength in the two towns, they could make their decisions.

The night deepened, the fires burned low, and most of the folk retired to their bedrolls. Finally, only an hour before the dawn, the scouts returned, led by an exuberant Roger Lockless. “All the giants are gone,” the young man proclaimed. “Every one! Driven off by the powries—and they hardly even put up a fight!”

“They did not want to be here in the first place,” Pony reasoned. “They prefer their holes in the steep mountains of the Wilderlands.”

Tomas Gingerwart gave a shout of victory.

“And what of the goblins?” Elbryan asked calmly, interrupting the celebration before it could begin. He didn’t want Roger’s excitement to steal the moment and lead Tomas and all the refugees down a course to absolute destruction. Even without giants, the remaining powries might prove too formidable.

“There was a fight and some were killed,” Roger replied, not missing a beat. “Others went scattering into the forest.”

“And still others remained with the powries,” Elbryan reasoned.

“Yes, but—”

“And few, very few, powries were killed?” the ranger pressed.

“The goblins who remained will flee at first sign of battle,” Roger said confidently. “They only stay because they’re afraid of the bloody caps.”

“Armies have won great victories inspired purely by fear,” Pony said dryly.

Roger glared at her. “They are ready to be taken,” he said evenly.

“We are a long way from making such a claim,” the ranger was quick to reply, pointedly cutting off Tomas Gingerwart with an upraised hand as he spoke. Elbryan rose to stand before Roger. “Our responsibilities are too great to make such a quick judgment.”

“As you made when you went into Caer Tinella alone?” the young man spat back.

“I did what I thought necessary,” Elbryan replied quietly, calmly. He could feel the gazes of many people settling on him and Roger, and any conflict between them would obviously prove a source of great discomfort. These people had come to trust and love Roger Lockless, and he had truly done much for them in the weeks of their exile. But if he was wrong now, if he was letting his desire to lead the folk to victory overrule good sense, then all of his previous exploits would be for naught, for all of the refugees would likely soon be dead.

“As did I in rescuing the thirty captured soldiers!” Roger said forcefully, and loudly.

“All by yourself?” Pony had to put in.

Elbryan put up his hand, quieting Pony, quieting all about him.

“It is too early to make the judgment of whether to attack the towns or circumvent them,” he announced. “We will know more, much more, with the light of day.” The ranger, thinking and hoping that the discussion was finished then, turned and started away.

“We take back Caer Tinella,” Roger Lockless declared, and there were more than a few agreeing calls. “And Landsdown,” the young man went on. “And when we have the towns in our possession once more, we send word to Palmaris, that the King’s army might reinforce our position.”

“The Kingsmen will not come this far north,” Pony argued. “Or at least, that is not something upon which we should stake our entire existence. Not yet. Not while Palmaris is under threat of invasion.”

“How can you know?” Roger asked sternly.

“I served in the King’s army,” Pony admitted. “In the Kingsmen and in the Coastpoint Guards. I understand their priorities, and I can assure you that measured against the value of Palmaris, second city of Honce-the-Bear and the gateway of the Masur Delaval, Caer Tinella and Landsdown are not among those priorities. If Palmaris falls, then the way is open all the way to the King’s seat in Ursal.”

That took a bit of Roger’s bluster away. He fidgeted for a few moments, thinking up a retort, but before he could deliver it, Tomas Gingerwart cut in. “We are all weary,” the man said loudly, commanding the attention of all nearby. “It is said that good news can be as tiring as bad, and either as tiring as a week of hard work.”

“Oh, true enough,” Belster O’Comely agreed.

“So our spirits are heightened, our thoughts hopeful,” Tomas went on. “But the ranger and Jilseponie are correct. This is not the time to decide.”

“Our enemies are disorganized and reeling,” Roger argued.

“As they will remain, for another day at least,” Tomas answered bluntly. “We’ll not attack the towns in the light of day anyway, so let us get our rest now, and hopefully we will see things more clearly in the morning.”

Elbryan locked gazes with Tomas and nodded, sincerely grateful that the man had taken such levelheaded control. Then he motioned to Pony and the pair walked off, heading for the pines and the meadow, and a clearer picture of what remained of their adversaries.

Roger Lockless waited in the camp for a short while, then, when no one was paying much attention to him, he stole away, on the trail of the ranger and the woman and, he knew, their private scout.

He caught up to Elbryan and Pony in a meadow lined with pine trees, and blushed deeply, reconsidering his course, when the man and woman embraced each other and kissed passionately. Roger breathed easier when they broke off the clench.

If he had examined his feelings a bit more closely, and more honestly, Roger would have realized that the kiss bothered him more than it should have, that not only did he not wish to spy on such a private moment, but especially not one involving this beautiful woman. But Roger wasn’t capable of that level of introspection where these two newcomers were concerned, not yet, and so, seeing the embrace finished, he crept closer into position, and was not surprised in the least when a melodious voice came down to the pair from the branches of a nearby pine.

“Fortune favored us this night,” Juraviel explained. “For the giants are gone, all of them, and a fair number of goblins, too. The only better scenario would have been an open brawl between the giants and the powries.”

“But that did not happen,” Elbryan replied. “Thus, we must assume that the powrie force is still considerable.”

“Indeed it is,” Juraviel confirmed. “Though their leader has been roasted!”

“The folk wish to attack Caer Tinella, to reclaim it as their home,” Pony put in.

“Is that not correct, Roger Lockless?” Elbryan added, recognizing that the young man was about.

Roger went even lower to the ground, put his face right in the grass.

“I do grow weary of this one’s spying,” Juraviel remarked, fluttering down from the tree.

“Well, come out, then,” said Pony. “Since you wished to hear what we would say, you should at least join in the conversation.”

Roger told himself repeatedly that there was no way these three could see him, no way that Elbryan and Pony could know, without doubt, that he had followed them.

“Stay with your face buried in the grass, then,” Elbryan said with a chuckle. “I am against the attack,” he offered to Juraviel.

“And with good reason,” the elf replied. “If the war was still a stalemate, then we might consider striking such a blow. But I doubt that Caer Tinella serves as anything more than a temporary home for the powries and few goblins that remain. Certainly, it is not a supply base for any coordinated monstrous force. I see nothing to gain by attacking—the thought of reclaiming and holding the town at this point is purely foolhardy—and everything to lose. Let us not underestimate the strength of the force remaining in Caer Tinella.”

“I think it wiser to skirt the town and flee to the southland,” Elbryan added.

“It is likely that the road south will prove open all the way to Palmaris,” Juraviel replied. “Though how long it will remain that way, I cannot say.”

“Convincing the townsfolk to abandon their homes will not be easy,” Pony explained.

“But we shall,” Elbryan assured her. He looked in the direction of Roger Lockless as he spoke, thinking that the proclamation might at last bring the lad from hiding.

“Perhaps you cared not for your own home!” the young man said, jumping up and storming across to face the ranger. “But we are loyal to Caer Tinella!”

“And so you shall return to Caer Tinella,” Elbryan said calmly. “This war will not last much longer, and as soon as the region about Palmaris is declared secure, then I expect the King to send the army north.”

“And what will they find?” Roger said, moving right up to the much larger Elbryan. “Burned-out skeletons of our homes?”

“Rebuild,” Elbryan calmly replied.

Roger scoffed at the notion.

“Our own home of Dundalis was sacked years ago,” Pony said.

“Then it was rebuilt, by Belster and his companions. And now it has been sacked again.”

“And so it shall be built again,” Elbryan said resolutely. “Houses can be put back up; people are forever lost.”

“My own family was lost in such a raid,” Pony said, taking the young man gently by the elbow.

“And my own,” Elbryan added. “And all of our friends.”

Roger’s visage softened for just a moment as he regarded Pony, but then he pulled away, anger again filling his eyes. “Tell me not of your grief,” he snapped. “I know all about losing family and friends. And I am not afraid now. The dwarves are in Caer Tinella, my home, and so I shall go there and get rid of them, every one! You delayed this, but after the success of our attack, you cannot stop it. The folk will follow me, Nightbird,” he said, poking himself in the chest. “You think yourself the leader, but it was Roger Lockless, not you, who rescued the prisoners in the last raid, just as it has been Roger Lockless all along, feeding the folk, stealing right from under the big nose of stupid Kos-kosio Begulne. Me!” he yelled, poking his chest again. “And you will not steer them away from Caer Tinella. They will follow me.”

“To their doom,” the ranger said evenly. “Is this about Caer Tinella, Roger, or is it about who leads?”

Roger waved a hand at him dismissively. “We’re not done with this, Nightbird,” he said, spitting the elvish title with contempt, and he turned and walked back across the field.

Pony started to follow, her face tight with anger, but Elbryan held up his arm to stop her. “He is young and confused,” the ranger explained. “He thought he had his place carved out among the folk, and then we came along.”

“He was never formally a leader of the group,” said Juraviel. “That lies more to Tomas Gingerwart and Belster O’Comely. Roger was, rather, working outside the limits of the band. Your arrival should not have affected that role.”

“In his own mind, he was the hero of the group,” Pony reasoned.

“He is indeed,” Elbryan corrected.

“Agreed,” said Juraviel. “But he does not understand that there is room for others.”

“Roger Lockless!” Elbryan called loudly.

Roger, at the far edge of the meadow, stopped in his tracks and turned about.

“This must be settled, here and now,” the ranger called. “For the good of all the folk.” Even as he spoke the words with determination, though, his expression revealed his trepidation. “Give Juraviel your sword,” he instructed Pony with a weary sigh.

The woman considered the request, and the look on her lover’s face. “Now is not the time,” she replied.

“It has to be,” the ranger said. “Give Juraviel your sword.” He paused and looked from Pony to the approaching Roger, trying to get an even deeper measure of Roger’s motivations. “And be gone from here,” he added to Pony. “You should not be a witness to this. For his sake.”

Pony slid her small sword from its sheath and handed it to the elf, all the while staring Elbryan in the eye. “If you hurt him . . .” she warned, and she turned and walked into the cover of the pines. Elbryan was wise enough to worry when Pony left a threat unfinished.

“Be careful,” Juraviel cautioned. “There may be grim consequences if you take all of the man’s dignity.”

“I hope it does not come to that,” Elbryan said sincerely. “For I do indeed fear the consequences. But this split cannot continue between us. We cannot ask folk in so desperate a situation to make a choice between Roger and me.”

“You think Roger will listen to you?”

“I will make Roger listen to me,” Elbryan assured him.

“You walk a fine line here, Nightbird,” the elf said.

“A line that you and Tuntun showed me well,” the ranger replied.

Juraviel nodded, conceding the point. “Make him start it,” the elf advised. “If it is to happen.”

Elbryan nodded and then straightened as Roger, bold as ever, strode defiantly to stand right before him.

“I grow weary of our bickering, Roger Lockless, who claims leadership of the group,” Elbryan called. “In the last raid on Caer Tinella, we showed that we can work well together.”

“We showed that my priorities, and not your own, are for the betterment of the folk,” the young man replied.

Elbryan took the insult in stride, recognizing the frustration behind it. “We both served valuable functions in the town,” he said quietly and calmly. “You freed the prisoners, and for that, all of us, myself included, are indeed grateful. And I defeated Maiyer Dek a blow from which our enemies will not soon recover.”

“But I could have accomplished my task all the more easily if you were not there!” the young man said accusingly. “Yet did you even ask me to go? Where my skills were the ones most needed, did the great Nightbird even inquire if I might be interested in the mission?”

“I did not even know that they held prisoners,” the ranger replied honestly. “Else my plan would have been greatly different”

“Your plan,” Roger spat. “Since you arrived I have heard nothing but your plans!”

“And are we not better off?”

Again Roger spat, this time on Elbryan’s feet “I do not need you, Nightbird,” he sneered.” I wish that you and your strange little friend would just disappear into the forest”

“But not Jilseponie,” Juraviel noted.

Roger’s face turned red. “Her, too!” he said unconvincingly.

Elbryan realized that it would be better to get off of this delicate subject. “But we are not leaving,” he said. “Not until the folk are safe in Palmaris, or until the army has marched north to reclaim the towns. I am a fact of your life, Roger Lockless. And if I am put in a position of leadership, one that I have earned through my work in the northland and through my experience, then know that I will not abandon that position for the sake of your foolish pride.”

Roger moved as if to strike out, but held his anger, though his face continued to flush.

“My responsibility is to them, not to you,” Elbryan calmly explained. “There is a place for you among this band, a very valuable place.”

“As your lackey?”

“But know this,” the ranger went on, ignoring the foolish comment, “I will argue against any fight for Caer Tinella at this time. Fleeing from the area is the proper course for the folk, and I expect and demand that you will support me in this decision.”

Roger eyed the man directly, obviously surprised that the ranger had presumed to give him a direct command.

“I will accept nothing less from you, Roger Lockless.”

“You threaten me? As did Pon . . . Jilseponie with her stupid curse?”

“I tell you the truth, and nothing less,” Elbryan replied. “This is too important—”

Before the ranger could finish, Roger exploded into motion, launching a punch at his jaw. Not surprised in the least, Elbryan knifed a hand up in front of his face and pushed it out slightly, just enough to deflect Roger’s blow harmlessly wide of the mark. The ranger’s open hand then shot forward, slapping Roger hard across the face, staggering him backward.

Roger drew out a dagger and started forward, but skidded to a quick stop, facing the angry glow of Tempest.

“A fight between us would be pointless,” the ranger said. “You have admitted that you have never killed, yet, regrettably, I have lived by the sword for along, long time.” That said, Elbryan calmly sheathed Tempest.

“I can fight!” Roger yelled at him.

“I do not doubt that,” Elbryan replied. “But your real talents lay elsewhere, in scouting, in hindering our enemy with your wits.”

“Wits you apparently do not trust with any important decision!”

Elbryan shook his head. “This is battle, not thievery.”

“And I am nothing more than a common thief?”

“You act now like a spoiled child,” the ranger said. “If you attack me, and kill me, or if I kill you, then what might be the cost to those folk who look to us two to lead them?”

“I do not wish to kill you,” Roger informed him. “Only to hurt you!” And on he came, dagger extended.

Elbryan’s left hand slapped out right under the blade, catching Roger by the forearm. Before the young man could react, the ranger whipped his free hand across in front of him and brought his left, and Roger’s arm, across the other way. Roger felt a sting in his hand, and then suddenly he was free. He caught his balance immediately and tried to come up with a countering strike, but noticed he was no longer holding the dagger, that Elbryan held it in his right hand.

The ranger’s left shot out, slapping Roger three times in rapid succession. “You care to try again?” Elbryan asked, flipping the knife back to Roger’s nimble grasp.

“Dignity,” Juraviel whispered behind the ranger.

Realizing that he might be pushing this too far, that he was insulting the young man, Elbryan reached back and took Pony’s sword from Juraviel, then turned and threw it so it stuck in the ground at Roger’s feet. “If you wish to continue this, then take up a real weapon,” he said.

Roger reached for the sword, then hesitated, looking up to match the ranger’s gaze. “I can fight,” he said. “But these are your weapons, and not mine. You offer me Pony’s ordinary and small sword, while you wield the magical blade—”

Before he could finish his protest, Elbryan, in one fluid movement, drew out Tempest and stuck it in the ground next to Pony’s sword, then took the other sword in hand.

“This will be finished, here and now,” the ranger said evenly. “It should be so without a fight, but if that is what it takes . . .

“Pick up the weapon, Roger Lockless,” Elbryan said. “Or do not. But either way, understand that in the matter of Caer Tinella, my decision shall stand. And that decision is to bypass the town, and Landsdown, as well, and get these folk to the safety of Palmaris.”

Roger was hardly listening to anything beyond the ranger’s first sentence. This was not about Caer Tinella, it was about pride. It was about a position of leadership that Roger thought he deserved, and it was about a woman—

Roger stopped his train of thought, not willing to go there. He glanced up at Elbryan only briefly, then put his hand about the crafted hilt of Tempest, the silverel pommel wrapped in blue leather. This was about his passage to manhood, he decided, about his courage or fear, about being in control or being controlled— and not by Elbryan, but by his own cowardice.

He pulled the blade from the ground and fell back to a balanced stance, Tempest at the ready.

“First blood?” he asked.

“Until one yields,” Juraviel explained, to Roger’s surprise. Under the normal guidelines, the sword etiquette, first blood would put an end to such a challenge, but in this instance Juraviel wanted to make certain that Roger Lockless learned a valuable lesson.

Elbryan held his ground calmly; he could tell from Roger’s expression that the impatient young man would strike first and strike hard. Predictably, Roger charged, skidding up short and launching Tempest in a wide-swinging arc.

Elbryan reached across his body with the blade of his sword inverted, angled down. As Tempest connected, the ranger skillfully “caught” the sword with his own blade and retracted his arm to somewhat absorb the shock of the strike—else, he feared, Tempest might have shorn his blade in two! Then the ranger smoothly turned his blade up, lifting his hand as he went so that Roger’s attack sailed harmlessly high.

Elbryan could have stepped ahead then, and with a short stroke ended the fight. He started to make that exact move, but remembered Juraviel’s warning and stepped back instead.

On came Roger, not even realizing that he had already lost the contest. The young man’s sword work this time was more deceptive, Tempest stabbing for Elbryan up high, then down low, then low again, and, after a feint up high, low a third time in succession.

Elbryan simply moved his head to avoid the first attack, slapped at the blade once and again to defeat the next two, then hopped the last. Now the ranger did counter, coming forward suddenly as soon as he landed from his slight jump and swinging at Roger in a wide arc, allowing the young man the time to get Tempest in the way to parry.

Elbryan worked furiously, in widely exaggerated and clearly revealed moves, and nimble Roger easily picked off each attack, even managed to counter on two occasions, the first surprising Elbryan and almost slipping through his defenses. The ranger recovered quickly, though, slapping his free hand against the flat of Tempest’s blade, though he did get a slight nick on the side of his hand in the process.

“In a contest of first blood, I already won,” Roger bragged.

The ranger sublimated his pride and let the insult pass. He had no time nor desire for such taunting games, for he had to focus on the challenge of this particular fight—not concerning whether he would win or lose, but to make sure that neither he nor Roger was injured in the process. Elbryan had to choreograph this one perfectly.

Another flurry ensued, the two men slapping their swords repeatedly in the air between them, picking off each other’s blows, with Roger gradually gaining an advantage, the ranger backing steadily. Spurred by the gain, Roger pressed onward even more forcefully, launching Tempest in mighty swings, inadvertently opening his defenses.

Elbryan did not take any of those openings, just continued to back, and to bend a bit, allowing the smaller man to rise above him.

Roger yelped with satisfaction and came on hard, slashing Tempest in a downward, diagonal manner.

Up came the ranger, flipping his sword to his left hand and parrying strong, then, in the blink of an eye, turning the blade right over Roger’s halted sword, then driving the tip back under, and whipping the blades out wide so forcefully that Tempest flew from Roger’s grasp. Elbryan let his own blade fall free, as well.

The young man dove for the sword; Elbryan dove right in front of him, rolling a somersault, pivoting as he landed and coming right back in. As Roger reached for the sword, his right arm was jerked back, bent at the elbow, Elbryan’s right arm sliding under it. Before the young man could react with his free left arm, Elbryan’s left slipped under his armpit, then up and around the back of Roger’s neck. At the same time, the ranger stepped one leg past Roger and jerked him to the side, over his knee. They went down hard, Elbryan on top of Roger, the young man’s arms helplessly pinned behind his back.

“Yield,” the ranger instructed.

“Not fair,” Roger complained.

Elbryan stood up, hauling Roger to his feet with him, then released him, shoving him forward. Roger immediately went for Tempest.

Elbryan started a silent call to the sword, which would have floated it back to his hand, but decided against the move, letting Roger retrieve the blade, then spin, facing him squarely.

“Not fair,” Roger gasped again. “This is a sword fight, not a contest of wrestling strength.”

“The hold was merely a continuation of the swordplay,” Elbryan replied. “Would you have preferred getting stuck with a sword?”

“You could not!” Roger argued. “Your parry cost us both our weapons!”

Elbryan turned to Juraviel, and saw that the elf recognized the truth of the situation, that he had fairly won. But the elf said, “The lad is correct,” and Elbryan, seeing that Roger had learned no lesson here, understood and approved. “Thus the fight is not ended.”

“Go and retrieve your sword,” Roger said to Elbryan.

“No need,” Juraviel interjected, and his tone was a bit too jovial for Elbryan’s liking. “The swords were dropped and you were the first to retrieve. Take the advantage, young Roger!”

Elbryan glared at Juraviel, thinking the elf might be pushing things a bit.

Roger came ahead three steps, sword raised in line with Elbryan’s face. “Yield,” the young man said, smiling widely.

“Because you have the advantage?” Elbryan replied. “As you had with the dagger?”

The poignant reminder sent Roger leaping ahead, but the ranger sprang out, too, soaring in a dive right past Roger, spinning up to his feet and scrambling to his sword before the young man could reverse direction and catch up.

Roger charged right in, though, furious at his own mistake, swinging wildly. Metal rang against metal many, many times, Elbryan neatly picking off every blow.

Fast tiring, Roger tried one of the ranger’s tricks, flipping Tempest to his left hand and slashing in.

Elbryan’s backhand parry nearly knocked him in a complete circle, and when Roger recovered, raising Tempest defensively before him, he found that the ranger was not there.

And then he felt the tip of a sword against the back of his neck.

“Yield,” Elbryan instructed.

Roger tensed, calculating a move, but Elbryan only dug the tip in a bit deeper, ending any such thoughts.

Roger threw Tempest to the ground and stepped away, turning an angry glare on the ranger—a look that grew even darker when Elbryan unexpectedly started laughing.

“Well fought!” the ranger congratulated. “I did not think you would be so strong with the blade. It seems that you are a man of many talents, Roger Lockless.”

“You easily defeated me,” the young man spat back.

Elbryan’s smile was unrelenting. “Not as easily as you might believe,” he said, and he looked to Juraviel. “The shadow dive,” he explained.

“Indeed,” replied the elf, cuing in to the ranger’s reference, remembering when he had seen Elbryan beaten on the sparring field by Tallareyish Issinshine, the elf using just such a move. “It is a move that will work two out of three times,” Juraviel went on, speaking to Roger. “Or at least, in two out of three attempts, it will not bring absolute disaster.”

Juraviel turned back to Elbryan. “It does not do my old heart well to see you, Nightbird, whom we elves trained to the highest levels, forced to resort to such a desperate maneuver to save defeat at the hands of a mere child!” he scolded.

Elbryan and the elf looked to Roger, both thinking they had done well here, that the issue about the towns, and the pecking order between the two of them, had been settled.

Roger glowered at the ranger and the elf for a few moments, then spat on the ground at Elbryan’s feet, turned and stormed away.

Elbryan gave a great sigh. “He is not an easy one to convince,” he said.

“Perhaps he recognized your deception as easily as did I,” Juraviel reasoned.

“What deception?”

“You could have beaten him at any time, in any manner,” the elf stated bluntly.

“Two out of three,” the ranger corrected.

“When you fought Tallareyish, perhaps,” Juraviel was quick to answer. “In that instance, however, Tallareyish’s maneuver had been wrought purely of desperation, for you had clearly gained the upper hand.”

“And this time?”

“This time the shadow dive was used for no better reason than to save some of Roger’s dignity, a tactic I am not certain will prove effective.”

“But—” Elbryan started to protest, for Juraviel had bade him do just that before the fight began.

“Just take care that your ‘lesson’ doesn’t impart a false sense of ability in Roger,” the elf warned. “If he goes into battle against a powrie, he’ll not likely come out of it alive.”

Elbryan conceded that point, looking to the place where Roger had exited the field. That seemed the least of their troubles, however, for, given Roger’s attitude, it seemed it would not be easy to convince the folk to go around the two occupied towns.

“Go and give Pony back her blade,” Juraviel instructed.

Too caught up in the moment, trying to figure out how he might better correct this situation with Roger, Elbryan didn’t even reply, just retrieved and sheathed Tempest and walked off into the night.

“While I go and have a talk with Roger Lockless,” Juraviel finished under his breath when the ranger had walked away.

The elf caught up with Roger soon after, in a root-strewn clearing beneath the heavy boughs of a wide-spreading elm tree.

“Etiquette and simple good manners would have demanded that you congratulate the winner,” Juraviel explained, lighting on a branch right above the young man.

“Be gone, elf,” Roger replied.

Juraviel hopped down to the ground right in front of the young man. “Be gone?” he echoed incredulously.

“Now!”

“Save your threats, Roger Lockless,” the elf answered calmly. “I have seen you fight and am not impressed.”

“I brought your wonderful Nightbird to a near standstill.”

“He could have beaten you at any time,” the elf interrupted. “You know that.”

Roger straightened up, and though he was not tall by human standards, he still towered over the elf.

“Nightbird is as strong as any man alive,” the elf went on. “And, trained by the Touel’alfar, he is as nimble with the blade as any. He is the complete warrior, and could have turned your own blade back in your face, had he so chosen. Or he might have simply caught your arm and crushed it in his iron grasp.”

“So says his lackey elf!” Roger cried.

Juraviel scoffed at the absurdity of the statement. “Have you already forgotten your first fight?”

Roger’s expression screwed up with curiosity.

“What happened when you went at Nightbird with the dagger?” the elf asked. “Is that not proof enough?”

A thoroughly frustrated Roger punched out at Juraviel. The elf stepped inside the blow, caught Roger by the wrist, then went right behind the young man, turning Roger’s arm behind his back and grabbing him by the hair with his free hand. A tug on both arm and hair had Roger turning about, and Juraviel promptly slammed his face into the trunk of the elm.

“I am not Nightbird,” Juraviel warned. “I am not human, and hold little compassion for fools!” With that, Juraviel slammed Roger into the tree once more, then spun the man about and hit him with a backhand that sat him on the ground.

“You know the truth, Roger Lockless,” he scolded. “You know that Nightbird is your better in these matters, and that his judgment concerning our course should be heeded. Yet you are so blinded by your own foolish pride that you will doom your own people before admitting it!”

“Pride?” Roger yelled back “Was it not Roger Lockless who went into Caer Tinella to rescue—”

“And why did Roger Lockless go into Caer Tinella?” Juraviel interrupted. “On both occasions. For the sake of the poor prisoners, or out of fear that he would be upstaged by this new hero?”

Roger stuttered over a response, but Juraviel wasn’t listening anyway. “He could have beaten you at any moment, in any manner,” the elf said again, and then he turned and walked away, leaving battered Roger sitting under the elm tree.

CHAPTER 16

To the Father Abbot’s Amusement

“Abbot Dobrinion grows increasingly uneasy,” Brother Francis offered to Father Abbot Markwart. The younger monk was obviously agitated; every word that came from him was strained, for in speaking them, Brother Francis was caught somewhere between fear and horror. Of course Abbot Dobrinion was uneasy, he realized, for they were torturing the abbot’s subjects in the very dungeons of this holy place!

“It is not my place to say, perhaps,” Francis went on, pausing often, trying to gauge impassive Markwart’s reaction, “but I fear—”

“That St. Precious is not friendly to our cause,” the Father Abbot finished for him.

“Forgive me,” Brother Francis humbly said.

“Forgive?” Markwart echoed incredulously. “Forgive your perceptiveness? Your wariness? We are at war, my young fool. Have you not yet realized that?”

“Of course, Father Abbot,” Francis said, bowing his head. “The powries and goblins—”

“Forget them!” Markwart interrupted. “And forget the giants, and the dactyl demon, as well. This war has become much more dangerous than any matter concerning mere monsters.”

Brother Francis lifted his head and stared long and hard at Markwart.

“This is a war for the heart of the Abellican Church,” Markwart went on. “I have explained this over and over to you, and yet you still do not understand. This is a war between traditions which have stood for millennia, and usurpous ideas, petty contemporary beliefs concerning the nature of good and the nature of evil.”

“Are those not timeless concepts?” a very confused Brother Francis dared to ask

“Of course,” Markwart replied with a disarming chuckle. “But some, Master Jojonah among them, seem to believe they can redefine the terms to fit their own perceptions.”

“And what of Abbot Dobrinion?”

“You tell me of Abbot Dobrinion,” Markwart instructed.

Brother Francis paused, contemplating the implications. He wasn’t quite sure how the Father Abbot viewed Dobrinion, or anyone else, for that matter. Back at St.-Mere-Abelle, Markwart had argued often with Master De’Unnero, and often violently, and yet, despite their differences, it was no secret that De’Unnero was the Father Abbot’s closest adviser, next to Francis himself.

“Brother Avelyn the heretic used to analyze every question,” Father Abbot Markwart remarked. “He could not simply speak what was in his heart, and that, I fear, was his undoing.”

“Abbot Dobrinion will fight us,” Brother Francis blurted. “I do not trust him, and think him more akin to Master Jojonah’s definitions of good and evil than to yours . . . ours.”

“Strong words,” Markwart said slyly.

Brother Francis paled.

“But not wholly untrue,” Markwart went on, and Francis breathed easier. “Abbot Dobrinion has ever been an idealist, even when those ideals fly in the face of pragmatism. I thought that his craving for the sainthood of Brother Allabarnet would allow me to keep him in line, but apparently he is possessed of greater weakness than I believed.”

“He will fight us,” Brother Francis said more firmly.

“Even as we speak, Abbot Dobrinion petitions for the release of the Chilichunks,” Markwart explained. “He will go to the Baron of Palmaris, likely to the King himself, and of course, to the other abbots.”

“Have we a right to hold them?” Brother Francis dared to ask

“Is the Abellican Order more important than the fate of three people?” came the curt response.

“Yes, Father Abbot,” Brother Francis replied, bowing his head once more. When Markwart put it that simple way, it was easy for Francis to put aside his private feelings about the treatment of the prisoners. Indeed the stakes were high here, too high for him to let foolish compassion get in the way.

“And what, then, shall we do?” the Father Abbot asked, though it was obvious to Brother Francis that the old man had already made up his mind.

Again Brother Francis hesitated, thinking through the problem. “An Abbot College,” he began, referring to the gathering of all the Church hierarchy, a process necessary if the Father Abbot meant to remove Abbot Dobrinion.

“There will indeed be such a gathering,” Markwart replied. “But it will not convene until mid-Calember.”

Brother Francis considered the words. Calember was the eleventh month, still more than four months away. “Then we must leave St. Precious at once,” he reasoned at length, guessing, correctly, that the Father Abbot was fast running out of patience with him. “We must take our prisoners to St.-Mere-Abelle, where Abbot Dobrinion shall have no say in their treatment.”

“Well spoken,” Markwart congratulated. “Indeed, we must be gone from St. Precious tomorrow, the centaur and the Chilichunks in tow. See to the arrangements, and plot our paths.”

“A straight run,” Brother Francis assured him.

“And make it public, very much so, that we are leaving,” the Father Abbot went on. “And see to it that Connor Bildeborough is taken, as well, for that is news which will spread wide.”

Brother Francis wore a doubting expression. “That may invite trouble from the crown,” he warned.

“And if so, we will release him,” Markwart replied. “Until that happens, the gossip may reach the ears of the woman we seek.”

“But may not care about Bildeborough,” Brother Francis reasoned. “Their union was short, and unpleasant, so it is said.”

“But she will come for the Chilichunks,” Markwart explained. “And for that ugly half-horse creature. The arrest of Master Bildeborough will only serve to publicize our other prisoners.”

Brother Francis considered the reasoning for a moment, then nodded. “And what of Abbot Dobrinion?” he asked.

“A smaller thorn than you would believe,” Markwart replied quickly, and it seemed to Francis that the man already had a plan in mind for the venerable abbot of St. Precious.

Connor Bildeborough paced the small room—a rented flat in the lower section of Palmaris. Though the man was of noble blood, he preferred the excitement of the docks and the rougher taverns. The only adventure he found at his uncle’s palace was the occasional fox hunt, and those he considered foolish, an ego-propping exercise that did not even qualify, in his mind, as sport. No, Connor, quick with his wits and quick with his sword, preferred a good fight in a tavern, or a brush with would-be muggers in a dark alleyway.

To that end, he had been spending a considerable amount of time in the fields north of Palmaris, trying to earn a warrior’s reputation in skirmishes with the many monsters to be found up there. His uncle had presented him with a magnificent gift at the outset of the war, a slender sword of unmatched craftsmanship. Its blade gleamed of some silvery metal that could not be identified, and inset along its golden basket pommel were several tiny magical magnetites so the weapon could be used beautifully for parrying, practically attracting an opponent’s blade. Its name was Defender, and where his uncle had ever found such a blade, Connor could not know. The rumors about the sword were many, and impossible to confirm. Most agreed it had been forged in the smithies of the first King of Honce-the-Bear—some said by a cunning powrie who had deserted its kindred on the Weathered Isles. Other tales claimed that the mysterious Touel’alfar had helped in its creation, and still others claimed that both races had played a role, along with the best human weaponsmiths of the day.

Whatever the truth of the blade’s origins, Connor understood that he now possessed a most extraordinary weapon. With Defender in hand, just a week before he had led a contingent of Kingsmen against a horde of powerful giants, and though the results had been somewhat disastrous—as can be expected in a fight with giants—Connor had done quite well, could even claim two kills by his sword. What glories he had found in the north!

Now, though, in this room with his good friend Abbot Dobrinion, Connor understood that he should be keeping his attention a bit closer to home.

“It is about Jill,” the abbot insisted. “Father Abbot Markwart believes she is in possession of the gemstone cache which was stolen from St.-Mere-Abelle.”

Jill. The name hit Connor bard, tugged at his memories and at his heart. He had courted her for months, wonderful months, only to have their marriage disintegrate in a matter of hours. When Jill had refused him his marital rights of consummation, Connor could have demanded her death.

But of course he could not have done that, for he had indeed loved the spirited, though troubled, woman. He had settled for the judgment that she should be indentured to the King’s army, and how his heart had broken when his Jilly left Palmaris.

“I had heard that she was far, far away,” the young nobleman said somberly. “In Pireth Tulme, or Pireth Danard, serving in the Coastpoint Guards.”

“So she may be,” Abbot Dobrinion conceded. “Who can tell? The Father Abbot is searching for her, and believes she was in the north, back in Dundalis, and even farther, accompanied by Avelyn of St.-Mere-Abelle, who stole the sacred gemstones.”

“Do you know this man?” Connor asked suddenly, again wondering about this first monk who had visited Pettibwa Chilichunk.

“Never met him,” Abbot Dobrinion replied.

“A description, then?” Connor pressed.

“A large man, big of bone and, they believe, big of belly, as well,” the abbot replied. “So said Master Jojonah.”

Connor nodded, digesting the information. The monk who had visited with Pettibwa was indeed large, of bone and of belly. Could it be that Jill had come back through Palmaris in this man’s company? Could Jilly, his Jilly, have been so close, without him ever knowing it?

“The woman is in trouble, Connor, very great trouble,” Abbot Dobrinion remarked gravely. “And if you know anything concerning her, where she might be, or if she is indeed in possession of the stones, the Father Abbot will seek you out. And his techniques of interrogation are not pleasant.”

“How could I know anything about Jill?” Connor replied incredulously. “The last time I saw her was at her trial, when she was sent away to join the King’s army.” His statement was true enough—the last time he had seen Jill was on the occasion of their annulment, and her indenture—but of late Connor had traveled out of Palmaris often, to the north to do battle, to make a name for himself in what many agreed were the waning days of the war. He had heard tales of a rogue band operating farther to the north, near the towns of Caer Tinella and Landsdown, using tactics and magic to wreak havoc with the monsters. Might Jill and the monk Avelyn, with their stolen gemstones, be the source of that magic?

Of course, Connor meant to keep his suspicions private, even from Abbot Dobrinion.

“The Father Abbot means to find her,” Dobrinion said.

“If Jill has made more trouble for herself, then there is little I can do to rectify the situation,” Connor replied.

“But by the simple fact that you were once wed to the woman, you are involved,” Dobrinion warned.

“Ridiculous,” said Connor, but even as he spoke the word, the door to the room burst open and four monks, Youseff and Dandelion, Brother Francis, and the Father Abbot himself, entered.

Dandelion went right for Connor; the man moved to draw his slender sword, only to find it lifting of its own accord from its scabbard. Connor grabbed at the handle, but when he caught it by the pommel, he found his arm pulled up high, and in a moment he was standing on his tiptoes, and for all his strength and all his weight, he could not bring the sword back down to a defensive posture.

Dandelion hit him a short, sharp blow, then yanked his hand from the sword hilt and wrapped him in a tight hug. The sword drifted away, weightless, and Connor couldn’t comprehend it until he noticed that the fourth monk, Brother Francis, was using a green-ringed gemstone.

“Do not resist, Master Connor Bildeborough,” the Father Abbot instructed. “We wish to speak with you, that is all, on a matter of tremendous importance, a matter concerning the security of your uncle’s holdings.”

Connor instinctively tried to break free of the hold, but found his efforts futile, for Dandelion was too strong and too skilled to allow him any openings. Besides, the other young monk, Youseff, was standing at the ready, a small and heavy club in hand.

“My uncle will hear of this,” Connor warned Markwart.

“Your uncle will agree with my decision,” the Father Abbot replied confidently. He gave a nod to his two lackeys and they dragged Connor away.

“You tread on dangerous ground,” Abbot Dobrinion warned. “Baron Rochefort Bildeborough’s influence is not to be taken lightly.”

“I assure you that one of us is indeed treading on dangerous ground,” the Father Abbot calmly replied.

“You knew that we were looking for Connor Bildeborough,” Brother Francis accused, walking over to take the sword from midair. “Yet you came out to warn him?”

“I came out to find him,” the abbot corrected. “To tell him that he must come in and speak with you, that any information he might have—and he has none, I can assure you—might prove important to winning the war.”

Father Abbot Markwart chuckled snidely throughout Dobrinion’s halfhearted protest. “Words are often such pretty things,” he remarked when Dobrinion was finished. “We use them to speak the truth of facts, yet to hide the truth of intent.”

“You doubt me?” Dobrinion asked.

“You have made your position concerning this matter quite clear to me,” Markwart replied. “I know why you came looking for Connor Bildeborough. I know what you wished to accomplish, and know, too, that your goals and my own are not in accord.”

Abbot Dobrinion huffed in reply and strode defiantly past the pair. “The Baron must be informed,” he explained, moving to the door.

Brother Francis grabbed him roughly by the arm, and he spun, glaring in disbelief at the young man’s brazen action.

Francis returned that look with a murderous stare, and for a moment Dobrinion thought the brother would lash out at him. A motion from Father Abbot Markwart ended the tension of the moment, though, and Francis let go of the abbot with his hand, if not with his glare.

“The manner of the telling is all important,” Markwart said to Dobrinion. “Do explain to the Baron that his nephew is not charged with any crime or sin, and had merely volunteered to answer our questions on this important matter.”

Abbot Dobrinion stormed away.

“His report to the Baron will not be flattering,” Brother Francis remarked as Youseff and Dandelion dragged Connor away.

“As he will,” the Father Abbot conceded.

“Baron Bildeborough could prove a difficult adversary,” Brother Francis pressed.

Again Markwart did not seem overly concerned. “We will see what happens,” he replied. “By the time Rochefort Bildeborough is even informed, we will have discerned what Connor knows, and the mere fact of his arrest will publicize our presence and the identity of our other prisoners. After that, this man means little to me.”

He started away then, and Brother Francis, after a short pause to consider the ramifications of this meeting, to consider the strain between Markwart and Dobrinion and the dire consequences that rivalry might hold for the abbot of St. Precious, turned to follow.

“Are we to do battle in the streets of Palmaris?” a frustrated Brother Francis fumed at Abbot Dobrinion. They had barely begun questioning Connor Bildeborough—using polite and friendly tactics—when a host of soldiers arrived at the gates of St. Precious, demanding the man’s release.

“I told you that arresting the nephew of Baron Bildeborough was no small matter,” the abbot shot back. “Did you not believe that his uncle would react with force?”

“Enough, enough, from both of you,” Father Abbot Markwart scolded. “Bring to me the emissary of Baron Bildeborough that we might settle this.”

Both Dobrinion and Brother Francis started for the door, then stopped, glaring at each other.

“And you, Abbot Dobrinion,” the Father Abbot went on, drawing the man’s attention, then motioning for Francis to go and complete the task. “You are needed with the centaur. He wishes to speak with you.”

“My place is here, Father Abbot,” Dobrinion replied.

“Your place is where I deem it to be,” the old man said. “Go to the pitiful creature.”

Abbot Dobrinion stared hard at Markwart, not pleased at all. He held no reservations about speaking with Bradwarden, but the centaur’s cell was far below, perhaps the farthest point in all the abbey from their present position, and by the time he got down there and back, even if his conversation with Bradwarden lasted but a few words, the meeting with Bildeborough’s men could be long over.

He did as he was instructed, though, bowing to his superior and storming out of the room.

Brother Francis entered a moment later. “Brother Youseff will bring the emissary presently,” he explained.

“And you will go right off to Connor Bildeborough,” Father Abbot Markwart said, tossing a gray soul stone to Francis. “Or near to Connor, though not where you can be seen. Go to him in spirit only, at first, and be not gentle. See what secrets his mind might hold. Then bring him to me. I will delay the Baron’s soldiers for as long as possible, but they will not leave here without Connor.”

Brother Francis bowed and ran off, and had just exited when another man burst in.

“Where is Abbot Dobrinion?” the gruff soldier asked, pushing past Brother Youseff to stand before Father Abbot Markwart. He was a burly man, dressed in the overlapping leather armor bearing the house insignia, the eagle, of House Bildeborough. That emblem was emblazoned on his metal shield, as well, and on the crest of his shining helm, a tight-fitting affair that pulled low over his ears, with a single strip running down between his eyes to fit over his nose.

“And you are?” Markwart prompted.

“An emissary from Baron Bildeborough,” the man said imperiously. “Come to secure the release of his nephew.”

“You speak as if young Connor had been arrested,” Markwart remarked casually.

The burly soldier rocked back on his heels, taken a bit off guard by Markwart’s cooperative tone.

“The Baron’s nephew was only asked in to St. Precious that he might answer some questions concerning a previous marriage,” Markwart went on. “Of course he is free to leave at his leisure; the man has committed no crime against the state or the Church.”

“But we were informed—”

“Erroneously, it would seem,” Father Abbot Markwart said with a chuckle. “Please, sit and take some wine—fine boggle from Abbot Dobrinion’s private stock. My man has already been sent to retrieve Master Connor. They should join us within a few minutes.”

The soldier looked around curiously, not really knowing how to react to it all. He had come out with a contingent of more than fifty armed and armored warriors, ready to do battle, if necessary, to pull Connor Bildeborough from his imprisonment.

“Sit,” Father Abbot Markwart bade him again.

The soldier pulled a chair from a side table, while Markwart retrieved a bottle of boggle from a cabinet at the side of the room. “We are not enemies, after all,” the Father Abbot said, again in an innocent tone. “The Church and King are allied, and have been for generations. It amazes me that you would be so impetuous as to come to the gates of St. Precious thusly armed.” He popped the top from the bottle and poured a generous amount in the soldier’s glass, then just a bit for himself.

“Baron Bildeborough wastes no effort where young Connor is concerned,” the soldier replied, taking a sip, then blinking repeatedly as the potent wine washed down.

“Still, you came here looking for battle,” the Father Abbot went on. “Do you know who I am?”

The man took another sip—a larger one this time—then eyed the wrinkled old man. “Another abbot,” he answered. “From some other abbey, St.-Mere-Able, or something like that.”

“St.-Mere-Abelle,” Markwart confirmed. “The mother abbey of all the Abellican Church.”

The soldier drained his glass and reached for the bottle, but Markwart, his expression changing dramatically to one of outrage, pulled the boggle away. “You are a member of the Church, are you not?” he asked sharply.

The soldier blinked a couple of times, then nodded.

“Then you should be aware that you are now addressing the Father Abbot of the Abellican Order!” Markwart screamed at him. “With a snap of my fingers I could have you banished and branded! With a word to your King, I could have you declared an outlaw.”

“For what crime?” the man protested.

“For any crime I choose!” Markwart yelled back at him.

Brother Francis entered the room then, Connor Bildeborough tight behind him, the nobleman looking somewhat unsettled, though not physically harmed.

“Master Connor!” the soldier said, rising so quickly that his chair toppled behind him.

The Father Abbot rose as well, and moved about the desk, coming to stand right before the obviously intimidated soldier. “Do not forget what I told you,” the old priest said to the man. “With just a word.”

“Now you threaten the soldiers of my uncle’s house?” Connor Bildeborough said. His presence and the forcefulness of his tone bolstered the soldier’s resolve, the man straightening and looking Father Abbot Markwart in the eye.

“Threatening?” Markwart echoed, and that laugh came again, but this time it held a sinister edge. “I do not threaten, foolish young Connor. But I think that it would do you well, would do your uncle well, and would do the soldiers of your uncle’s house well, to understand that these are matters quite beyond their understanding. And interference.

“I am not surprised that a willful young man, so full of pride, such as yourself, would not look past his own importance to comprehend the gravity of our present situation,” Markwart went on. “But it does surprise me that the Baron of Palmaris would act so foolishly as to send an armed contingent against the leaders of the Abellican Order.”

“He thought that those leaders had acted improperly, and dangerously,” Connor stated, working hard to keep from seeming defensive. He had done nothing wrong, after all, and neither had his uncle. If there had been criminal conduct in all of this, it was perpetrated by the old man standing before him.

“He thought . . . you thought,” Markwart said dismissively. “It seems that all of you make your own judgments, and act upon them as though God Himself blessed you with special vision.”

“You deny that you came and took me?” Connor asked incredulously.

“You were needed,” Markwart replied. “And were you mistreated, Master Bildeborough? Were you tortured?”

The soldier puffed out his chest and clenched his jaw.

“No,” Connor admitted, and the burly man relaxed. “But what of the Chilichunks?” he asked. “Do you deny that you hold them, and that their treatment has not been so kindly?”

“I do not,” Markwart replied. “They have, by their own actions, become enemies of the Church.”

“Rubbish!”

“We shall see,” the Father Abbot replied.

“You mean to take them from Palmaris,” Connor accused.

No answer.

“That I will not allow!”

“You hold jurisdiction in such matters?” the Father Abbot asked sarcastically.

“I speak for my uncle.”

“How pretentious,” Markwart said with a snicker. “And tell me, Master Connor, are we to do battle in the streets of Palmaris, that all the city might learn of the rift between the Church and their Baron?”

Connor hesitated before responding, realizing the potentially disastrous implications. His uncle was held in high regard, but most of the common folk in Palmaris, and in any other city in Honce-the-Bear, truly feared the wrath of the Church. But still, the fate of the Chilichunks was at stake here, and for Connor that was no small matter. “If that is what is necessary,” he said sternly.

Markwart continued to laugh, his agitated trembling hiding the movement as he slipped his hands into a pouch on the sash of his voluminous robes, drawing forth a lodestone. Up came the hand, and a split second later the magnetite shot out to smash the soldier’s helmet on the nose guard. The burly man yelped and grabbed at his face, blood pouring freely from both nostrils, waves of pain rolling over him, driving him down to one knee.

At the same moment, Brother Youseff leaped forward, tightening his hand as though it were a blade and driving it into the kidney of unsuspecting Connor Bildeborough, dropping him to his knees, as well.

“Possess him,” Father Abbot Markwart instructed Brother Francis. “Use his mouth to instruct the soldiers to let us pass.” He turned to Youseff. “The prisoners are ready for transport?”

“Brother Dandelion has all the caravan loaded and readied in the back courtyard,” Youseff replied. “But Abbot Dobrinion, before he went down into the dungeons, set many guards about that yard.”

“They will not battle us,” Markwart assured him.

The soldier groaned and tried to stand as the Father Abbot retrieved the lodestone, but Youseff, the alert watchdog, was right there, launching a series of vicious, snapping blows to the man’s face that laid him low on the floor.

Markwart looked to Brother Francis, who stood staring at Connor but apparently taking no action. “Brother Francis,” the Father Abbot prompted sternly.

“I did get into his thoughts,” Brother Francis explained. “And learned some things which might prove valuable.”

“But . . .” Markwart prompted, recognizing the hesitant tone.

“But only when he was caught unawares,” Brother Francis admitted. “And only for a second. He is strong of will and readily expelled me, though he knew not the nature of the attack.”

Father Abbot Markwart nodded, then stepped closer to the still-dazed Connor. Out shot the old man’s fist, brutally snapping Connor’s head to the side, and he crumbled to the floor. “Now possess him,” the Father Abbot said impatiently. “It should not prove too difficult!”

“But I will learn nothing when he is in this state,” Brother Francis argued. It was true enough; an unconscious or dazed man might be relatively easily possessed, but of body only, with no invasion of memory or desire. When consciousness returned, the fight for control would begin anew.

“We need nothing more of this one’s mind,” Markwart explained. “We need only his body and his voice.”

“Evil doings,” Brother Braumin whispered to Brother Dellman as the two stood solemnly in the courtyard of St. Precious, surrounded by their brothers of St.-Mere-Abelle, and with the four prisoners close by. Brother Braumin was not surprised by the sudden order to ready the wagons, for he had been watching the Father Abbot and his lackey Francis closely in their interactions with Abbot Dobrinion, and knew their welcome at St. Precious was wearing quite thin.

What did surprise the monk, though, was the presence of armed soldiers at all of the abbey’s gates, a force sent to contain them, he realized, and particularly to contain their prisoners. Whispers among the ranks had spoken of a new captive, a nobleman, though none save Markwart, Brother Francis, and the Father Abbot’s two personal bodyguards had been allowed anywhere near the man. Still, given the appearance and the demeanor of the soldiers, it wasn’t hard to understand that the Father Abbot might have overstepped his bounds here.

“Why have they come?” Brother Dellman whispered back.

“I do not know,” Braumin replied, not wanting to involve this promising young monk too deeply in the intrigue. Brother Braumin feared that he and his brothers would be leaving, and if the soldiers tried to stop them, Palmaris would see a display of magical devastation heretofore unknown in the city.

What should I do? the gentle Brother Braumin wondered. If the order came from Father Abbot Markwart to battle the soldiers, what course should he follow?

“You seem distressed, brother,” Dellman remarked. “Do you fear that these soldiers will attack us?”

“Exactly the opposite,” Brother Braumin replied in exasperation. He growled and smacked his hand against the wagon. How he wished that Master Jojonah were here to guide him!

“Brother,” Dellman said, putting a hand on Braumin’s shoulder to calm him.

Braumin turned to face the younger monk squarely, took him by the shoulders and locked his gaze. “Watch closely the coming events, Brother Dellman,” he bade the man.

Dellman stared at him quizzically.

Braumin Herde sighed and turned away. He wouldn’t openly accuse the Father Abbot to this young man. Not yet. Not until the evidence was overwhelming. Such an accusation, such a declaration that so much of what Dellman thought holy was a lie, might break the man, or send him running to Father Abbot Markwart for comfort.

Then Braumin Herde’s heart would be known, and he, like Master Jojonah, would quickly be neutralized.

The monk knew then what he would do if the order came. He would fight with his brothers, or at least would give the appearance of fighting. He could not reveal his heart, not yet.

“Forgive me, Master Jojonah,” he mumbled under his breath, and then, on impulse, he added, “Forgive me, Brother Avelyn.”

Soon after, the grim-faced guards of Baron Bildeborough stood aside, on orders from the man they had come to rescue, as the caravan from St.-Mere-Abelle rolled out of the abbey’s back gate. The three Chilichunks were bound and gagged in the back of one wagon, with Brother Youseff standing dangerous guard over them, while Brother Dandelion sat atop the back of battered Bradwarden, the centaur’s upper, human torso covered in blankets. The monks had tied Bradwarden close to the wagon in front of him, and brutal Dandelion forced the centaur to bow low and forward, so that nearly all of that telltale human torso was inside the leading wagon.

Father Abbot Markwart and Brother Francis were likewise hidden from sight, the Church leader not wishing to be bothered with common soldiers, and Brother Francis deep in the throes of maintaining his possession of Connor. When the caravan was safely away, moving steadily to the eastern dock area of the city, then turning north, Francis walked Connor’s body back into the abbey and relinquished control, and the man, still dazed from the pounding Markwart had given him, slumped to the floor. The caravan encountered no resistance as it exited the city altogether, moving through the north, and not the east gate. Markwart turned them east almost immediately, and soon they were running clear of Baron Bildeborough’s domain. Again the monks used their levitating malachite to cross the strong flowing waters of the Masur Delaval, avoiding any possible trouble at the well-guarded ferry.

From the moment he reached the lower dungeons, to find that Bradwarden had been removed by Markwart’s men more than an hour before, Abbot Dobrinion knew that trouble was brewing up above. His first instincts started him running back for the stone stair, crying for guards.

Pragmatic Dobrinion calmed and slowed, though. What could he do? he asked himself honestly. If he even managed to get to the courtyard before the caravan’s departure, would he lead the fight against Markwart’s men?

“Yes, my Abbot!” a young monk, a man barely more than a boy, whom Dobrinion recognized as a newcomer to St. Precious, cried enthusiastically, skidding to a stop right before the tired old abbot. “At your bidding.”

Dobrinion pictured this young man as a smoking husk, a charred corpse left in the wake of a magical fireball. Markwart carried such stones, he knew, and so did Brother Francis. And those two younger men, Youseff and Dandelion, were trained killers, or, as the Church called such assassins, Brothers Justice.

How many dozens of Dobrinion’s flock would be slaughtered this day if he went above and refused to allow Markwart to leave? And even if they proved successful in defeating the monks from St.-Mere-Abelle, then what?

Dalebert Markwart was the Father Abbot of the Abellican Order. “There is no reason to guard these empty cells,” Dobrinion said quietly to the young monk. “Go and find some rest.”

“I am not weary,” the monk replied, wearing a wide and innocent smile.

“Then rest for me,” Dobrinion said in all seriousness, and he started a long and slow walk up the stone stairs.

CHAPTER 17

Edicts from on High

Elbryan blew a long sigh and looked helplessly to Pony. He knew that Juraviel, too, was watching him, though the elf remained far from the firelight where the leaders of the band had gathered.

“Once Caer Tinella and Landsdown are secured,” Tomas Gingerwart said, obviously trying to placate the adamant ranger, “we will follow your lead to the south, those of us who are not fit to remain and defend our homes, at least.”

Elbryan wanted to grab the man by the shoulders and shake him hard, wanted to yell into his face that even if the two towns were taken, there would likely be few remaining to stand in defense. He wanted to remind Tomas and all the others that if they went after the towns and failed, and the powries then pursued them, it was likely that all would be lost: all the fighters, all the elderly, and all the children. But the ranger kept silent, he had made the argument over and over, had spoken it in every manner he could think of, and every time, it had fallen on deaf ears. How bitter this impotence was for Elbryan, to think that all of his efforts to ensure that the fate that befell his own home and his own family would not be repeated here, might prove to be in vain because of foolish pride. They wanted to save their homes, they claimed, but if there could be no security in a place, how could it be called home?

His frustration now was not lost on one of the men sitting nearby. “Are ye not to argue with him, then?” Belster O’Comely asked.

The ranger looked at his old friend and merely threw up his hands.

“Then you will join us in our fight,” Tomas reasoned, and that notion brought a cheer from the gathering.

“No,” Pony said sternly, and unexpectedly. All eyes, even Elbryan’s, turned to regard her.

“I’ll not go,” the woman said firmly.

Surprised gasps turned to angry whispers.

“I’ve never shied from a fight, you know that,” Pony went on, crossing her arms resolutely. “But to agree to go and do battle for the two towns would only bolster your belief that you are following the correct course. And you are not. I know this, and Nightbird knows it. I am not going to now make the same arguments that you have ignored for the last days, but neither will I fall in line for the slaughter. I wish you well in your folly, but I will remain with the infirm, trying somehow to usher them to safety when the powries roll out of Caer Tinella into the forest, hunting, and with no one to stand against their hordes.”

It seemed to Elbryan that Pony might be exaggerating just a bit, but her strong words prompted many whispered conversations, some angry but others doubting the course of attack. The ranger had thought to go along for the attack, and thought Pony would surely stand outside the town proper, launching devastating magical attacks. Her resolve not to participate—and he knew this to be no bluff—had caught him by surprise. As he considered it over the next few seconds, though, he came to understand her point.

“Nor will I join you,” the ranger said, drawing more comments, angry and astonished. “I cannot condone this course, Master Gingerwart. I will remain with Jilseponie and the infirm, and if the powries come out, I, we, will do what we may to hold them at bay and get the infirm to safety.”

Tomas Gingerwart verily trembled as he looked to Belster O’Comely, his expression openly accusatory.

“Reconsider, I beg,” Belster said to Elbryan. “I, too, have seen too much of this war, my friend, and would prefer a course around the powries to Palmaris. But the decision is made, fairly and by vote. The warriors will go after their homes, and we, as allies, have a responsibility to aid in that fight.”

“Even if it is folly?” Pony asked.

“Who is to say?” Belster replied. “Many thought your own attack on the towns to be folly, yet it turned out for the better, by far.”

Elbryan and Pony locked stares, the ranger drawing strength from the resolute woman. Pony had made up her mind and it would not be changed, and so Elbryan, too, decided to stay the course.

“I cannot participate in this,” he said calmly. “When I went into Caer Tinella, my actions brought no threat to those who could not fight.” Belster looked to Tomas and shrugged, having no practical argument against that simple logic.

Roger Lockless, looking bedraggled, walked into the camp then. He stared at Elbryan for a long while, and all in attendance, the ranger included, thought he would seize the moment to paint Elbryan as the coward, or as the traitor.

“Nightbird is right,” the young man said suddenly. He stepped past a stunned Elbryan and Pony to address the whole gathering. “I have just returned from Caer Tinella,” he said loudly. “We cannot attack.”

“Roger—” Tomas started to protest.

“The powries have reinforced,” Roger went on. “They outnumber us, perhaps two or three to one, and they are entrenched in strong defensible positions. Also, they have great spear-throwing contraptions hidden among the walls. If we attack, even if Nightbird and Pony join with us, we will be slaughtered.”

The grim news quieted the gathering for a while, then inspired many more whispered conversations, though these were neither agitated nor angry, but rather subdued. Gradually, the looks from every man and woman fell onto the shoulders of Tomas Gingerwart.

“Our scouts said nothing of this,” the man explained to Roger.

“Were your scouts, before me, within the town?” Roger replied.

Tomas looked to Belster and to the other leaders of the band for some help, but all of them just shook their heads helplessly.

“If you decide to go to battle, then I, too, will remain with Nightbird and Pony,” Roger finished, stepping back to stand at the ranger’s side.

That was enough, for Tomas and for all the proud and stubborn folk.

“Get us to Palmaris,” Tomas said grudgingly to Elbryan.

“We break camp at first light,” the ranger replied, then looked to Roger, nodding his approval as the gathering dispersed. Roger didn’t return the look with a smile or a nod; he had done what he had to do, and nothing more. Without meeting the ranger’s stare, without a word to either Elbryan or Pony, the young man walked away.

Soon Elbryan and Pony were alone at the fire, and Juraviel came down from the trees behind to join them.

“What did you say to him?” the ranger asked, guessing that the elf had spent some private time with the surprising Roger Lockless.

“The same thing I said to you at the milking trough when you were blinded by pride,” Juraviel replied with a sly look.

Elbryan blushed deeply and looked away from Pony and the elf, remembering all too clearly that embarrassing moment. He had just fought with Tuntun—a real fight and not a planned sparring match—accusing the female elf of cheating at a contest that left him with a cold meal. Tuntun had summarily battered him, but the young Elbryan, blinded by anger and pride, had not accepted the defeat well, had spouted foolish words and idle threats.

Belli’mar Juraviel, his mentor, and the closest thing he could then call a friend in all of Andur’Blough Inninness, had promptly thrashed him, putting him into the cold water of the trough several times.

“A painful lesson,” Juraviel said at length. “But one that stayed with you all these years.”

Elbryan couldn’t deny the truth of that.

“This young Roger has promise,” the elf went on. “It was no small matter for him to come in here and side with you, even though he knew that you were right.”

“He is maturing,” Pony agreed.

Juraviel nodded. “I will begin scouting our path this night,” he explained.

“A wide berth of the powries,” Pony said.

The elf nodded again.

“One last question,” Elbryan begged as ever-elusive Juraviel started back to the trees. The elf turned to regard him. “Have the powries really reinforced?”

“Would it make a difference in your choice?” the elf asked.

“None.”

Juraviel smiled. “To my knowledge—and that knowledge is great concerning this matter, do not doubt—Roger Lockless has been nowhere near Caer Tinella this night.”

The ranger had suspected as much, and the confirmation made him admire Roger’s choice all the more.

There was no sign of pursuit; as Father Abbot Markwart had figured, Baron Bildeborough, Abbot Dobrinion, and indeed all of Palmaris, were simply glad to be rid of the monks from St.-Mere-Abelle. They set camp that night across the Masur Delaval, the lights of Palmaris clear in the distance.

After conferring with Brother Francis and learning of the man’s discoveries from his brief time inside the thoughts of Connor Bildeborough, the Father Abbot spent a lot of time alone, pacing, fighting hard to control his mounting anxiety. Just a score of feet away, inside the ring of wagons, the firelight blazed and the monks talked happily of returning to their home. The Father Abbot blocked it all out, had no time for such petty matters. Connor Bildeborough knew of the search for the woman, and furthermore, he believed the woman to be operating, with the magical stones, not too far away in the battleground north of Palmaris. Francis had caught the name Caer Tinella in that brief invasion of Connor’s thoughts, and a quick look at his maps confirmed that to be a town along the road to the Timberlands, a town Francis and the caravan had passed on their wild run to Palmaris.

The goal was close, so close, the end of the troubles of Avelyn Desbris, the restoration of Father Abbot Dalebert Markwart’s good name in the annals of the Abellican Church. Youseff and Dandelion would complete the task and retrieve the stones, and then all that would be left for Markwart would be the complete denunciation of the heretic Avelyn. He would destroy the legend as the explosion at Aida had destroyed the body.

Then all would be well, would be as it had been before.

“Or will it?” the Father Abbot asked himself aloud. He sighed deeply and considered the potential trail of problems his expedition had set for him. Jojonah was no ally and would likely oppose him, perhaps even going so far as to speak positively and publicly concerning dead Avelyn! And Abbot Dobrinion was no longer even neutral on the matter. The abbot of St. Precious was surely outraged at the abduction of the Chilichunks, and at his own treatment by the contingent from St.-Mere-Abelle. Particularly the latter, the Father Abbot mused, thinking that the abbot was more concerned with his wounded pride than his tortured subjects.

And what of Baron Bildeborough, who was already prepared to do battle with the Church for the sake of his nephew?

As he rolled the problems over and over in his thoughts, they each appeared to Markwart as a huddled black creature, and each seemed to grow with every rethinking, mounting powerfully, until they were black walls surrounding him, choking him, burying him!

The old man stamped the ground and issued a stifled cry. Would all the world and all the Church turn against him? Was he alone in his understanding of the truth? What conspiracies had that wicked Jojonah and that fool Dobrinion launched? To say nothing of the rot started by the evil Avelyn Desbris!

Markwart’s mind whirled, looking for holes in those black walls, seeking some way to fight down the darkness. He must call Jojonah back from the trail to Ursal, bring him back into St.-Mere-Abelle, where he could watch over the man’s every move. Yes, that was necessary.

And he must set Youseff and Dandelion on the trail at once, settling the issue of Avelyn’s cache, returning the gemstones to their rightful place in St.-Mere-Abelle. Yes, that would be prudent.

And Connor and Dobrinion would prove to be trouble. They had to be persuaded, or . . .

The Father Abbot stood very still in the small clearing outside the wagon ring, steadying his breathing. The strength was back in his heart now, the will to fight on, to do whatever necessary to gain the desired end. Gradually he was able to open his eyes, and then to unclench his taut fists.

“Father Abbot?”

The call came from behind, a familiar voice and not an enemy. He turned to see a very concerned Brother Francis staring at him.

“Father Abbott?” the man said again.

“Go and tell Brothers Youseff and Dandelion to come to me,” the old man instructed. “And then you join in the discussion within the wagon ring. I must know the mood of my brothers.”

“Yes, Father Abbot,” Francis replied. “But should you be out here alone, with monsters—”

“Now!” Markwart growled.

Brother Francis disappeared behind another wagon, into the more common area within the ring. A moment later two forms, one hulking, the other lithe, appeared, moving silently to bow before their master.

“It is time for you to put your training to use,” Markwart said to them. “Brother Justice is your title now, for each of you, the only name that you will know, the only name by which you will refer to each other. You cannot comprehend the urgency of this matter; the fate of all the Church rests on your actions these next few days.

“Brother Francis has come to believe that the stolen gemstones are in the hands of the woman, Jilseponie Ault, who is referred to as Jill or Pony by her friends,” the old man went on. “And she, we believe, is in the region about Caer Tinella, north of Palmaris, along the road to the Timberlands.”

“We go straightaway,” Youseff replied.

“You go in the morning,” Father Abbot Markwart corrected. “In disguise, and appearing as no monk. You go by ferry across the river, then into Palmaris. The journey north will wait one day.”

“Yes, Father Abbot,” the pair said in unison, cuing on the old man’s hesitation.

“Or five days,” Markwart went on, “if that is what it takes. You see, we have a problem in Palmaris, one which you must eliminate.”

Again Markwart hesitated, considering the course. Perhaps he should split the pair, that if one of them failed in this matter, the other might still get to the stones. Perhaps he should bypass Palmaris and concentrate on the gemstones, and then, when that issue was settled, he could send the pair back out.

No, he realized. By that time the conspiracy against him would be fully entrenched, perhaps even expecting trouble from him, and even worse, Connor knew of the woman and might find her before the monks.

“Connor Bildeborough,” he said suddenly. “He has become a problem to me, to all the Church. He seeks the gemstones for his personal gain,” he lied.

“The problem is to be eliminated,” Brother Youseff reasoned.

“Leave no trail.”

After a long silence the two men bowed and turned about, starting away.

Markwart hardly noticed the movement, as he considered his last words. Leave no trail.

Would that be possible with a suspicious Abbot Dobrinion in Palmaris? Dobrinion was no fool, nor was he weak with the few stones he possessed, one of which was a soul stone. The man might even find Connor’s spirit before it flew far from the world, and from it learn the truth.

But Dobrinion was alone, isolated. There wasn’t another monk at St. Precious of any consequence, not another who could use hematite for so difficult a task.

“Brothers Justice,” Markwart said.

The two men spun about, running back to stand before their superior.

“The trouble is deeper than Connor Bildeborough, for he is in league with another who might put the stones to devastating use,” Markwart explained. “If this man gets the gemstones, he will claim leadership of the Church, and will assume his place in St.-Mere-Abelle.”

It was all preposterous, of course, but the two men, their minds bent by the expert work of Master De’Unerro, hung intent on every word.

“It pains me greatly,” the Father Abbot lied. “Yet, I have no choice in the matter. You must kill two men in Palmaris, the other being Dobrinion Calislas, abbot of St. Precious.”

Just a hint of surprise showed on the alert face of Brother Youseff, while Brother Dandelion accepted the order as easily as if Markwart had just told him to throw away the dinner scraps.

“It must appear to be an accident,” Markwart went on. “Or an act of our monster enemies, perhaps. There can be no mistakes. Do you understand?”

“Yes, Father Abbot,” Brother Dandelion replied at once.

Markwart studied Youseff, who wore a wicked smile. The man nodded, and it seemed to Markwart that he was enjoying the prospect of this immensely.

“Your reward awaits you at St.-Mere-Abelle,” Markwart finished.

“Our reward, Father Abbot, is in the service, in the act itself,” Brother Youseff declared.

Now Father Abbot Markwart, too, was smiling wickedly. And feeling much better. Suddenly, as with his earlier reflections, everything seemed to come clear to him, as though he had found a deeper level of concentration where all the worries could be put aside, all distractions ignored, and problems could be resolved logically and with foresight. He reconsidered his course about recalling Master Jojonah. Let the man be gone to Ursal until he died, for all he cared, for without Dobrinion’s backing, Master Jojonah seemed no real threat.

Yes, if all went well with the Brothers Justice, the elimination of two potential problems and the retrieval of the stones, the issue would be settled, as would his own place in the history of the Abellican Order. Now the Father Abbot was agitated again, excited. He knew that he could not sleep this night and had to find some distraction, something to allow him to believe he was working toward that most coveted goal. He went to Brother Francis then, bidding the man to collect Grady Chilichunk and meet him outside the wagon ring. When Francis arrived, verily dragging the protesting Grady, Markwart motioned for him to follow and then led the pair faraway from the ring.

“Is this safe?” Brother Francis dared to ask.

“Brothers Youseff and Dandelion are shadowing our every move,” Markwart lied, for he was little concerned about any monsters, sensing somehow that few were about. Like the revelations that had come to him, he just somehow knew there was no danger out here.

Not for him, anyway. Poor Grady Chilichunk could not claim the same.

“You were her brother, for years,” Markwart said to him.

“Not by choice, nor by blood,” Grady replied, spitting every word with contempt.

“But by circumstance, and that is equally damning,” Markwart came back.

Grady chuckled and turned away, but Francis was there in an instant, forcing the man’s head back so he looked Markwart in the eye.

“You are not repentant,” Markwart remarked.

Grady tried to look away again, and this time Francis not only forced his head back, but kicked him hard in the back of the knees, dropping him to a kneeling position before the Father Abbot. The young monk stayed right beside Grady, keeping him in that position, grabbing him by the hair and turning up his head so he could not look away from his superior.

“I have committed no crime!” Grady protested. “Nor, certainly, have my parents. You are the unholy one!” Grady Chilichunk had never been a brave man. He always followed the course of luxury, willingly serving as lackey to men of higher position, particularly Connor Bildeborough, that his own life be easier. Nor had he ever been a dutiful son, turning his back on his parents and their business—except for the monies it provided him—for many years. But now, helpless and hopeless on the road with the brutal and powerful monks, something changed within Grady, some sense of responsibility. He cared little for his own comfort at that time, focusing rather on the fact that his parents, his mother, were being so ill-treated. All the world had gone crazy, it seemed, and Grady somehow understood that all the whining and pleading and cooperating he could muster would not get him, and certainly not his parents, out of this trouble. With hopelessness came anger, and that anger in Grady sparked action—a rare thing for the cowardly man. He spat up at Markwart, hitting the Father Abbot in the face.

Markwart only laughed, unconcerned, but Francis, horrified that this common peasant would do such a thing to the Father Abbot, drove his elbow into the side of Grady’s head. The man groaned and tumbled, and Francis was on him, kicking him hard, again in the head, then falling atop him, rolling him over onto his belly and yanking his arms painfully behind his back.

Grady said nothing, was too dazed to even offer a protest.

“Enough, Brother Francis,” Markwart said calmly, patting his hand in the air. “His actions only verify that this one has turned his back on the Abellican Church and all the goodliness in the world.”

Still Grady only lay limply beneath Brother Francis, groaning softly.

“Well, it seems as though we’ll get nothing important from this one this night,” Markwart remarked.

“I am sorry, Father Abbot,” Francis said with alarm, but again Markwart was making no complaints. Given the events he had set into motion, the Father Abbot was simply in too fine a mood to let anything upset him.

“Take him back and put him in his bed,” Markwart said.

Brother Francis hauled Grady to his feet and started away, but then stopped, realizing that Markwart wasn’t following.

“I will enjoy the peace of the night,” the Father Abbot explained.

“Alone?” Francis asked. “Out here?”

“Be gone,” Markwart bade him. “There is no danger out here.”

Francis found that he had little choice but to follow the command. He left slowly, looking back often, and every time seeing his Father Abbot standing calmly, unafraid.

For indeed Father Abbot Markwart was absolutely certain of his safety, for though he didn’t know it, he was not alone.

The spirit of Bestesbulzibar was with him, relishing in his choices this dark night, guiding those decisions.

Much later on, Markwart slept contentedly, so much so that when Francis came to rouse him at the dawn, he instructed the brother to go away, and to let the others sleep in, as well. Several hours later Markwart did rise, to find most of the camp astir and a very nervous Brother Francis pacing back and forth near the three wagons that each held one of the Chilichunks.

“He’ll not awaken,” the brother explained to Markwart when he came over to see what was the matter.

“Who?”

“The son, Grady,” Francis explained, shaking his head, then nodding toward the wagon that held the man. Markwart went in, and came back out grim-faced.

“Bury him by the side of the road,” the Father Abbot said. “A shallow grave, unconsecrated ground.” And he walked by Francis as though nothing out of sorts was going on, as though this had just been another routine order. He stopped just a few steps away and turned back on Francis. “And make certain that the other prisoners, particularly the dangerous centaur, know nothing of this,” he explained. “And Brother Francis, you bury him yourself, after the caravan has departed.”

A panicked look came over Francis, to which Markwart only chuckled and walked away, leaving the brother alone with his guilt.

Francis’ thoughts whirled. He had killed a man! The night before, he must have hit Grady too hard, or kicked him too hard. He replayed the events over and over, wondering how he had done such a thing, or what he might have done differently, all the while fighting hard not to scream out aloud.

He was trembling, eyes darting all about. He felt the sweat on his forehead as he saw the Father Abbot coming back toward him.

“Be at peace, brother,” Markwart said. “It was an unfortunate accident.”

“I killed him,” Francis gasped in reply.

“You defended your Father Abbot,” Markwart answered. “I will perform a ceremony of absolution back at St.-Mere-Abelle, but I assure you that your penitential prayers will be light.”

Trying to hide his grin, Markwart left the man.

Brother Francis was not so easily calmed. He could understand the logic of Markwart’s argument—the man had, after all, spat in the face of the Father Abbot of the Abellican Church. But while Francis could logically argue that this had indeed been an unfortunate accident, his own actions justified, the rationalization could not take root in his heart. The pedestal had been knocked out from under him, that pervasive self-belief that he was above all other men. Francis had made mistakes before, of course, and he knew it, but not to this extreme. He remembered all the times of his life when he had imagined that he was the only real person, and that everyone else, and everything else, was merely a part of his dream of consciousness.

Now, suddenly, he felt as if he was just another man, a very small player in a very large script.

Later that morning, as the caravan moved far away, Brother Francis pushed the dirt on the pale face of Grady Chilichunk. In one blackened corner of his heart, Francis knew then that he was a damned thing.

Subconsciously that heart and soul ran to the Father Abbot then, for in that man’s eyes, there had been no crime, no sin. In that man’s view of the world, Brother Francis could hold his illusions.

PART THREE

THE DEMON WITHIN

I cried for the death of Brother Justice.

That was not his real name, of course. His real name was Quintall; I know not if that was his surname or his birth-given name, or if he even had another name. Just Quintall.

I do not think that I killed him, Uncle Mather—not when he was human, at least. I think that his human body died as a consequence of the strange broach he carried, a magical link, so Avelyn discovered, to that most evil demon.

Still, I cried for the man, for his death, in which I played a great part. My actions were taken in defense of Avelyn and Pony, and of myself and given the same situation, 1 have no doubt that I would react similarly, would battle Brother Justice without hearing any cries of protest from my conscience.

Still, I cried for the man, for his death, for all the potential lost, wasted, perverted to an evil way. When I consider it now, that is the true sadness, the real loss, for in each of us there burns a candle of hope, a light of sacrifice and community, the potential to do great things for the betterment of all the world. In each of us, in every man and every woman, there lies the possibility of greatness.

What a terrible thing the leaders of Avelyn’s abbey did to the man Quintall, to pervert him so into this monster that they called Brother Justice.

After Quintall’s death, I felt, for the first time, as though I had blood on my hands. My only other fight with humans was with the three trappers, and to them I showed mercy—and mercy well repaid! But for Quintall there was no mercy; there could not have been even if he had survived my arrow and his fall, even if the demon dactyl and the magical broach had not stolen his spirit from his corporeal form. In no way short of his death could we have deterred Brother Justice from his mission to slay Avelyn. His purpose was all-consuming, burned into his every thought by a long and arduous process that had bent the man’s free will until it had broken altogether; that had eliminated Quintall’s own conscience and turned his heart to blackness.

Perhaps that is why the demon dactyl found him and embraced him.

What a pity, Uncle Mather What a waste of potential.

In my years as a ranger and even before that in the battle for Dundalis, I have killed many creatures—goblins, powries, giants—yet I shed no tears for them. I considered this fact long and hard in light of my feelings toward the death of Quintall. Were my tears for him nothing more than an elevation of my own race above all others, and if so, is that not the worst kind of pride?

No, and I say that with some confidence, for surely I would cry if cruel fate ever drove my sword against one of the Touel’alfar. Surely 1 would consider the death of a fallen elf as piteous and tragic as the death of a fallen man.

What then is the difference?

It comes down to a matter of conscience, I believe, for as in humans, perhaps even more so, the Touel’alfar possess the ability, indeed the inclination, to choose a goodly path. Not so with goblins, and certainly not with the vile powries. I am not so sure about the giants—it may be that they are simply too stupid to even understand the suffering their warlike actions bring. In either case, I’ll shed no tears and feel no remorse for any of these monsters that falls prey to Tempest’s cut or to Hawkwing’s bite. By their own evilness do they bring their deaths. They are the creatures of the dactyl, evil incarnate, slaughtering humans—and often each other—for no better reason than the pleasure of the act.

I have had this discussion with Pony, and she posed an interesting scenario. She wondered whether a goblin babe, raised among humans, or among the Touel’alfar in the beauty of Andur’Blough Inninness, would be as vile as its wild kin. Is the evil of such beings a blackness within, ingrained and everlasting, or is it a matter of nurturing?

My friend, your friend, Belli’mar Juraviel, had the answer for her for indeed his people had long ago taken a goblin child into their enchanted land and raised the creature as if it were kin. As it matured, the goblin was no less vicious and hateful and no less dangerous than its kin raised in the dark holes of distant mountains. The elves, ever curious, tried same thing with a powrie child, and the results were even more disastrous.

So I’ll cry not for goblins and powries and giants, Uncle Mather. I shed no tears for creatures of the dactyl. But I do cry for Quintall, who fell into evil ways. I cry for the potential that was lost, for the one terrible choice that pushed him to blackness.

And I think Uncle Mather that in crying for Quintall, or for any other human or elf that cruel fate may force me to slay, I am preserving my own humanity.

This is the scar of battle, I fear that will prove to be the most everlasting.

—ELBRYAN the NIGHTBIRD

CHAPTER 18

Enemies of the Church

The only magic they carried was a garnet, for detecting the use of the enchanted gemstones, and a sunstone, the antimagic stone. In truth, neither of the pair was very proficient with gemstones, having spent the bulk of their short years in St.-Mere-Abelle in rigorous physical training and in the mental incapacitation necessary for one to truly claim the title of Brother Justice.

The caravan had gone back to the east that morning, while the two monks, changing out of their robes to appear as common peasants, had gone south, to the Palmaris ferry, catching the first of its three daily journeys across the Masur Delaval at the break of dawn. They were in the city by mid-afternoon, and wasted no time in going out to the north, over the wall and not through the gate. By the time the sun was low on the western horizon, Youseff and Dandelion had spotted their first prey, a band of four monsters—three powries and a goblin—setting camp amidst a tumble of boulders less than ten miles from Palmaris. It quickly became obvious to the monks that the goblin was the slave here, for it was doing most of the work, and whenever it slowed in its movements, one of the powries would give it a sharp slap on the back of the head, spurring it to motion. Even more important, the monks noted that the goblin had a rope, a leash, tied about its ankle.

Youseff turned to Dandelion and nodded; they would be able to take advantage of this arrangement.

As the sun was slipping below the horizon, the goblin exited the camp, followed closely by a powrie holding the other end of the rope. In the forest, the goblin began foraging for firewood, while the powrie stood quietly nearby. Youseff and Dandelion, silent as the lengthening shadows, moved into position, the slender monk going up a tree, the heavier Dandelion slipping from trunk to trunk, to close ground on the powrie.

“Yach, hurry it up, ye fool thing!” the powrie scolded, kicking at the leaves and dirt. “Me friends’ll eat all the coney, and there’ll be nothing but bones for me to gnaw!”

The goblin, a truly beleaguered creature, glanced back briefly, then scooped another piece of kindling. “Please, master,” it whined. “Me arms is full and me back is hurtin’ so.”

“Yach, shut yer mouth!” the powrie growled. “Ye’re thinkin’ ye got all ye can carry, but it’s not enough for the night fire. Ye’re wanting me to come all the way back out here? I’ll flog yer skin red, ye smelly wretch!”

Youseff hit the ground right beside the startled powrie, plopping a heavy bag over its head in the blink of a surprised eye. A moment later Dandelion, in full run, slammed the dwarf from behind, hoisting it in a bear hug and taking it on a fast run, face first into the trunk of the nearest tree.

Still the tough powrie struggled, throwing back an elbow into Dandelion’s throat. The big monk hardly noticed, just pressed all the harder, and then, when he saw his companion’s approach, he hooked his arm under the powrie’s and lifted the dwarf’s arm up high, exposing ribs.

Youseff’s dagger thrust was perfectly aimed, sliding between two ribs to pierce the stubborn dwarf’s heart. Dandelion, holding fast the thrashing powrie, managed to free one hand so he could wrap the wound, not wanting too much blood to spill.

Not here.

Youseff, meanwhile, turned to the goblin. “Freedom,” he whispered excitedly, waving his hand for the creature to run away.

The goblin, on the verge of a scream, looked curiously at the human, then at its armload of wood. Shaking from excitement, it tossed the wood to the ground, slipped the rope from its ankle and sped off into the darkening forest.

“Dead?” Youseff asked as Dandelion let the limp powrie slump to the ground.

The big man nodded, then went to tighten the bindings on the wound. It was imperative that no blood would be spilling when the pair returned to Palmaris, and particularly not when they entered St. Precious. Youseff removed the powrie’s weapon, a cruel-looking serrated and hooked blade as long and thick as his forearm, and Dandelion put the dwarf in a heavy, lined sack. With a glance about to make sure the other powries had not caught on to the ambush, they went on their way, running south, the load proving hardly a burden to the powerful Dandelion.

“Should we not have taken the goblin for Connor Bildeborough?” Dandelion asked as they slowed their pace, nearing the city’s north wall.

Youseff considered the question a moment, trying hard not to laugh at the fact that his dim-witted friend had only mentioned it now, more than an hour after they told the goblin to run away. “We need only one,” Youseff assured him. The Father Abbot had made his needs quite clear to Brother Youseff. Any action against Abbot Dobrinion had to either appear as simply an accident or lead suspicion in a direction far removed from Markwart; the implications within the Church should St.-Mere-Abelle seem connected in any way, after all, could prove grave. Connor Bildeborough, though, was not such a problem. If his uncle, the Baron of Palmaris, even suspected the Church in Connor’s demise, he, in his ignorance of the rivalries between the abbeys, would be as likely to blame St. Precious as St.-Mere-Abelle, and even if he did turn his attention to the abbey on All Saints Bay, there would be little, very little, he could do.

It was hardly an effort for the skilled assassins to get over the city wall and past the eyes of weary guardsmen. The battlefield had been pushed back, and though rogue bands like the one the monks had encountered were, still about, they were not thought to be much of a threat by the garrison entrenched in the city—a garrison strengthened in recent days by a full brigade of Kingsmen from Ursal.

Now Dandelion and Youseff changed back into their brown robes and, with heads humbly bowed, made their solemn way through the streets. They were bothered only once, by a beggar man, and when he would not leave them alone, even going so far as to threaten them if they would not give him a silver coin, Brother Dandelion calmly tossed him against an alley wall.

It was long after vespers and St. Precious was quiet and dark, but the monks took little comfort in that fact, understanding that the men of their Order would prove more vigilant than the slothful city guards. Again, though, the Father Abbot had prepared them properly. On the southern wall of the abbey, where the wall was in fact a part of the main building itself, there were no windows and no visible doors.

In truth, there was a single door, carefully concealed, from which the abbey’s kitchen workers brought out the scraps from the day’s meals. Brother Youseff brought forth the garnet, using it to find the invisible doorway, for the portal, in addition to being magically concealed, was magically sealed against opening from the outside.

The door was also conventionally locked—or should have been—but before the monks of St.-Mere-Abelle had departed St. Precious, Brother Youseff had gone to the kitchen, ostensibly for supplies, but in truth to destroy the integrity of the portal’s binding. Apparently the Father Abbot had recognized that they might need a quiet way into St. Precious, he pondered now, and was indeed impressed by his master’s foresight.

Using the sunstone, Youseff defeated the meager magical lock and carefully pushed open the door. Only one person was inside, a young woman singing and scrubbing a pot over a sink of steaming water.

Youseff was behind her almost immediately. He paused, listening to her carefree song, taking pleasure in the evil irony of that lively tune.

The woman stopped singing, sensing the presence.

Youseff basked in her fear for just a moment, then grabbed her by the hair and drove her face into the water. She struggled and thrashed, but to no avail against the efficient assassin. Youseff smiled as she slumped to the floor. He was supposed to be a passionless killer, a mechanical tool for the Father Abbot’s will, but in truth the monk found that he enjoyed the killing, enjoyed the victim’s fear, enjoyed the absolute power. Looking down at the dead young woman, he only wished he had been granted more time, that he could have savored the preliminary game, the terror leading up to the death.

Death, by comparison, was such a bland and easy thing.

St. Precious was quiet that night, as if the whole of the place, the abbey itself, was relaxing after the trials of the Father Abbot’s visit. Through the hallways stalked Youseff and Dandelion, the Brothers Justice, with powerful Dandelion carrying the sacked powrie over one shoulder. They saw only one monk, and he didn’t see them, all the way to the door of Abbot Dobrinion’s private quarters.

Youseff went down to one knee before the door, a small knife in hand. Though he could easily pick the meager lock, he scraped and scratched at the wood about it, whittling it down, making it appear as if the door had been forced.

Then they were in, and through another door, this one less sturdy and not locked, to Dobrinion’s bedside.

The abbot awoke with a start. He began to scream out, but fell strangely silent when he considered the pair, when he saw the heavy serrated blade waving tantalizingly inches from his face, its metal gleaming in the soft light of the moon spilling in through the room’s lone window.

“You knew we would come for you,” Youseff teased.

Dobrinion shook his head. “I can speak with the Father Abbot,” he pleaded. “A misunderstanding, that is all.”

Youseff held a finger to pursed lips, smiling wickedly behind it, but Dobrinion pressed on.

“The Chilichunks are criminals—that is obvious,” the abbot spouted, and he hated the words as he spoke them, hated himself for his cowardice. Abbot Dobrinion fought a great battle then, his conscience vying against his most basic survival instinct.

Youseff and Dandelion watched his torment, not understanding the source of it, but with Youseff surely enjoying it.

Then Dobrinion calmed and stared at Youseff squarely, seeming suddenly unafraid. “Your Markwart is an evil man,” he said. “Never was he truly Father Abbot of the Abellican Church. I call on you now, in the name of the solemn vow of our Order—piety, dignity, poverty—to turn against this evil course, to find again the light—”

His sentence ended as a gurgle, as Youseff, too far lost to even hear such conscience-tugging pleas, ripped the serrated edge across the abbot’s throat, opening it wide.

The pair went to the powrie then, dropping it to the floor. Dandelion unwrapped and then picked at its wound, removing all sign of scabbing, while Youseff searched about the abbot’s quarters. He found at last a small knife, used for cutting seals from letters. Its blade was not as broad as the one of his dagger, but the knife fit fairly snugly into the powrie’s mortal wound.

“Take him from the bed,” Youseff instructed Dandelion. As the big man dragged Dobrinion toward the desk, Youseff walked alongside, cutting a series of smaller wounds on Dobrinion’s corpse, making it seem as if the abbot had put up a great struggle.

Then the two killers were gone, silent death, two shadows flowing out from St. Precious into the black night.

Word of the abbot’s murder spread throughout the city the very next morning, frantic cries sweeping along the fortified walls, teary-eyed soldiers blaming themselves for allowing a powrie to slip past them. Whispers of doom crossed from tavern to tavern, street corner to street corner, each retelling the rumors, embellishing the tale. By the time Connor Bildeborough, waking in a bed in the infamous brothel, House Battlebrow, heard the story, an army of powries was reputedly on the outskirts of Palmaris, ready to rush in and slaughter all of the people in their time of grief.

Half naked, dressing as he went, Connor exited the house and flagged down a carriage, demanding that the driver take him at once to Chasewind Manor, the home of his uncle.

The gates were closed; a dozen armed soldiers, their weapons drawn, surrounded the carriage as the horse skidded to an abrupt stop, and both Connor and the poor frightened driver felt the eyes of many archers upon them.

Recognizing Connor, the guards relaxed and helped the nobleman down, then ordered the driver away in no uncertain terms.

“My uncle is well?” Connor asked desperately as the guards escorted him through the gate.

“Unnerved, Master Connor,” one man answered. “To think that a powrie could so easily get through our defenses and slay Abbot Dobrinion! And all of this coming right behind the troubles in the abbey! Oh, what dark days are upon us!”

Connor made no move to reply, but he listened carefully to the man’s words, and the unspoken, probably even unrealized, implications behind them. He rushed through the manor house then, down the heavily guarded halls and into his uncle’s audience room.

Fittingly, the soldier standing guard beside Baron Rochefort Bildeborough’s desk was the burly man, face heavily bandaged, whose nose had been smashed under a magical assault by none other than Father Abbot Dalebert Markwart himself.

“My uncle knows of my arrival?” Connor asked the man.

“He will join us presently,” the guard replied, his voice slurred, for his mouth, too, had been battered by the magnetite missile.

Even as he finished speaking, Connor’s uncle entered the room through a side door, his face brightening as he gazed upon his nephew.

“Thank God himself that you are alive and well,” the man said generously. Connor had always been Rochefort Bildeborough’s favorite relative, and since the man had no children, it was a common belief in Palmaris that Connor would inherit the title.

“Should I not be?” Connor asked in his typically casual manner. “They got in to kill Abbot Dobrinion,” Rochefort replied, taking his seat opposite the desk from Connor.

Connor did not miss the effort his uncle required for the simple action. Rochefort was overweight and suffered from severe pains in the joints. Until the previous summer, the man had ridden his fields every day, rain or shine, but this year he had been out only a couple of times, and never two days in succession. Rochefort’s eyes, too, showed the sudden aging. They had always been gray in hue, but they were dull now, filmed over.

Connor had wanted the title of Baron of Palmaris since he was old enough to understand the prestige and entitlement that came with it, but now, as that moment seemed to be drawing near, he had discovered that he could wait—and many years. He would rather that he kept his present position, and that his dear uncle, the man who had been as a father to him, remained alive and well.

“How would the monsters even know to look for me?” Connor replied calmly. “The abbot is a clear target for our enemies, but myself?”

“The abbot and the Baron,” Rochefort reminded.

“And indeed I am glad to see that you have taken all the proper precautions,” Connor said quickly. “You may be a target, but not I. To the knowledge of our enemies, I am nothing more than a common tavern-hunter.”

Rochefort nodded, and seemed relieved by the logic of Connor’s reasoning. Like a protective father, he didn’t fear for himself half as much as he feared for Connor.

Connor, though, was not really convinced by his own words. The powrie slipping into St. Precious at this tension-filled time, so soon after the horrible Father Abbot’s departure, seemed a bit too convenient to him, and he only grew more uneasy as he looked upon the broken face of his uncle’s principal guard.

“I want you to stay at Chasewind Manor,” Rochefort said.

Connor shook his head. “I have business in the city, Uncle,” he replied. “And I have been battling powries for months now. Fear not for me.” As he finished, he patted Defender, comfortably sheathed at his hip.

Rochefort stared long and hard at the confident young man. That was what he liked about Connor, the confidence, the swagger. He had been so much like Connor in his own youth, bouncing from tavern to tavern, from brothel to brothel, living life so fully, taking each moment to the very limits, of life, of danger. How ironic, he thought, that now, growing older, and with less pleasure, less excitement, less life, ahead of him, he should be more protective of his life. Connor, indeed so much like a younger Rochefort, with so much more to lose, thought little of potential danger, felt immortal and invulnerable.

The Baron laughed, and dismissed the thought of ordering Connor to stay at Chasewind Manor, for that, he realized, would steal all that he loved from the spirited young man. “Keep one of my soldiers beside you,” he offered in compromise.

Again Connor resolutely shook his head. “That would only outline me as a potential target,” he reasoned. “I know the city, Uncle. Know where to garner information and where to hide.”

“Go out! Go out!” the Baron cried in defeat, laughing all the while. “But know that you carry more than the responsibility of your own life with you.” He rose with considerably less trouble than he had found in sitting, and rushed about the desk, clapping Connor on the shoulder roughly a couple of times, then letting his big hand rest intimately about his nephew’s neck. “You carry my heart with you, boy,” he said solemnly. “If they find you as they found Dobrinion, then know that I will surely die of a broken heart.”

Connor believed him, every word. He gave the man a hug and a pat, then strode confidently from the room.

“He will soon be your baron,” Rochefort said to the soldier.

The man snapped to attention and nodded, obviously approving of the choice.

“Open it.”

“But Master Bildeborough, I see no reason to disturb the sleep of the dead,” the monk replied. “The coffin has been blessed by Brother Talumus, our highest-ranking—”

“Open it,” Connor repeated, locking the young man in his unrelenting glare.

Still the young monk hesitated.

“Should I bring my uncle?”

The monk bit at his lip, but surrendered to the threat, bending low to grasp the wooden lid. With a look back to the resolute Connor, he slid the cover aside. There lay the woman, her complexion chalky blue in death.

To the monk’s horror, Connor reached in and grabbed her by the shoulder, lifting and turning the corpse, his face low, impervious to the stench as he studied her intently. “Wounds?” he asked.

“Just the drowning,” the monk replied. “In the sink. Hot water, too. Her face was all red at first, but now the blood, and all the life, is gone from it.”

Connor gently shifted the body back into place and stood back, motioning to the monk that he could close the coffin. He put his hand to his mouth, running his thumbnail between his teeth, trying to make sense of it all. The monks of St. Precious had been very accommodating when he showed up at their gate. They were frightened and confused, he knew, and the presence of so important a representative of Baron Bildeborough had helped to settle them.

In Abbot Dobrinion’s room Connor had found little in the way of clues. Both bodies were still there, the abbot’s cleaned and carefully placed in state on his bed, and the powrie’s right where the monks had found it. The blood of both corpses was liberal about the room, despite all efforts to clean the place. When Connor protested the changes in the room, the monks took great pains to describe the struggle, as they had interpreted it, in great detail: the abbot had been wounded first, and several times, probably taken by surprise while he lay asleep on his bed. One of the wounds was mortal, a slash across the throat, but still the brave Dobrinion had managed to struggle across the room to retrieve the small knife.

How proud were the monks of St. Precious that their abbot had been able to take revenge on his killer!

To Connor, who had battled the tough powries, it seemed unlikely at best that a single thrown dagger could have so perfectly taken one down, and that Dobrinion, given the viciousness of the slashed throat, could even have gotten to the desk. The scenario was not beyond belief, though, and so he kept his thoughts to himself, accepting the description with a noncommittal nod and a simple word of praise for gallant Dobrinion.

When he subsequently inquired about how the powrie might have gained access, Connor learned of a second victim, a poor girl who had been ambushed and drowned in the kitchen. It remained a mystery to the monks as to how the powrie had gained entrance, for the door was magically sealed against being opened from the outside, and indeed it was little known, being invisible against the abbey’s bricked wall. The only explanation they could find was that the foolish girl had been in league with, or more likely, been duped by, the powrie and had let the dwarf in.

That, too, seemed acceptable to Connor, though a bit of a stretch, but now, in looking at the girl, her skin unbroken, the young nobleman’s fears and suspicions rose high about him. Still he said nothing to the monks, understanding that without the guidance of the only man of any authority in all the abbey, they could do little.

“Poor girl,” was all he muttered as the monk escorted him from the abbey’s cellar—just a pair of stairways up from where the Chilichunks had been held as prisoners, Connor continually reminded himself.

“Your uncle will help us to secure the abbey from further intrusion?” one of the monks waiting in the chapel for the pair inquired.

Connor asked for parchment and quill, then scribbled out a request for such aid. “Take this to Chasewind Manor,” he instructed. “Of course the family Bildeborough will do all that we can for the security of St. Precious.”

He bade the monks farewell then, and swept out into the streets of Palmaris, the place of whispers and rumors, the place where he might truly find his answers.

Questions and images haunted him throughout the afternoon. Why would the powries go after Abbot Dobrinion, who had not been very much engaged in the fighting? Only a handful of monks had gone out from St. Precious to the fighting in the north, and they had been far from decisive in any battles. Given that, and the fact that St. Precious had played more of a healing role in the war, it seemed unlikely that any of Dobrinion’s actions would have spurred the powries to such a dramatic action.

The only explanation Connor could think of was that the monks of St.-Mere-Abelle, who had reportedly come in from the north, had skirmished with the monsters, probably destroying many, and thus inadvertently set up the abbot as a target for assassination.

But after his experiences with Markwart, Connor didn’t believe that possible scenario. The words “too convenient” echoed in his mind whenever he considered every piece of evidence or any seemingly logical conclusions.

That night, Connor found his way to Fellowship Way, which he had convinced Dainsey Aucomb to reopen the previous night, explaining to her that the Chilichunks would be in desperate straits indeed when they returned to Palmaris—even though Connor did not believe they would ever return to Palmaris—if their business had not been maintained. The place was bustling, all the locals eager for gossip about what had happened to Abbot Dobrinion and to Keleigh Leigh, the poor drowned kitchen girl. Connor kept quiet through most of the discussion, more interested in listening than in speaking, trying to find someone who might have some important and valid information—no small matter in this sea of rumor. Though he worked hard to keep a low profile, he was approached often, the commoners suspecting that the nobleman would know more than they.

Through all their inquiries, Connor only smiled and shook his head. “I know only what l have heard since entering the Way,” he’d reply.

The night rolled on without progress; frustrated Connor put his back against the wall and closed his eyes. Only one fellow’s call of “newfolks,” the term commonly applied to visitors who had not been previously seen in the Way, stirred him from his respite.

It took him a few moments to focus his vision, to shift his gaze through the crowd toward the door and the two men, one large, the other small and slender, but walking with the perfect balance and absolute alertness of a trained warrior. Connor’s eyes went wide. He knew these men, and knew that their present dress, that of common peasants, was not fitting.

Where were their robes?

The mere sight of Youseff brought back pain in Connor’s kidney, and given his last meeting with the two, the nobleman thought it wise to slip even further into the crowd. He motioned to Dainsey first, bringing her to the bar opposite him.

“See what they want,” he instructed, indicating the two newfolks. “And tell them that I have not been in the Way all the week.”

Dainsey nodded and slid back the other way, while Connor faded toward the back wall. He tried to stay close enough to catch any snatches of conversation between Dainsey and the two as they predictably approached the hostess, but the noise of the packed tavern allowed for very little eavesdropping.

Until Dainsey—wonderful Dainsey!—raised her voice pointedly and called out, “Why, he’s not been in here all the week!”

Connor’s suspicions were confirmed, the monks were looking for him—and he could guess why easily enough. And now he knew why Keleigh Leigh had not been cut, why no powrie had dipped its beret in her spilling blood, a tradition that, according to everything Connor had ever heard about the cruel bloody caps, no powrie would ever forsake. He dared to turn about and steal a glance back toward Dainsey, and she looked at him out of the corner of her eye, then “inadvertently” brushed her other hand down the front of her blouse, opening it wide, catching the attention of every man nearby, the two monks included.

Good girl, Connor thought, and he used the distraction to make some ground, slipping, weaving, toward the door. It took him more than a minute to cover the twenty feet, so crowded was the Way, but then he was out in the salty air of the Palmaris night, the wide sky clear and crisp overhead.

He glanced back into the tavern, to see the crowd jostling, as though someone was trying to get to the door.

Connor didn’t wait to discern who that might be; if the monks recognized Dainsey’s move as a diversion, they would understand where to turn next. The nobleman rushed to the corner of the Way, then went around the corner, turning and peering back to the door.

Sure enough, Youseff and Dandelion burst out onto the street.

Down the alley went Connor, his thoughts spinning. He wasted no time, climbing the gutter work to the roof, then falling flat on his belly, shaking his head as the two monks came around the corner on his trail. He turned away, crawling quietly.

Up here, with the sky seeming so close, the lights of the city night below him, Connor couldn’t help but fall back in time. This place had been Jill’s special spot, her hideaway from the world. She had come up here often, to be alone with her thoughts, to seek out past events too painful for her fragile mind to find.

A metal scraping sound blew away those thoughts of Jill; one of the monks, Youseff likely, had started to climb.

Connor was away in an instant, leaping the far alley to the roof of the next building, rushing over the peak and sliding down, turning, catching the lip of the roof as he went over, then dropping to the street. He went on in full flight, running scared, thinking of Jill, thinking of all the craziness that had come to his little world.

Abbot Dobrinion was dead. Dead! And no powrie had done it.

No, it was these two, the lackeys of Father Abbot Dalebert Markwart, the leader of all the Abellican Church. Markwart had killed Dobrinion because of the abbot’s resistance, and now had set his assassins on him.

The enormity of that line of reasoning at last hit Connor, and nearly laid him low. He considered his course—should he seek protection at Chasewind Manor?

Connor dismissed that, fearing to implicate his uncle: If Markwart had gotten to Dobrinion, could anyone, even the Baron of Palmaris, be safe? These were powerful enemies, Connor understood; if all the legions of the King of Honce-the-Bear were turned against him, they would be no more dangerous enemies than the monks of the Abellican Church. Indeed, by many standards, not the least of which concerned those mysterious and little-understood magical powers, the Father Abbot was a more powerful man than the King.

The scope of this all, the incredible idea that the Father Abbot would order—had ordered!—Dobrinion murdered, assaulted the nobleman’s sensibilities, kept his mind whirling as he vanished into the Palmaris night.

But still, Connor knew that he would run out of places to hide. These two, and others, if there were more in the city, were professional assassins. They would find him and kill him.

He needed answers, and he thought he knew where he might find them. Besides, someone else was in danger here, the real target of Markwart’s wrath. He did turn to Chasewind Manor then, crossing the gate into the courtyard, but veering from the main house to the stables. There he quickly saddled Greystone, his favorite hunting horse, a beautiful and thick-muscled palomino with a long blond mane. With eager Greystone under him, Connor rode out of Palmaris’ northern gate before the night had crossed its midpoint

CHAPTER 19

Change in Direction

The traveling was easy—or should have been, for the road stretching along the western bank of the Masur Delaval south of Palmaris was the finest causeway in all the world. And early on Jojonah found a ride with a caravan that traveled for two days, through both day and night. Master Jojonah, though, was not having a good time of it. His old bones ached badly, and some two hundred miles south of Palmaris he had taken ill, beset by terrible cramps and nausea, and by a low fever that kept him sweating continually.

Bad food, he supposed, and hoped in all seriousness that this journey and illness would not be the end of him. He still had much he meant to do before he died, and in any case, dying alone on the road halfway between Ursal and Palmaris, two cities of which he had never been overly fond, was not appealing in the least. So with typical stoicism the old master staggered along from town to town, walking slowly, leaning heavily on a sturdy stick, and chastising himself for letting his belly grow so thick. “Piety, dignity, poverty,” he said sarcastically, for truly he felt less than dignified, and it seemed he was carrying this vow of poverty way too far. As for piety . . . Jojonah wasn’t sure what that word meant anymore. Did it mean following blindly the lead of Father Abbot Markwart? Or following his heart, using those insights that Avelyn, by example, had given to him?

The latter, he decided, but in truth, that solved little, for Jojonah wasn’t sure exactly what course he might take to make any real difference in the world. Likely he’d just get himself demoted in Church rank, perhaps even banished, perhaps even burned as a heretic—the Church had a long history of turning like a ravenous animal on a proclaimed heretic, torturing such men to death. A shudder coursed Jojonah’s spine as he considered that thought, like some grim premonition. Yes, Father Abbot Markwart was in a foul mood of late, and the more foul it became by far if ever someone mentioned the name of Avelyn Desbris! Thus the master found a new enemy, despair, on that long road to Ursal. But he plodded on, putting one foot in front of the other.

He awoke on the sixth day out to find the sky thick with dark clouds, and by mid-morning a cool rain had begun. Jojonah was at first glad of the cloud cover, for the previous day had been brutally hot. But as the first raindrops began to fall, as the chilly water touched his feverish skin, he grew miserable indeed, and even considered returning to the town in which he had slept the previous night.

He didn’t reverse direction, though, but simply slogged along a puddle-filled road, turning his attention inward, to Avelyn and Markwart, to the direction of the Church and any course he might follow to alter that dark path. As the minutes turned to an hour, then two, the master was so deep in thought that he never heard the wagon approaching fast from behind.

“Be clear the road!” the driver cried, pulling hard on the reins, then yanking them to the side. The wagon swerved, narrowly missing Jojonah, spraying him with a great wash as he tumbled to the muddy ground in surprise and terror.

Off to the side went the wagon, sinking deep into the mud—and only that mud, grabbing at the wheels like some living creature, kept the cart from overturning as the frantic driver fought to gain control. Finally the team slowed and the wheels slipped to a messy halt. The driver leaped down at once, taking only a quick glance at his stuck rig, then rushing back across the road to where Jojonah sat.

“My pardon,” the monk stammered as the man, a handsome fellow of about twenty years, splashed over to him. “I did not hear you in the rain.”

“No pardon’s needed,” the man said pleasantly, helping Jojonah to stand and brushing some of the mud from his soaked robes. “Sure that I been fearing that since I taked the road outta Palmaris.”

“Palmaris,” echoed Jojonah. “I, too, just came from the most excellent town.” The monk noted that the man’s expression soured at the mention of the word “excellent,” and so Jojonah quieted, thinking it prudent to listen and not to speak.

“Well, the quicker I’m coming from the same place,” the man replied, glancing back helplessly at his wagon. “Or was,” he added despondently.

“We will not easily extract it from the mud, I fear,” Jojonah agreed.

The man nodded. “But I’ll find villagers to help,” he said. “There be a town a three-mile back.”

“The folk are helpful,” Jojonah said hopefully. “Perhaps I shall accompany you; they would be quick to help a priest of the Church, after all, and were quite kind to me last night, for that is where I slept. And then, after we have extracted your wagon, perhaps you’ll take me along. My destination is Ursal, and I’ve a long road ahead, I fear, and a body not taking well to the travel.”

“Ursal’s me own ending,” the man said. “And ye might help in me message, since it concerns yer own Church.”

Jojonah perked his ears up at that remark and cocked an eyebrow. “Oh,” he prompted.

“Truly ’tis a sad day,” the man went on. “So sad a day that sees the death of Abbot Dobrinion.”

Jojonah’s eyes went wide and he staggered, catching hold of the man’s sleeve for support. “Dobrinion? How?”

“Powrie,” the man answered. “Little rat devil. Sneaked into the church and killed him to death.”

Jojonah could hardly digest the information. His mind started whirling, but he was too sickly and too confused. He sat down again, plop, onto the muddy road, and dropped his face into his hands, sobbing, and didn’t know if he was crying for Abbot Dobrinion or for himself and his beloved Order.

The driver put a comforting hand on his shoulder. They left together for the town, the man promising he would spend the night there even if the folk managed to clear his wagon of the mud. “And ye’ll be riding with me the rest o’ the way to Ursal,” he said with a hopeful smile. “We’ll get ye blankets to keep ye warm, Father, and good food, lots of good food, for the road.”

One of the families in the small town put Jojonah and the driver up for the night, giving him a warm bed. The monk retired early, but couldn’t immediately fall asleep, for a crowd was gathering in the house, with all the folk of the area coming to hear the driver’s sad tale of the death of Abbot Dobrinion. Jojonah lay quiet and listened to them for a long while, then finally, shivering and sweating, he drifted off to sleep.

Youseff and Dandelion did not make the return trip.

Master Jojonah awoke with a start. The house was quiet and, since the clouds hung low outside, dark. Jojonah looked all around, narrowing his eyes. “Who is there?” he asked.

Youseff and Dandelion did not make the return trip! he heard again, more emphatically.

No, not heard, Jojonah realized, for there was not a sound, save the pat of heavy raindrops on the roof. He felt the words, in his mind, and he recognized the man who was putting them there.

“Brother Braumin?” he asked.

I fear that the Father Abbot put them on your trail, the thoughts imparted. Run, my friend, my mentor. Flee back to Palmaris if you are not faraway, to the court of Abbot Dobrinion, and do not allow Brothers Youseff and Dandelion entrance into St. Precious.

The communication was weak—which Jojonah understood, for Braumin wasn’t very practiced with the hematite, and likely the man was using it now under less than ideal circumstances. Where are you? he telepathically asked. St.-Mere-Abelle?

Please, Master Jojonah! You must hear my call. Youseff and Dandelion did not make the return trip!

The contact was lessening—Braumin was getting tired, Jojonah realized. Then, abruptly, it was gone altogether, and Jojonah feared that perhaps Markwart or Francis had happened upon Braumin.

If it really was Braumin, he had to remind himself. If it was anything at all beyond the delirium of his fever.

“They did not know,” the master whispered, for he realized only then that Braumin’s message had mentioned nothing about Dobrinion. Jojonah scrambled out of bed, groaning for the effort, and made his way quietly through the house. He startled the lady first, nearly tripping over her as she slept on a mattress of piled blankets on the common room floor. She had given up her own bed for him, he realized, and truly he did not wish to disturb her now. But some things simply couldn’t wait.

“The driver?” he asked. “Is he in the house, or did he take shelter with another family?”

“Oh, no,” the woman said as pleasantly as she could. “Sure that he’s sleeping in the room with me little boys. Snug as bugs in a rug, so the sayin’ goes.”

“Get him,” Master Jojonah instructed. “At once.”

“Yes, Father, whatever ye’re needing,” the woman replied, untangling herself from her bedroll and half walking, half crawling across the room. She returned in a few moments, the bleary-eyed driver at her side.

“Ye should be sleeping,” the man said. “Not good for yer fever, being up so late.”

“One question,” Jojonah prompted, waving his hands to quiet the man, to make sure he was paying close attention. “When Abbot Dobrinion was murdered, where was the caravan of St.-Mere-Abelle?”

The man cocked his head as if he didn’t understand.

“You know that monks of my abbey were visiting St. Precious,” Jojonah pressed.

“A bit more than visiting, by the trouble they bringed,” the man said with a snort.

“Indeed,” Jojonah conceded. “But where were they when the powrie killed Abbot Dobrinion?”

“Gone.”

“From the city?”

“Out to the north, some say, though I heared they crossed the river, and not on the ferry,” the driver replied. “They were out a day and more afore the abbot fell to the powrie.”

Master Jojonah rocked back on his heels, stroking his large chin. The driver started to elaborate, but the monk had heard enough and stopped him with an upraised palm. “Go back to bed,” he bade both the man and the lady of the house. “As will I.”

Back in the solitude of his darkroom, Master Jojonah did not fall off to sleep. Far from it. Convinced now that the contact with Braumin was not a dreamy, imagined thing, Jojonah had too much to think about. He was not fearful, as Braumin had been, that Youseff and Dandelion had been set on his trail. Markwart was too close to his goal, or at least the obsessed man thought he was, to delay the killers. No, they would go north of Palmaris, not south, onto the battlefield in search of the stones.

But apparently they had made one brief stop on the way, long enough to fix a bit of Markwart’s trouble in Palmaris.

Master Jojonah rushed to the one window in the room, pushed open the shutters and vomited onto the grass outside, sickened by the mere thought that his Father Abbot had ordered the execution of another abbot!

It rang as preposterous! Yet, every detail that was filtering to Jojonah led him inescapably in that direction. Was he, perhaps, clouding those details with his own judgments? he had to wonder. Youseff and Dandelion did not make the return trip!

And Brother Braumin had no idea that Abbot Dobrinion had met such an untimely end.

Truly Master Jojonah hoped he was wrong, hoped that his fears and his feverish delirium were running wild, hoped that the leader of his Order could never have done such a thing. In any case, there seemed only one road ahead of him now, back to the north, and not south, back to St.-Mere-Abelle.

Finally all two hundred were on the move, swinging west and then south of the two towns still in powrie hands. Elbryan directed the march, keeping scouts well ahead of the caravan and holding his forty best warriors in a tight group. Of all the ragged caravan, only about half could fight even if pressed, the other half being simply too old or too young, or too ill. The general health of the group was good, though, thanks mostly to the tireless efforts of Pony and her precious soul stone.

No resistance came out at them from the two towns, and as the afternoon of the fifth day began to wane, they were almost halfway to Palmaris.

“Farm and a barn,” Roger Lockless explained, coming back to meet with Elbryan. “Just a mile ahead. The well’s intact, and I heard chickens.”

Several of the people nearby groaned and cooed and smacked their lips at the thought of fresh eggs.

“But no one was about?” the ranger asked skeptically.

“None outside,” Roger replied, and he seemed a bit embarrassed that he couldn’t have discerned more. “But I was not far ahead of you,” he hastily explained. “I feared that if I tarried too long, you would get in sight of the structures, and any monsters inside, if there are any, would see you.”

Elbryan nodded and smiled. “You did well,” he said. “Hold the group in check here while Pony and I go in and see what we might learn.”

Roger nodded and helped Pony climb on Symphony’s back behind the ranger.

“Strengthen the perimeter, particularly in the north,” Elbryan instructed the young man. “And find Juraviel. Tell him where to find us.”

Roger accepted the orders with a nod. He slapped Symphony on the rump and the horse bounded away. Roger hardly watched the departure, was already moving to instruct the folk of the caravan to settle into a defensive posture.

The ranger found the structures easily enough, and then Pony went to work, using the soul stone to spirit-walk into first the barn and then the farmhouse.

“Powries in the house,” she explained when she came back into her own body. “Three, though one is sleeping in the back bedroom. Goblins hold the barn, but they are not alert.”

Elbryan closed his eyes, seeking a deep, meditative calm, transforming, almost visibly, into his elven-trained alter ego. He indicated a small copse of trees to the left of the barn, then slipped down from Symphony, helping Pony do the same. Leaving the horse, the pair moved cautiously to the shadows of the copse, and then the ranger went on alone, continuing his advance, moving to stumps, to a water trough, to anything that would conceal him. Soon enough he was at the farmhouse, his back to the wall beside a window, Hawkwing in hand. He peered around, then looked back in Pony’s direction and nodded, fitting an arrow.

He turned abruptly and let fly, scoring a hit on the back of the head of a powrie as the unsuspecting dwarf cooked over a stove. The momentum drove the creature’s head forward, forcing its face right into the sizzling grease in the frying pan.

“What’re ye doing!” the dwarf’s companion howled, rushing to the stove.

That dwarf skidded to a stop, though, noting the quivering arrow shaft, then spun about to find Nightbird and Tempest waiting.

Down swept the mighty sword as the powrie reached for its weapon. As its arm fell free of its body, the howling dwarf tried instead to charge ahead, barreling into the ranger.

A sure thrust of Tempest skewered the creature right through the heart, the lunging ranger putting the blade in all the way to its hilt. After a couple of wild spasms, the powrie slid dead to the floor.

“Yach, ye’re waking me up!” came a roar from the bedroom.

Nightbird smiled, then waited a minute, slipping quietly to the door. He paused a few moments longer, making sure that the dwarf had settled down once more, then slowly pushed open the door.

There lay the powrie, on a bed, its back to him.

The ranger came out of the house soon after, giving a quick wave to Pony. He retrieved Hawkwing and began a cautious circuit of the barn. Of note was the hayloft, with one door cracked open and a rope hanging to the ground.

The ranger glanced all around, to see Pony moving to a new position, one that allowed her to view both the main door and the hayloft. He was truly blessed to have such a competent companion, he knew, for if he got into trouble, Pony would always be there.

And now, both of them understood the plan. Pony could have charged straight into the barn, of course, using serpentine and the explosive ruby to blow the place away, but the smoke of such a fire would not be a good thing. Instead she held her position, magnetite and graphite in hand, as Nightbird’s backup.

And the ranger did not underestimate the amount of discipline it took for her to accept that position. Every morning, she performed the sword-dance beside him, and her blade work was truly becoming magnificent. She wanted to fight, to stand beside Elbryan, to dance now for real. But Pony was truly disciplined and patient. The ranger had assured her that she would get her chance to use the new techniques—both knew that she was almost ready.

But not yet.

Nightbird tested the rope to the hayloft, then began a cautious and quiet climb. He paused just below the door, listening, peeking in at the loft level, then waved one finger up in the air for Pony to see.

Up he went, level with the door, putting one foot gingerly in the small crack, though he had to continue to hold on to the rope. He had to move fast, he realized, and wouldn’t likely have time to draw any weapon.

Again the ranger took a deep, steadying breath, found his center and his necessary calm. Then he hooked his foot about the bottom of the door and yanked it out, hurling himself into the loft, into the surprised goblin standing a nonchalant guard within.

The goblin gave a cry, muffled almost immediately as the ranger clamped a strong hand over its mouth, his other arm wrapping tight around the goblin’s weapon hand. Nightbird clamped his hand over the creature’s face, squeezing hard, then turned his wrist and drove the goblin to its knees.

A cry from below told him he was out of time.

With a sudden jerk, Nightbird brought the goblin back up to its feet, then twisted and threw, launching the creature out the open door to dive the ten feet to the ground. It landed hard and groaned, then tried to get back up, tried to call out. At the last instant it spotted Pony, the woman standing calm, hand extended.

A lodestone traveling many times the speed of a sling bullet blasted right through the metal amulet the creature had around its neck, a piece of jewelry it had stolen from a woman who futilely begged for her life.

Inside the barn, Nightbird set Hawkwing to deadly work, blasting goblins from the ladder as they tried to gain the loft. A moment later the startled ranger found out he was not alone, as a second archer joined him.

“Roger told me of your plans,” Belli’mar Juraviel explained. “A good start!” he added, plunking an arrow into a goblin that had foolishly scurried into view.

Recognizing that there was no way they could possibly get up that ladder, the remaining goblins went for the main door instead, pushing it wide and scrambling out into the daylight.

A bolt of streaking lightning laid most of them low.

Then the elf was above them, at the doors to the loft, firing down at those who continued to scramble.

The ranger did not join his friend, but took a different route, slipping down the ladder. He hit the ground in a roll, avoiding a spear throw by one creature, and was firing Hawkwing as he came around, taking the goblin right in the face, then again, taking out a second as it ran for the door.

Then all was quiet, inside at least, but Nightbird sensed he was not alone. He put his bow to the ground and drew out his sword, moving slowly, silently.

Outside, the cries diminished. Nightbird came to a bale of hay, put his back against it and listened hard.

Breathing.

Around he went suddenly, holding his swing just long enough to make sure that it was indeed another goblin and not some unfortunate prisoner, then lopping the creature’s ugly head from its shoulders with a single stroke. He came out into the daylight afterward, finding Pony and Juraviel walking Symphony toward the barn, their business finished.

The elf stayed with Elbryan, securing a new perimeter, while Pony galloped the stallion back to gather the group.

“I canno’ be turning back now,” the driver replied when Jojonah told him of the plans the next morning. “Though suren I’d love to be helping ye. But me business—”

“Is important. Indeed,” Jojonah finished for him, excusing him.

“Yer best way back is with the ships,” the driver went on. “Most o’ them are heading up north and to the open sea for the summer season. I’d’ve come down on one meself, but few be coming south just now.”

Master Jojonah stroked his stubbly chin. He had no money, but perhaps he could find a way. “The nearest port, then,” he said to the driver.

“South and east,” the man replied. “Bristole by name. A town built for fixing and supplying the boats and not much else. She’s not too far outta me way.”

“I would be obliged,” the monk answered.

So they were off again, after a hearty breakfast, supplied for free by the goodly townsfolk. Only when the wagon began rambling down the road did Master Jojonah comprehend how much better he was feeling physically. Despite the bumpy nature of the ride, his breakfast had settled well. It was as if the news of the previous night, the implication that things were darker by far than he had ever imagined, had pumped strength back into his frail body. He simply could not afford to be weak now.

Bristole was as small a town as Jojonah had ever seen, and seemed strangely unbalanced to the monk. The dock areas were extensive, with long wharves that could accommodate ten large ships. Other than that, though, there were but a few buildings, including only a pair of small warehouses. It wasn’t until the wagon pulled into the center of the cluster of houses that Jojonah began to understand.

Ships going up- or downriver would need no supplies at this point, since the trip from Palmaris to Ursal was not a long one. However, the sailors might desire a bit of relief, and so the ships would put in here for restocking of a different nature.

Of the seven buildings clustered together, two were taverns and two were brothels.

Master Jojonah said a short prayer, but was not overly concerned. He was an accepting man, ever willing to forgive the weakness of the flesh. It was, after all, the strength of the soul that counted.

He bade farewell to the generous driver, wishing he could give the goodly man more than words for his efforts, and then turned to the business at hand. Three ships were in; another was approaching from the south. The monk walked down to the riverbank, his sandals clapping against the extensive boardwalk.

“Hail, good fellows,” he called as he neared the closest ship, seeing a pair of men bending low behind the taffrail, working hammers on some problem he could not see. Jojonah noted that this ship was in stern first, an oddity, and, he hoped, an omen that it would soon depart.

“Hail, good fellows!” Jojonah yelled more loudly, waving his arms to get their attention.

The hammering stopped and one old sea dog with wrinkled brown skin and no teeth looked up to regard the monk. “And to yourself, Father,” he said.

“Are you heading north?” Master Jojonah asked. “To Palmaris, perhaps?”

“Palmaris and the Gulf,” the man answered. “But we’re not heading anywhere at all anytime soon. Got an anchor line that won’t hold; chain’s all busted.”

Jojonah understood why the ship was in dock backward. He looked around, back at the town, searching for some solution that would get this ship sailing. Any worthy port would have held the proper equipment—even the meager docks of St.-Mere-Abelle were supplied with such items as chains and anchors. But Bristole was no town for ship repairs, was more a place for “crew repairs.”

“Got a new one sailing up from Ursal,” the old seaman went on. “Should arrive in two days. Are you looking for passage, then?”

“Yes, but I cannot delay.”

“Well, we’ll take you, for five pieces of the King’s gold,” the old man said. “A fair price, Father.”

“Indeed it is, but I’ve not the gold to pay, I fear,” Jojonah replied. “Nor the time to delay.”

“Two days?” the sea dog balked.

“Two days more than I have to spare,” Jojonah answered.

“I do beg your pardon, Father,” came another voice, from the ship next in line, a wide and sturdy caravel. “We shall be sailing north this very day.”

Master Jojonah waved to the two on the damaged vessel and walked around to get a better view of the newest speaker. The man was tall and lean and dark-skinned—not from the sun, but from his heritage. He was Behrenese, and, given his complexion, likely from a region of southern Behren, far south of the Belt-and-Buckle.

“I am afraid that I have no gold to pay,” Jojonah replied.

The dark man flashed a pearly smile. “But Father,” he said, “why would you be needing the gold?”

“I’ll work for my passage, then,” Jojonah offered.

“All on my ship could use a good prayer, Father,” the Behrenese man replied. “More, I fear, after our little stop here. Come aboard, I beg you. We were not to leave until late in the day, but I’ve only one man out and he can be retrieved easily. If you are in a hurry, then we are in a hurry!”

“Very generous, good sir—”

“Al’u’met,” the man answered. “Captain Al’u’met of the good ship Saudi Jacintha.”

Jojonah cocked his head at that curious name.

“It means Jewel of the Desert,” Al’u’met explained. “A bit of a joke on my father, who wished me to ride the dunes, not the waves.”

“As my own father wanted me to serve ale, not prayer,” Jojonah replied with a laugh. He was more than a bit surprised to find a dark-skinned Behrenese in command of an Ursal sailing ship, and even more surprised to see the man pay so much respect to one of the Abellican Order. Jojonah’s Church was not prominent in the southern kingdom; indeed, missionaries had many times been slaughtered for trying to impose their vision of divinity on the often intolerant priests—yatols in the Behren tongue—of the deserts.

Captain Al’u’met helped Jojonah over the last step of gangplank, then dispatched two of his crewmen to go and find the one missing sailor. “Have you bags to bring aboard?” he asked Jojonah.

“Only what I carry,” the monk replied.

“And how far north will you be sailing?”

“Palmaris,” Jojonah replied. “Or across the river, actually; I can ride the ferry. I am needed at St.-Mere-Abelle on most urgent matters.”

“We may be sailing past All Saints Bay,” Captain Al’u’met said. “Though you will lose a week at least traveling by sea.”

“Then Palmaris it is,” the monk said.

“Exactly where we were going,” Captain Al’u’met replied, and, smiling still, he pointed to the cabin door leading under the poop deck. “I have two rooms,” he explained. “Surely I can share one with you for a day or two.”

“You are Abellican?”

Al’u’met’s grin widened. “For three years,” he explained. “I found your God at St. Gwendolyn of the Sea, and as fine a catch as Al’u’met has ever known.”

“But another disappointment for your father,” Jojonah reasoned.

Al’u’met put a finger to pursed lips. “He does not need to know such things, Father,” he said slyly. “Out on the Mirianic, when the storms blow high and the waves break twice the height of a tall man above the forward rail, I choose my own God. Besides,” he added with a wink, “they are not so different, you know, the God of your land and the one of mine. A change in robes would make a priest a yatol.”

“So your conversion was one of convenience,” Jojonah teased.

Al’u’met shrugged. “I choose my own God.”

Jojonah nodded and returned the wide smile, then made his slow way toward the captain’s cabins.

“My boy will show you your quarters,” Al’u’met called after him.

The cabin boy was just within the shelter of the room, throwing bones, when Master Jojonah opened the door. The lad, no more than ten years of age, scrambled frantically, collecting his dice and looking very guilty—he had been caught derelict from his chores, the monk knew.

“Set our friend up, Matthew,” Captain Al’u’met called. “See to his needs.”

Jojonah and Matthew stood staring at each other, sizing each other up for along time. Matthew’s clothes were threadbare, as was the lot for anybody working aboard a ship. But they were a fine cut, better than the attire of most crewmen the monk had met. And the boy was cleaner than most cabin boys, his sun-bleached hair neatly trimmed, his skin golden tanned. There was one notable blemish, though, a black patch on the boy’s forearm.

Jojonah recognized the scar, and he imagined the pain the boy must have felt. The patch had been caused by the second of the three “medicinal” liquids—rum, tar, and urine—kept on the sailing ships. The rum was used to kill the worms that inevitably found their way into foodstuffs, to kill the aftereffects of bad food, and simply to forget the long, long, empty hours. The urine was used for washing, clothes and hair, and as disgusting as that thought was, it paled in comparison to the liquid tar. This was used to patch torn skin. The boy, Matthew, had obviously gashed his arm, and so the sailors had applied tar to the wound to seal it.

“May I?” Jojonah quietly asked, reaching for the arm.

Matthew hesitated, but dared not disobey, cautiously holding the arm up for inspection.

A fine job, the monk noted. The tar had been sanded flat with the skin, a perfect patch of black. “Does it hurt?” Jojonah asked.

Matthew shook his head emphatically.

“He does not speak,” came Captain Al’u’met’s voice, the man having moved up right behind the distracted monk.

“Your work?” Jojonah asked, indicating the arm.

“Not mine, but Cody Bellaway’s,” Al’u’met answered. “He serves as healer when we are far from port.”

Master Jojonah nodded and let the issue drop—openly, at least, for in his mind the image of Matthew’s blackened arm would not so quickly fade. How many hematites were locked away in St.-Mere-Abelle? Five hundred? A thousand? The number was considerable, Jojonah knew, for when he was a younger monk, he had done an inventory of just that stone, easily the most common stone returned from Pimaninicuit over the years. Most of these soul stones were of far less power than the one the caravan to the Barbacan had taken along, but still, Jojonah had to wonder how much good might come of these if they were given to the sailing ships with one or two men on each vessel taught how to bring forth their healing powers. Matthew’s wound had been considerable, no doubt, but Jojonah could have easily sealed it with magic, not tar. With hardly an effort, much suffering could have been avoided.

That line of thinking made the master wonder on a grander scale. Why weren’t all the communities, or at least one community in each general region of the kingdom, given a hematite, with their chosen healers trained in its use?

He had never discussed such a thing with Avelyn, of course, but somehow Master Jojonah understood that Avelyn Desbris, if the choice had been his, would without hesitation have distributed the small hematites to the general populace, would have opened up St.-Mere-Abelle’s horde of magic for the betterment of all, or at least distributed the most minor hematites, stones too weak to be used for diabolical purposes such as possession, stones too weak to be used in any real malevolent way.

Yes, Jojonah knew, Avelyn would have done it if given the chance, but of course Father Abbot Markwart would never have given him the chance!

Jojonah patted the mop of Matthew’s blond hair and motioned for the lad to show him to his room. Al’u’met left them then, calling for his hands to ready the ship for departure.

Saudi Jacintha slipped out of Bristole soon after, her sails fast filling with wind, pushing her against the considerable current. They would make good time, Al’u’met came and assured the monk, for the south winds were brisk, with no sign of storm, and as the Masur Delaval widened, the pull of the water was not so strong.

The monk spent the bulk of the day in his cabin, sleeping, gathering the strength he knew he would need. He did get up for a short while, and with a friendly nod convinced Matthew to play dice with him, assuring him the captain wouldn’t mind if he took a short break from his chores.

Jojonah wished that the boy could talk, or even laugh, in the hour they spent throwing dice. He wanted to know where the lad had come from and how he had wound up on a ship at so tender an age.

Likely his parents, poverty-stricken, had sold him, the monk knew, and he winced at the thought. That was how most ships acquired cabin boys, though Jojonah hoped that Al’u’met had not been the one to purchase him. The captain claimed to be a religious man, and men of God did not do such things.

A light rain came up that night, but nothing that impeded Saudi Jacintha’s progress. This crew was well-trained and knew every turn in the great river, and on the ship plowed, her prow spray foaming white in the moonlight. It was at that forward rail, in that same night after the rain had stopped, that Master Jojonah fully accepted the truths that were forming in his heart. Alone in the darkness with the splash of the prow, the croaking of the animals on the bank, the flutter of the wind in the sails, Master Jojonah found his course come clearer.

He felt as if Avelyn were with him, hovering about him, reminding him of the three vows—not just the empty spoken words, but the meaning behind them—that supposedly guided the Abellican Order.

He stayed up all through the night and went to bed again right before the dawn, after coaxing a sleepy-eyed Matthew to go and fetch him a good meal.

He was up again at dinnertime, dining beside Captain Al’u’met, who informed him they would reach their goal early the next morning.

“You might not wish to stay up all the night again,” the captain said with a smile. “You will be back to land in the morning, and will not travel far, I will guess, if you are asleep.”

Still, later on that evening, Captain Al’u’met found Jojonah again at the forward rail, staring into the darkness, looking into his own heart.

“You are a thinking man,” the captain said, approaching the monk. “I like that.”

“You can tell such things simply because I am standing out here alone?” Jojonah replied. “I might be thinking of nothing at all.”

“Not at the forward rail,” Captain Al’u’met said, taking a spot right beside the leaning monk. “I, too, know the inspiration of this place.”

“Where did you get Matthew?” Jojonah asked abruptly, blurting out the words before he could even consider them.

Al’u’met gave him a sidelong glance, surprised by the question. He looked back to the prow spray and smiled. “You do not wish to think that I, a man of your Church, purchased him from his parents,” the perceptive man reasoned. “But I did,” Al’u’met added, standing straighter and looking directly at the monk.

Master Jojonah did not return the stare.

“They were paupers, living near St. Gwendolyn, surviving on the scraps your Abellican brothers bothered to toss out for them,” the captain went on, his tone deepening, growing somber.

Now Jojonah did turn, eyeing the man severely. “Yet this is the Church you chose to join,” he stated.

“That does not mean that I agree with all of those who now administer the doctrine of the Church,” Al’u’met calmly replied. “As to Matthew, I purchased him, and at a handsome price, because I came to think of him as my own son. He was always at the docks, you see—or at least, he was there at those times when he could escape his wrathful father. The man beat him for no reason, though little Matthew had not seen his seventh birthday at the time. So I purchased him, took him aboard to teach him an honest trade.”

“A difficult life,” Jojonah remarked, but all animosity and hints of accusation were gone from his voice.

“Indeed,” the large Behrenese agreed. “A life some love and others loathe. Matthew will make up his own mind when he is old enough to better understand. If he comes to love the sea, as I do, then he will have no choice but to stay aboard ship—and hopefully he will choose to stay with me. Saudi Jacintha will outlive me, I fear, and it would be good to have Matthew to carry on my work.”

Al’u’met turned to face the monk and went quiet, waiting until Jojonah looked at him directly. “And if he does not love the smell and the roll of the waves, he will be free to go,” the man said sincerely. “And I will make sure that he has a good start wherever he chooses to live. I give you my word on this, Master Jojonah of St.-Mere-Abelle.”

Jojonah believed him, and his return smile was genuine. Among the tough sailors of the day, Captain Al’u’met surely stood tall.

They both looked back to the water and stood in silence for some time, save for the splashing prow and the wind.

“I knew Abbot Dobrinion,” Captain Al’u’met said at length. “A good man.”

Jojonah looked at him curiously.

“Your companion, the wagon driver, spread word of the tragedy in Bristole while you were seeking passage,” the captain explained.

“Dobrinion was indeed a good man,” Jojonah replied. “And a great loss it is for my Church that he was killed.”

“A great loss for all the world,” Al’u’met agreed.

“How did you know him?”

“I know many of the Church leaders, for, given my mobile profession, I spend many hours in many different chapels, St. Precious among them.”

“Have you ever been to St.-Mere-Abelle?” Jojonah asked, though he didn’t think Al’u’met had, for he believed that he would remember this man.

“We put in once,” the Captain replied. “But the weather was turning, and we had far to go, so I did not get off the docks. St. Gwendolyn was not so far away, after all.”

Jojonah smiled.

“I have met your Father Abbot, though,” the Captain went on. “Only once. It was 819, or perhaps 820; the years do seem to blend as they pass. Father Abbot Markwart had put out a call for open-seas sailing ships. I am not really a river-runner, you see, but we took some damage last year—powrie barrelboat, for the wretched dwarves seemed to be everywhere!—and were late getting out of port this spring.”

“You answered the Father Abbot’s call,” Jojonah prompted.

“Yes, but my ship was not chosen,” Al’u’met replied casually. “Truthfully, I think it had something to do with the color of my skin. I do not believe that your Father Abbot trusted a Behrenese sailor, especially one who was not, at that time, an anointed member of your Church.”

Jojonah nodded his agreement; there was no way that Markwart would have accepted a man of the southern religion for the journey to Pimaninicuit. The monk found that notion ironic, laughable even, given the carefully planned murderous end of the voyage.

“Captain Adjonas and his Windrunner were the better choice,” Al’u’met admitted. “He was riding the open Mirianic before lever learned to work an oar.”

“You know of Adjonas, then?” Jojonah asked. “And of the end of the Windrunner?”

“Every seaman on the Broken Coast knows of the loss,” Captain Al’u’met replied. “Happened just outside of All Saints Bay, so they say. A rough bit of water, to be sure, though I am amazed that a man as sea-seasoned as Adjonas got caught too near the shoal.”

Jojonah only nodded; he could not bring himself to reveal the awful truth, to tell this man that Adjonas and his crew had been slaughtered in the sheltered waters of All Saints Bay by the holy men of the religion Al’u’met had freely joined. Looking back at that now, Master Jojonah could hardly believe that he had gone along with the plan, the terrible tradition. Had it always been that way, as the Church insisted?

“A fine ship and crew,” Al’u’met finished reverently.

Jojonah nodded his agreement, though in truth, he hardly knew any of the sailors, had met only Captain Adjonas and the first hand, Bunkus Smealy, a man he did not like at all.

“Go and get your sleep, Father,” Captain Al’u’met said. “You’ve a hard day of walking ahead of you.”

Jojonah, too, thought that to be a good time to break the conversation. Al’u’met had inadvertently given him much to think about, had rekindled memories and put them in a new light. That does not mean that I agree with all of those who now administer the doctrine of the Church, Al’u’met had said, words that rang as truly prophetic to the disillusioned master.

Jojonah slept well that night, better than he had since he had first arrived in Palmaris, since all the world had spun completely over. A cry concerning dock lights woke him with the sun and he gathered his few possessions and raced onto the deck, thinking to see the long wharves of Palmaris.

All that he saw was fog, a heavy gray blanket. All the crew was above decks; most at the rail, holding lanterns and peering intently into the gloom. Looking for rocks, or even other ships, Jojonah realized, and a shudder coursed his spine. The sight of Captain Al’u’met calmed him, though, the tall man standing serenely, as though this situation was nothing out of the ordinary. Jojonah made his way to join him.

“I heard a cry for dock lights,” the monk explained, “though I doubt that any might have been spotted in this fog.”

“We saw,” Al’u’met assured him, smiling. “We are close, and getting closer by the second.”

Jojonah followed the captain’s gaze out over the forward rail, to the gloom. Something—he couldn’t quite identify it—seemed out of place to him, as though his internal direction sense was askew. He stood quiet for a long while, trying to sort it out, noting the position of the sun, a lighter splotch of grayness ahead of the ship.

“We are traveling east,” he said suddenly, turning to Al’u’met. “But Palmaris is on the western bank.”

“I thought that I would save you the hours on the crowded ferry,” Al’u’met explained. “Though they might not even run the ferry in this gloom.”

“Captain, you did not have to—”

“No trouble, my friend,” Al’u’met replied. “We would not be allowed into Palmaris port until the fog rolled back anyway, so rather than set anchor, we turned to Amvoy, a smaller port and one with less rules.”

“Land to forward!” came a call from above.

“Amvoy’s long dock!” another sailor agreed.

Jojonah looked to Al’u’met, who only winked and smiled.

Soon after, Saudi Jacintha glided easily into position beside the one long dock at Amvoy, the skilled sailors expertly tying her in place.

“I wish you well, Master Jojonah of St.-Mere-Abelle,” Al’u’met said sincerely as he led the monk to the gangplank. “May the loss of good Abbot Dobrinion strengthen us all.” He shook Jojonah’s hand firmly, and the monk turned to go.

At the edge of the plank he stopped, torn, prudence battling conscience.

“Captain Al’u’met,” he said suddenly, turning about. He noted several other sailors in the vicinity, all listening to his every word, but didn’t let that deter him. “In the coming months you will hear stories of a man named Avelyn Desbris. Brother Avelyn, formerly at St.-Mere-Abelle.”

“The name is not known to me,” Captain Al’u’met replied.

“But it will be,” Master Jojonah assured him. “You will hear terrible stories of the man, naming him as a thief, a murderer, a heretic. You will hear his name dragged through the very fires of hell.”

Captain Al’u’met made no reply at all as Jojonah paused and swallowed hard on his words.

“I tell you this in all sincerity,” the monk went on, realizing that he was crossing a very delicate line here. Again he paused, swallowing hard. “The stories are not true, or at least, the manner in which they will be told will be slanted against the actions of Brother Avelyn, who was, I assure you, a man following his God-inspired conscience at all times.”

Several of the crewmen merely shrugged, thinking that the words meant little for them, but Captain Al’u’met recognized the gravity in the monk’s voice and understood that this was a pivotal moment for the man. From Jojonah’s tone, Al’u’met was wise enough to understand that these tales of this monk he did not know might indeed affect him, and everyone else associated with the Abellican Church. He nodded, not smiling.

“Never has the Abellican Church fostered a better man than Avelyn Desbris,” Jojonah said firmly, and he turned and left the Saudi Jacintha. He understood the chance he had just taken, realizing that the Saudi Jacintha would likely find its way to St.-Mere-Abelle again one day, and that Captain Al’u’met, or more likely, one of the eavesdropping crewmen would speak with men at the abbey, would perhaps speak with Father Abbot Markwart himself. But for some reason, Jojonah didn’t try to qualify the story, or retract it. There, he had said it, openly. As it should be.

Still, the monk’s words followed him as he entered Amvoy, filling him with doubts. He secured a ride to the east on a wagon, and though the driver was a member of the Church, and a man as friendly and generous as Captain Al’u’met, at their parting three days later, only a few miles from the gates of St.-Mere-Abelle, Master Jojonah did not recount his tale of Avelyn.

It wasn’t until he came in sight of the abbey that the master’s doubts vanished. From any perspective, St.-Mere-Abelle was an impressive place, its walls ancient and strong, a lasting part of the mountainous coastline. Whenever he looked upon the abbey from out here, Jojonah was reminded of the long, long history of the Church, of traditions that preceded Markwart, and even the last dozen Father Abbots before him. Again Jojonah felt as if Avelyn’s tangible spirit was about him and in him, and he was overcome with a desire to dig deeper into the Order’s past, to look for the way things had once been so many centuries before. For Master Jojonah could hardly believe that the Church as it now existed could have become such a dominant religion. These days, people were drawn to the Church out of heritage; they were “believers” because their parents had been, their grandparents had been, their grandparents’ parents had been. Few were like Al’u’met, he understood, recent converts, members out of their heart and not their heritage.

It could not have been like that in the beginning, Jojonah reasoned. St.-Mere-Abelle, so vast and impressive, could not have been built with the few who would have agreed, in heart, with the teachings of the present-day Church.

Bolstered by his insight, Master Jojonah approached the strong gates of St.-Mere-Abelle, the place he had called home for more than two-thirds of his life, the place that now seemed to him a facade. He did not yet understand the truth of the abbey, but, with Avelyn’s spirit guiding him, he meant to find it out.

CHAPTER 20

Following the Bait

Connor Bildeborough didn’t feel nervous in the least as he left the familiar and safe, until now, confines of Palmaris behind. He had been in the open northland many times in the last months, and was confident he could avoid any trouble from the large numbers of monsters still to be found up there. The giants, with their dangerous rock-throwing abilities, had become quite scarce, and goblins and powries did not ride horses and would never catch Greystone.

Even when he set camp that first night, some thirty miles north of the city, the nobleman wasn’t concerned. He knew how to conceal himself, and since it was summer, he didn’t even need a fire. He reclined under the boughs of a bushy spruce, his horse nickering softly nearby.

The next day and night were much the same. Connor avoided the one real road that ran up this way, but he knew where he was going, and found enough level and clear ground to keep the pace swift.

On the third day, well over a hundred miles north of Palmaris, he came upon the ruins of a farmhouse and barn, and the tracks in the area told the experienced hunter exactly what had happened: a goblin troupe, a score at least, had come this way within the last couple of days. Fearing rain and an obscurement of the tracks, for the sky was heavy, Connor was back on his horse at once, following the easy trail. He caught up to the raiding band late that afternoon, a light rain just beginning to fall. While Connor was glad to see that it was indeed only goblins, their numbers were twice his estimate and they were outfitted for war and marching with some measure of discipline. The nobleman considered their course, north-by-northwest, and thought it prudent to follow them. If what he suspected, if what the rumors had told him, were true, then these foolish goblins might lead him to the warrior band, and to the person using the magical gemstones operating in the area.

He rested within half a mile of the noisy goblin encampment. At one point, late in the night, he dared to sneak close to the perimeter—and was again impressed by the professionalism shown by the normally slovenly creatures. Still, Connor managed to get close enough to hear pieces of various conversations, complaints mostly, and a confirmation that most of the giants had gone home and the powries were too concerned with their own welfare to worry about any goblins.

Then Connor listened with great interest as a pair of goblins argued about their destination. One wanted to go north, to the encampment at the two towns—Caer Tinella and Landsdown, Connor realized.

“Argh.” the other scolded. “Yer knowin’ that Kos-kosio’s dead and gone, and so’s Maiyer Dek! Ain’t nothing up there but that Nightbird and his killers! The towns’re all but lost, ye fool, and gettin’ hit with balls o’ fire every day!”

A smile widened on Connor’s face. He went back to his impromptu camp and his horse and managed to steal a few hours’ sleep, but was up and ready to go well before the dawn. He followed the goblin troupe again, thinking to swing wide to the west with them, just in case, then turn back to explore the area near Caer Tinella and Landsdown.

The rain was back, heavier this day, but Connor hardly cared.

They took their rest under the shelter of the buildings, using the well, and they did indeed find fresh eggs and fresh milk for their enjoyment. They also found a wagon in the barn, and oxen to pull it, some whetstones to hone their blades and a pitchfork, which Tomas thought would look fine tucked into the belly of a giant. Roger, snooping about every corner of the barn, found a thin but strong rope and a small block and tackle, small enough that he could carry it without trouble. He had no idea what he might use it for, except maybe to rescue the wagon from some mud, but he took it anyway.

And so when the refugees left the farmhouse later that same night, they were refreshed and ready for the last leg of their flight to safety.

As usual, Roger and Juraviel moved into the point position, the elf scrambling nimbly along the lower branches of the trees, the tireless young Roger running a sweeping arc, always alert, always looking for signs of danger.

“You did well today,” Juraviel said unexpectedly, catching Roger off his guard.

The young man looked up at the elf curiously. The two hadn’t spoken much since Juraviel’s thrashing of Roger, other than to agree to plans for their common scouting routes.

“After you spotted the farmhouse and barn, you accepted the position Nightbird gave to you without question,” the elf explained.

“What was I to do?”

“You could have argued,” the elf replied. “Indeed, the Roger Lockless I first met would have seen the duty of staying with the caravan as a slight to his abilities, would have grumbled and complained and probably run off to the farmhouse anyway. In fact, the Roger Lockless I first met would not even have come to Nightbird and the others with the news, not until he had first had his way with the powries and the goblins.”

Roger considered the words for a moment, and found that he could not disagree with the assessment. When he had first spotted the farmhouse, his instincts goaded him to go in for a better look, and a bit of light-fingered fun, perhaps. But that course had screamed as dangerous to Roger, not so much for him, but for the others, who were moving along not so far behind. Even if he hadn’t been caught—which seemed to him likely, whatever monsters might have been inside—he might have had to lie low and stay put, and thus the caravan would not have been warned in time, and a fight—not on favorable terms—might have ensued.

“You understand, of course,” the elf went on.

“I know what I did,” Roger replied curtly.

“And you know that you did well,” Juraviel said, and then, with a sly smile, he added, “You learn quickly.”

Roger’s eyes narrowed as he snapped his angry gaze over the elf; he certainly didn’t need to be reminded of the “lesson.”

Juraviel’s continuing smile defeated him, though, put his pride in its proper place. Roger knew then that they had come to an understanding, he and this elf. The lesson had taken, he had to admit. The cost of failure in this situation was bigger than his own life, and thus he had to accept directions from those more experienced than he. He relented his angry glare, and even managed a nod and a grin.

Juraviel perked up his ears suddenly, his eyes darting to the side. “An approach,” he said, and then he was gone, slipping into the tree cover so quickly that Roger blinked many times.

Then the young man moved fast, finding cover. He spotted the “approach” soon after, and relaxed when he recognized the source, a woman of his group, also out scouting. He startled her so much when he stepped out from behind a tree that she nearly drove her dagger into his chest.

“Something has put you on edge,” Roger understated.

“A group of enemies,” the woman replied. “Moving west, south of our position.”

“How strong?”

“There are quite a few, two score, perhaps,” she answered.

“And what manner of enemies?” came a question from the trees above.

The woman looked up, though she knew she would not catch a glimpse of this ever-elusive friend of Nightbird. Few of the advance scouts had seen Juraviel, though all had heard his melodic voice from time to time. “Goblins,” she replied. “Just goblins.”

“Back to your place, then,” the elf bade her. “Find the next in line, and he, the next in line, that all the scouts are linked, that word can be passed quickly.”

The woman nodded and sped away.

“We could let them pass,” Roger offered as Juraviel came back in sight on a lower branch.

The elf was not looking at him, was staring far away. “Go back and tell Nightbird to prepare a surprise,” he instructed Roger.

“By Nightbird’s own words, we are not to engage,” Roger argued.

“Just goblins,” Juraviel replied. “And if they are part of a larger band, they might be flanking us, and thus should be defeated quickly. Tell Nightbird that I insist we attack.”

Roger looked long and hard at the elf, and for a moment Juraviel thought he would refuse the order. And that was exactly what Roger was thinking. The young man bit back that response, though, nodded and ran off.

“And Roger,” Juraviel called, stopping him before he had gone five strides. He turned back to regard the elf.

“Tell Nightbird that this was your plan,” Juraviel said, “And that I approve completely. Tell him that you believe we must hit the goblins fast and hard. The plan is yours to claim.”

“That would be a lie,” Roger protested.

“Would it?” asked the elf. “When you heard of the goblins, did you not first think that we should attack? Was it not only your obedience to the words of the ranger that stopped you from saying so?”

The young man pursed his lips as he considered the words, the simple truth of them.

“There is nothing wrong with disagreeing,” Juraviel explained. “You have proven repeatedly that your opinion in these matters is truly valuable, and Nightbird understands this, as does Pony, as do I.”

Again Roger turned and sped off, and this time with a noticeable spring in his step.

“My baby!” the woman screamed. “Oh, do not hurt him, I beg of you!”

“Duh?” one goblin asked its leader, scratching its head at the unexpected voice. This band had come from the Moorlands, and were not well-versed in the common language of the land. From their dealings with powries, they knew enough words to understand the general meaning of it all, though.

The goblin leader saw its band shuffling anxiously. They were thirsty for blood, though in no mood for any real battle, and now, delivered into their hands, it seemed, was an easy kill. The overcast had finally broken, and a bright full moon illuminated the night.

“Please,” the unseen woman went on. “They are all just children.” That was all the goblins could stand. Before the leader of the band even gave the word, they were off and running into the forest, each wanting to be the first to claim a kill.

Another cry came out of the shadows, but seemed no closer. The goblins continued their blind charge, crashing through the brush, tripping over roots, but scrambling right back to their feet and running on. Eventually they all came into a small clearing, bordered on the back by a tumble of boulders, on the left by a stand of pines, and on the right by an equally thick mix of oak and maple.

From somewhere behind those pines came the woman’s voice, but now it did not seem so frantic as she sang:

Goblins, goblins, running hard,

Delivering songs unto the bards.

For in your folly you’ve come to play

And every goblin dies this day!

“Duh?” the goblin asked its leader again.

Another voice, melodious and clear, the voice of an elf, picked up the impromptu tune from somewhere within the shadows of the oak.

Dies from arrow, dies from blade,

From magic woven, the toll is paid.

For every person who at your hands

Was murdered most foul while you walked these lands,

We take revenge, we cleanse the night,

That dawn might bring a shining light.

More verses came at the confused monsters as many others took up the song, and laughter followed some of the lines, particularly the ones insulting to the goblins. Finally a resonating, powerful voice joined in, in a tone calm and deathly serious, and all the forest went quiet, as if to hear the words:

By your own evil have you brought this hour,

And by my hands and by my power,

Beg not for mercy, for judgment is passed

We cut you down unto the last.

As he finished, the man walked his shining black stallion out from the shadows behind the boulders, in plain view of the stunned goblins.

“Nightbird,” more than one creature whispered, and they knew then, every one, that they were truly doomed.

From a hillock not so far away, Connor Bildeborough watched the unfolding spectacle with more than a passing interest. For that first voice, the woman’s, haunted the man, a voice he had listened to for so many wonderful months.

“I would give you a chance to surrender,” the ranger said to the goblins. “But I am afraid that I have no place to put you, nor do I trust the likes of smelly goblins.”

The goblin leader strode forward boldly, clenching tight its weapon.

“Are you the leader of this ragged band?” the ranger asked.

No answer.

“Impertinence!” the Nightbird shouted, and he pointed his finger at the goblin’s helmeted head. “Die!” he commanded.

The sharp retort had every goblin jumping, and then staring incredulously as their leader’s head snapped violently to the side, as this powerful goblin who had bullied its way to a position of prominence simply fell over dead!

“And who is now the leader?” the ranger asked ominously.

The goblins went into a frenzy, scrambling every which way, most turning about, trying to run out the way they had come in. But Nightbird’s band had not been idle during the minutes of the taunting song, and a strong contingent of archers was now in place in the forest behind the monsters. As they turned to the trees, they were met by a hail of stinging arrows, and then, when they scrambled yet another way, a sizzling bolt of lightning thundered out of the pines, blinding them all and killing several.

On came Nightbird, on came his warriors, charging down on the confused and disorganized band.

And on came Connor Bildeborough, as well, Defender in hand. The nobleman had seen and heard enough, and galloped headlong into the battle, the name of Jilly ringing from his lips.

Nightbird seemed to be everywhere he was most needed, bolstering his soldiers wherever the goblins appeared to have gained any advantage.

From the oak stand, Belli’mar Juraviel, so sure of hand and eye, peppered the monsters with his small arrows, even stinging several who were engaged in close combat.

Across the way from the elf, Pony held her magic in check, conserving her strength, thinking, fearing, that she would have to use the healing soul stone soon enough.

By the time he got near the clearing, Connor was truly impressed. No ragtag band this! The lightning, the arrows, the perfect timing of the ambush—he lamented that if the King’s soldiers were as well-trained, this war might have ended long ago!

He hoped to find Jilly when he came onto the clearing, but she was not about and he couldn’t rightly go looking for her. His sword was needed now, and so he kicked Greystone into a short burst, slashing one goblin as he passed and then trampling a second who had put a man to the ground.

The horse stumbled and Connor lost his seat, tumbling hard to the ground. No matter, though, for he was not badly hurt and he was up and ready with his sword in an instant.

Luck was not with the nobleman, though, for several goblins had chosen this particular place as their exit point, and now only Connor stood between them and the forest. He raised his sword and bravely assumed defensive posture, slipping his thoughts to the magnetites, activating their attracting magic.

A goblin sword slashed in, but Defender easily got in its path, blade against blade. When the goblin tried to retract its weapon, it found the blade somehow stuck to the nobleman’s sword.

A deft twist and swing of Defender, a release of the magnetite magic, and the goblin’s sword was flying free.

But Connor was far from free, for other goblins pressed in, and many carried not metal weapons, but thick wooden clubs.

A small arrow zipped out from behind Connor, taking one goblin in the eye. Before he could even glance back to discern the source, the warrior astride the stallion was there beside him, his magnificent sword glowing of its own magical light.

The goblins turned about, shouting “Nightbird!” and “Doom!” repeatedly, and seemed not to care that they were running from two men into the whirling swords of two score.

It was over in a matter of minutes, and the wounded—and there weren’t many, and only one or two appeared seriously injured— were quickly ushered back to the forest in the north, into the pines.

Connor went to his horse, carefully inspecting the beast’s legs and breathing a deep sigh indeed when he discerned that beautiful Greystone had not been seriously injured.

“Who are you?” the man on the stallion asked him, walking near. His tone was not threatening, was not even suspicious.

Connor looked up to see that many of the warriors were about him, eyeing him curiously.

“Forgive us, but we have not found many allies so far from the more populated lands,” the ranger added calmly.

“I am a friend from Palmaris, it would seem,” Connor answered. “Out hunting goblins.”

“Alone?”

“There are advantages to riding alone,” Connor answered.

“Then hail and good greetings,” Elbryan said, sliding down from Symphony and walking to stand directly before the man. He took Connor’s hand in a firm shake. “We have food and drink, but we will not be stopping for long. Our road leads to Palmaris, and we plan to use the hours of the night to our advantage.”

“So it would seem,” Connor said dryly, looking at the many goblin dead.

“You are welcome to join us,” Elbryan said. “In fact, we would consider it an honor and a great favor.”

“I did not prove myself so worthy a fighter in that battle,” Connor remarked. “Not measured next to the one called Nightbird,” he added, offering the ranger a smile.

Elbryan only smiled in reply, and started away, Connor falling in beside him. He went to the first kill, the goblin who had led the band, and bent low, pulling aside the creature’s bent and torn helmet.

“How far to the city?” another man, young and slight, asked.

“Three days,” Connor replied. “Four, if you have any who will slow you down.”

“Four, then,” Roger replied.

Connor looked from him to the ranger just in time to see the large man dig a gemstone out of the goblin’s smashed head.

“Then you are the worker of magic,” the nobleman reasoned.

“Not I,” replied Elbryan. “I can use the stones to some small degree, but pale indeed beside the true wielder.”

“A woman?” Connor asked breathlessly.

Elbryan turned and rose, facing Connor directly, and Connor realized that his question had touched some nerve, had unsettled this man as surely as a threat. As eager as he was, Connor was wise enough to let the matter drop for now; these folks, the magic-user at least, were outlaws in the eyes of the Church, and they might know it, and might be more than a little suspicious of anyone asking too many probing questions.

“I heard the woman’s song,” Connor went on, deflecting his true intent “I am a nobleman, and have seen magic before, but never have I witnessed such a magnificent display.”

Elbryan didn’t reply, but his visage softened somewhat. He looked around, to see that the refugees were efficiently ending the suffering of those goblins who had not yet succumbed to their wounds, then going about the task of taking whatever supplies they could find among the dead monsters. “Come,” he bade the stranger. “I must ready the folk for the continuing march.”

He led Connor, Roger in tow, into the forest then, moving to an area where the undergrowth was not so dense. Several fires were burning, guiding the people as they went about their work, and beside one such blaze Connor saw her.

Jilly, working over the wounded. His Jilly, as beautiful—more beautiful!—than she had been back in Palmaris, before the war, before all the pain. Her blond hair was shoulder-length now, and so thick that he felt as if he could lose himself in it, and even in the dim light of the fires her eyes shone blue, sparkling and rich.

All color left Connor’s handsome face and he broke away from Elbryan, walking as if in a daze toward her.

The ranger caught up to him in an instant, taking him by the arm. “Are you wounded?” Elbryan asked.

“I know her,” was Connor’s breathless reply. “I know her.”

“Pony?”

“Jilly.”

Still the ranger held him firmly, more firmly, in place, turning him and eyeing him directly. Elbryan knew that Pony had married a nobleman in Palmaris, with disastrous consequences. “Your name, sir,” the ranger inquired.

The man straightened. “Connor Bildeborough of Chasewind Manor,” he answered boldly.

Elbryan didn’t know how to react. One part of him wanted to punch the man in the face, to lay him low . . . because he had hurt Pony? No, that wasn’t the reason, the ranger had to admit, to himself if not openly. He wanted to punch Connor out of sheer jealousy, out of the fact that, for a time at least, this man had found Pony’s heart. She may not have been in love with Connor as she now loved him, may not even have consummated their relationship, but she had cared deeply about Connor Bildeborough, had even married him!

The ranger closed his eyes for a brief moment, finding his center and his calm. He had to consider how Pony would feel if he clobbered the man now, had to consider how she would feel at the mere sight of Connor Bildeborough. “Better to wait until she is finished with the wounded,” he explained calmly.

“I must see her and speak with her,” Connor stuttered.

“To the detriment of those who just battled the goblins beside her,” the ranger said firmly. “You will prove a distraction, Master Bildeborough, and the work with the stones requires absolute concentration.”

Connor glanced again to the woman, even took a step that way, but the ranger tugged him insistently back, with strength that frightened the man. He turned again to face Elbryan, and understood he would not get near Jilly now, that this man would drag him away forcibly, if need be.

“She will be finished within the hour,” Elbryan said to him. “And then you may see her.”

Connor studied the ranger’s face as he spoke, and realized only then that there was something more than friendship between this man and the woman who had been his wife. He sized up Elbryan in light of his new observation, taking a measure of the ranger should they come to blows.

He didn’t like the prospect.

So he followed the ranger as the man went about the business of preparing for the move. Connor glanced over at Jill often, as did Nightbird, and neither of them doubted that they were thinking much the same things. Finally Connor broke away from the ranger and moved to the far end of the encampment, putting as much distance, and as many people, between himself and Jill as possible. The sight of her, the realization that she was once again so near, was finally settling in on the nobleman; he had gone past the pleasant recollections to that one horrible night, their wedding night, when he had almost raped his unwilling bride. And then he had paid for an annulment, and forced charges against Jill for refusing him, an accusation that had taken her from her family and indentured her to the King’s army. How would she feel about seeing him again? he wondered, and worried, for Connor could not believe that she would return his wistful smile.

They were on the road for nearly half an hour before Connor finally mustered the courage to ride up beside the woman, who was riding Symphony, the ranger walking along beside her.

Elbryan saw him coming first. He looked up at Pony, locking her gaze. “I am here in support of you,” he said. “For whatever you need of me, even if that means that I must leave you alone.”

Pony eyed him curiously, not understanding, then heard the hoofbeats. She knew that a stranger had joined in the battle, a nobleman from Palmaris, but Palmaris was a big city, and she had never imagined that it might be . . .

Connor.

Pony nearly toppled from Symphony at the sight of the man; her arms and legs went weak, her stomach churned. The black wings of remembered pain fluttered up about her, threatening to bury her. It was a part of her life that she did not want to recall, a memory better lost. She had survived the pain, had even grown from the pain, but she did not wish to relive it, especially not now, with the future so uncertain and so full of challenges.

Still, she could not avoid those images. She had been held down, like an animal, her clothes torn from her and her limbs held steady. And then, when he, this man who had professed to love her, could not follow through, she had been summarily dismissed, dragged from her bedchamber. Even that was not enough for him, for then Connor—this man, this gallant-looking figure so splendid on his well-groomed riding horse, with jewels in his sword belt and clothes cut of the finest cloth—had ordered both the handmaidens to return to him for his pleasure, had cruelly shot the barb right into her heart.

And here he was, astride his horse right beside her, a smile finding its way onto his undeniably handsome face. “Jilly,” he blurted, so full of excitement.

CHAPTER 21

In the Bowels of St.-Mere-Abelle

“You would allow your beloved husband to be tortured for the sake of your outlaw, adopted daughter?” Father Abbot Markwart asked the poor woman.

Pettibwa Chilichunk was a wretched sight. Dark bluish bags circled her eyes and all of her skin seemed to sag, for she had not slept more than a few hours in many days, ever since Grady had died on the road. Pettibwa had been heavy for many years, but had always carried her round form with grace and a light bounce in her step. No more. Even during those times when sheer exhaustion laid the woman low, she was ultimately awakened by horrible nightmares, or by her captors, who seemed as wicked as any dream could ever be.

“We will take his nose first,” Father Abbot Markwart went on. “Right to here,” he added, running his finger along the crease of a flared nostril. “It makes for a gruesome sight indeed, and assures that poor Graevis will be forever an outcast”

“Why would ye be doin’ such a thing, and yerself claimin’ to be a man o’ God!” Pettibwa cried. She knew that the old man was not lying, that he would do exactly what he had threatened. She had heard him just minutes before, in the adjoining room in the southernmost cellar of St.-Mere-Abelle, formerly a storage area but now converted to hold the two Chilichunks and Bradwarden. Markwart had gone to Graevis first, and Pettibwa heard the agonized screams quite clearly through the earthen wall. Now the woman wailed and repeatedly made the holy sign of the evergreen, the symbol of the Abellican Order.

Markwart was unrepentant and unimpressed. He came forward suddenly, powerfully, moving his leering visage to within a hair’s breadth of Pettibwa’s face. “Why, you ask!” he roared. “Because of your daughter, foolish woman! Because your dear Jilly’s evil alliance with the heretic Avelyn could bring about the end of the world!”

“Jilly’s a good girl!” Pettibwa yelled back at him. “Never would she do—”

“But she has!” Markwart interrupted, growling out every word. “She has the stolen gemstones, and I will do whatever is necessary—pity Graevis!—to see that they are returned. Then Pettibwa can look upon her disfigured outcast husband and know that her own foolishness condemned him, as it condemned her son!”

“Ye killed him!” Pettibwa cried, tears streaming down her face. “Ye killed me son!”

Markwart’s expression went perfectly cold, stone-faced, and that, in turn, seemed to freeze the woman, locked her in his gaze. “I assure you,” the Father Abbot said in even tones, “that your husband, and then you, will soon envy Grady.”

The woman wailed and fell back—and would have fallen right to the ground had not Brother Francis been behind to support her. “Oh, what’re ye wantin’ o’ poor Pettibwa, Father,” she cried. “I’ll tell ye. I’ll tell ye!”

A wicked smile crossed the Father Abbot’s face, though he had been looking forward to cutting off the stupid Graevis’ nose.

St-Mere-Abelle was buttoned up tight, with guards, young monks armed with crossbows, and the occasional older student armed with a potent gemstone, graphite or ruby, patrolling every section of wall. Master Jojonah, recognized by all and liked by most, had no trouble getting back into the abbey, though.

Word of his arrival preceded him, and he was met in the main hall almost as soon as he entered by a very sour-looking Brother Francis. Many other monks were in that hall, as well, curious as to why Jojonah had returned.

“The Father Abbot will speak with you,” the young monk said curtly, looking around as he spoke, as though playing to the audience, showing them which of them, he or Jojonah, was truly in the favor of Markwart.

“You seem to have forgotten respect for your superiors,” Master Jojonah replied, not backing off an inch.

Francis snorted and started to reply, but Jojonah cut him short.

“I warn you, Brother Francis,” he said gravely. “I am sick and have been too long on the road and too long in this life. I know that you fancy yourself Father Abbot Markwart’s adopted son, but if you continue this attitude toward those who have attained a higher rank than you, toward those who, by their years of study and the wisdom of simple age, are deserving of your respect, I will bring you before the College of Abbots. Father Abbot Markwart may protect you there, in the end, but his embarrassment will be considerable, as will his vengeance upon you.”

All the hall went deathly silent, and Master Jojonah pushed past the stunned Brother Francis and exited. He needed no escort to Markwart’s room.

Brother Francis paused for a long while, regarding the other monks in the room, their suddenly condescending stares. He responded with a threatening glare, but for now, at least, Master Jojonah had stolen the bite from this dog’s bark. Francis stormed out of the main hall, feeling the eyes of his lessers upon him.

Master Jojonah entered the Father Abbot’s room with hardly a knock, pushing through the unlocked door and moving right up to the desk of the old man.

Markwart shifted aside some papers he had been studying and sat back in his chair, sizing up the man.

“I sent you on an important matter,” the Father Abbot stated. “Surely you could not have completed your mission in Ursal and returned to us already.”

“I never got near to Ursal,” Master Jojonah admitted. “For I was taken by illness on the road.”

“You do not seem so sick,” Markwart remarked, and not kindly.

“I was met on the road by a man with news of the tragedy in Palmaris,” Master Jojonah explained, eyeing Markwart closely as he spoke the words, trying to see if the Father Abbot would inadvertently offer any clue that the death of Abbot Dobrinion had not been unexpected.

The old man was too sly for that. “Not so much a tragedy,” he replied. “The issue was settled with the Baron amicably, his nephew returned to him.”

A knowing grin made its way onto Master Jojonah’s face. “I was speaking of the murder of Abbot Dobrinion,” he said.

Markwart’s eyes widened and he came forward in his chair. “Dobrinion?” he echoed.

“Then news has not reached St.-Mere-Abelle,” Jojonah reasoned, going with the obvious bluff. “It is good that I have returned.”

Brother Francis bumbled into the room.

“Yes, Father Abbot,” Jojonah went on, ignoring the younger man. “Powries, or a single powrie, at least, entered St. Precious and murdered Abbot Dobrinion.” Behind him, Brother Francis gasped, and it seemed to Master Jojonah that the news was a true surprise to the younger man. “As soon as I heard, of course, I turned back for St.-Mere-Abelle,” he went on. “It would not do for us to be caught so unawares; it would seem that our enemies have singled out their prey, and if Abbot Dobrinion is a target, it only stands to reason that the Father Abbot of the Abellican Order—”

“Enough,” Markwart interrupted, putting his head down in his arms. Markwart realized what had just happened here, understood that Jojonah, ever the clever one, had just turned his feigned surprise back against him, had just justified his return to St.-Mere-Abelle beyond any question.

“It is good that you returned to us,” Markwart said a moment later, looking back to the man. “And a tragedy indeed that Abbot Dobrinion met with such an untimely end. But your business here is finished, and so prepare again for the road.”

“I am not physically able to make the journey to Ursal,” Jojonah replied.

Markwart eyed him suspiciously.

“Nor do I think such a move prudent, given the demise of the chief sponsor for Brother Allabarnet’s sainthood. Without Dobrinion’s backing, the process will be set back years, at least.”

“If I order you to go to St. Honce, then you shall go to St Honce,” Markwart answered, the rough edge of his ire beginning to show through.

Still, Master Jojonah didn’t back away. “Of course, Father Abbot,” he replied. “And by the code of the Abellican Order, when you find justification to send a sickly master halfway across the kingdom, I will willingly go. But there is no reason for that now, no justification. Just be pleased that I was able to return in time to warn you of the potential danger from the powries.” Jojonah turned on his heel suddenly, putting his smirking face right in front of Brother Francis.

“Step aside, brother,” he said ominously.

Francis looked past him, to Father Abbot Markwart.

“This young monk moves dangerously close to a trial before the College of Abbots,” Jojonah said calmly.

Behind him, Father Abbot Markwart motioned for Brother Francis to get out of the master’s way. Then, when Jojonah was gone, Markwart motioned for the flustered young monk to close the door.

“You should have sent him back out on the road,” Brother Francis argued immediately.

“For your convenience?” Markwart replied sarcastically. “I am not the supreme dictator of the Abellican Order, but only the appointed leader, forced to work within prescribed guidelines. I cannot simply order a master, particularly a sickly one, on the road.”

“You did so before,” the young monk dared to put in.

“With justification,” Markwart explained, rising from his seat and walking around the desk. “The canonization process was very real, but Master Jojonah is correct in saying that Dobrinion was its chief sponsor.”

“And it is true that Abbot Dobrinion is dead?”

Markwart gave the young man a sour look. “So it would seem,” he replied. “And thus, Master Jojonah was correct in returning to St.-Mere-Abelle, and is correct in refusing to go back out at this time.”

“He did not look so sickly,” Brother Francis remarked.

Markwart was hardly listening. Things had not played out as he had hoped; he wanted Jojonah settled at St. Honce in Ursal long before news of the abbot’s death reached him. Then he would have sent news to Abbot Je’howith to use the master as his own, giving a temporary appointment of Jojonah to St. Honce—a temporary appointment that Markwart meant to make last until the portly master had died. Still, this scenario did not seem so terrible to him. Jojonah was a thorn in his side—one growing sharper and longer daily, it seemed—but at least with Jojonah here, he could keep an eye on him.

Besides, it was hard for Markwart to be upset. Youseff and Dandelion had completed part of their mission, at least, and certainly the most dangerous part in Palmaris. By Jojonah’s own words, a powrie was being blamed. One very formidable enemy had been eliminated, and the other had no proof that Markwart had been involved. All the Father Abbot needed now was the return of the stolen stones and his position would be secured. He could deal with Jojonah, could crush the man if need be.

“I will attempt contact with the Brothers Justice,” Brother Francis offered. “We should keep abreast of their progress.”

“No!” Markwart said suddenly, sharply. “If the thief with the stolen stones is wary, such contact might be detected,” he lied, noting Brother Francis’ questioning stare. In truth, Markwart meant to use a soul stone himself to speak with Youseff and Dandelion; he didn’t want anyone else, including Brother Francis, to contact them, to perhaps learn of their doings in Palmaris.

“Keep an eye and an ear bent always toward Master Jojonah,” he instructed Francis. “And be wary, too, of your peer, Brother Braumin Herde. I want to know with whom they converse during their free time, a complete list.”

Brother Francis hesitated along while before nodding his understanding. So many things were going on about him, he realized, things of which he knew so very little. But again, as was typical for the man, he saw the opportunity to impress his Father Abbot, saw the course toward personal growth, and he was determined that he would not fail.

The news was not so disconcerting to Father Abbot Markwart as Brother Youseff had feared. Connor Bildeborough had escaped and could not be found. He had gone underground, into the bowels of the city, or perhaps out to the north.

Go for the gemstones, Markwart telepathically instructed the young monk, and with that, Markwart imparted a clear picture of the woman who went by the various titles of Jill, Jilly, Pony, and Cat-the-Stray. Pettibwa had been quite helpful that morning. Forget the Baron’s nephew.

As soon as Youseff’s reply of understanding came back to him, the weary Father Abbot broke the connection, let his spirit fall back into his own body.

But there was something else . . .

Another presence, Markwart feared, thinking that his lie to Brother Francis about Avelyn’s protégé sensing the magic of the soul stone might hold more truth than he believed.

He relaxed, and quickly, though, for he came to recognize the intrusion as just another part of his own subconscious. Monks had traditionally used the soul stones for the deepest forms of meditation and introspection, though rarely in these times, and it seemed to Markwart that he had inadvertently stumbled down that path.

So he followed the course to the destination, thinking he was laying bare his own innermost feelings, thinking that perhaps in this state he might find needed moments of pure clarity.

In his thoughts he saw Master Jojonah and the younger monk, Brother Braumin Herde, plotting against him. Of course this didn’t surprise Markwart; hadn’t he just sent Brother Francis to keep a close watch over them?

But then something else came into the scene: Master Jojonah with a handful of stones, walking toward a door, a door that Markwart knew, Markwart’s own door. And in the master’s hand . . . graphite.

Jojonah kicked open the door and released a tremendous bolt of energy at the Father Abbot as he sat quiet on his chair. Markwart felt the sudden flash, the burn, the jolt, his heart fluttering, his life rushing away.

It took Markwart several agonizing seconds to separate imagination from reality, to realize it was only insight and not actually happening. Before this moment of enlightenment, he had never imagined just how dangerous Jojonah and his wicked cohorts could be!

Yes, he would watch them closely, and would act against them in a brutal and definitive manner if need be.

But they would grow strong, his inner voice told him. As the war ended, the great victory achieved, the still little-known fight at Mount Aida would be whispered and then spoken openly, and, with Jojonah’s prodding, Avelyn Desbris might be held up as a hero. Markwart could not tolerate that possibility, and he understood then that he must move quickly against the memory of the thief and murderer, must paint such a dark portrait of Avelyn—one that put him in league with the demon dactyl—that the whispers would speak of fortunate infighting between enemies at Aida, not the actions of a heroic man.

Yes, he must thoroughly discredit Avelyn and put the heretic in his proper place in the thoughts of the people and in the annals of Church history.

Markwart came out of his trance suddenly, realizing only then how tightly he was clutching the soul stone, his withered old knuckles gone white from the strain.

He smiled, thinking himself clever for attaining such a high level of concentration, then put the stone back in the secret drawer of his desk. He was feeling much better, caring not at all that the bothersome Connor had apparently gotten away—the man could do him no harm in any case. Dobrinion, the true threat in Palmaris, had been taken care of, and now Markwart understood the true nature of Jojonah and his cohorts. As soon as the Brothers Justice delivered the stones, his own position would be secured. And from such a position of strength, Markwart knew he could easily deal with any trouble Jojonah put his way. Yes, he decided, he would begin the preemptory strike against Jojonah soon, would speak with Je’howith, who was a longtime friend and a man as dedicated to the preservation of the Order as he was, and through the influence of the abbot of St. Honce, Markwart thought, he could enlist the aid of the King.

At the other end of the broken connection, the spirit of Bestesbulzibar, the demon dactyl, was satisfied. The supposed spiritual leader of the human race was in his palm now, was accepting the precepts that Bestesbulzibar fed to him as though they were his own thoughts and beliefs.

The demon remained bitter about the defeat at Aida, about the loss of its corporeal form—which it had not yet figured out how to replace or recover—but found this puppet game with the Father Abbot of the Abellican Church, the institution that had ever been the demon’s greatest foe, quite pleasant, a distraction that allowed Bestesbulzibar to forget the defeat.

Almost.

“Why are we down here?” Brother Braumin asked, glancing nervously at the flickering shadows cast by his torch. Rows of bookcases filled with dusty ancient texts were crowded all about the two men, and the ceiling, too, closed in on them, for it was low and thick.

“Because here is where I will find my answers,” Master Jojonah replied calmly, seeming oblivious to the tons and tons of rock hanging thick over his head. He and Brother Braumin were in the sublibrary of St.-Mere-Abelle, the oldest section of the abbey, buried deep beneath the newer levels, almost down at the level of the waters of All Saints Bay. In fact, in the abbey’s earliest days, there had been a direct exit from this section of rooms to the rocky beach, a tunnel connecting to the corridor and portcullis Master De’Unnero had defended against the powrie attack, but that ancient passageway had been closed off as the abbey moved upward on the mountainside.

“With Abbot Dobrinion dead and the canonization process at least delayed, the Father Abbot has no excuse to send me out of St.-Mere-Abelle,” Jojonah explained. “But he will keep me quite busy, if he has his way, and no doubt Brother Francis or some other will hover about my every move.”

“Brother Francis would not be quick to come down here,” Brother Braumin reasoned.

“Oh, but he will,” Master Jojonah replied. “In fact, he has, and, recently. In these ancient rooms, Brother Francis found the maps and texts to guide our journey to Aida. Some of those maps, my friend, were drawn by Brother Allabarnet of St. Precious himself.”

Brother Braumin cocked his head, not quite catching on.

“I will assume the role as chief sponsor of Brother Allabarnet for sainthood,” Master Jojonah explained. “That will allow me room from the Father Abbot’s intrusions, for no doubt he intends to keep me so busy that I have little time for any mischief. When I announce publicly that I will sponsor Allabarnet, the Father Abbot must concede time to me or risk the enmity of St. Precious, thus freeing me even from my normal duties.”

“That you might spend your days down here?” Brother Braumin asked doubtfully, for he saw no gain in being in this place; indeed, he wanted to run out of there at once, back into the daylight, or at least into the lighter and more hospitable rooms of the upper abbey. This place was too much like a crypt for his liking—and in fact there was a crypt nearby, in several of the adjoining rooms! Even worse, in the far corner of this very library stood a shelf of very old books, ancient tomes of sorcery and demon magic that the Church had banned. Every copy that had been discovered save these—preserved that the Church might better investigate the workings of its enemies—had been burned. Braumin wished that none had been spared, for the mere presence of these ancient tomes sent a shudder through him, a palpable aura of cold evil.

“This is where I must be,” Master Jojonah explained.

Brother Braumin held out his arms, his expression purely incredulous. “What will you find down here?” he asked, and subconsciously glanced at the shelf of horrible tomes.

“I do not honestly know,” Jojonah replied. He noted the direction of Braumin’s glance but thought little of it, for he had no intention of going anywhere near the demonic volumes. Drawing Braumin’s attention, he moved to the nearest shelf and reverently lifted one huge volume, its cover holding on by barely a strand. “But here, in the history of the Church, I will find my answers.”

“Answers?”

“I will see as Avelyn saw,” Jojonah tried to elaborate. “The attitudes I witness now among supposedly holy men cannot be the same as those who founded our order. Who would follow Markwart now, were it not for traditions that root back a millennium and more? Who would adhere to the doctrines of the leaders of the Abellican Church if they could see past their blindness and recognize the men as merely men, full of the failings adherence to the higher order of God is supposed to erase?”

“Strong words, Master,” Brother Braumin said quietly.

“Perhaps it is time that someone spoke those strong words,” Jojonah replied. “Words as strong as Avelyn’s deeds.”

“Brother Avelyn’s deeds have branded him as a thief and a murderer,” the young monk reminded.

“But we know better,” Jojonah was quick to reply. He looked back to the ancient tome again, brushing the dust from the battered cover. “And so would they, I believe. So would the founders of the Order, the men and women who first saw the light of God. They would know.”

Jojonah fell silent, and Brother Braumin spent a long time digesting the words. He knew his place here, though, that of portraying the worst-case scenario, and so he had to ask, “And if your studies show that they do not, that the Church is as it has always been?”

The words hit Master Jojonah hard, and Brother Braumin winced as the older man’s round shoulders visibly slumped.

“Then my life is a waste,” Jojonah admitted. “Then I have followed errantly that which is not holy, but humanly.”

“Heretics have spoken such words,” Brother Braumin warned.

Master Jojonah turned and eyed him directly, locked his gaze with the most intense stare the immaculate had ever seen from the normally jovial man. “Then let us hope the heretics are not correct,” Jojonah said gravely.

The master turned back to the texts, and Braumin again paused, letting the words sink in. He decided that to be enough of that line of questioning—Master Jojonah had embarked upon a course for which there could be no retreat, one of enlightenment that would lead to justification or to despair.

“Brother Dellman has been asking many questions since we departed St. Precious,” Brother Braumin said, trying to lighten the conversation.

That notion brought a welcome smile to Master Jojonah’s face.

“The Father Abbot’s actions concerning our prisoners seem out of place, of course,” Brother Braumin went on.

“Prisoners?” Jojonah interrupted. “He brought them?”

“The Chilichunks and the centaur,” Brother Braumin explained. “We know not where they are being held.”

Master Jojonah paused. He should have expected as much, he realized, but in the commotion over Abbot Dobrinion’s death, he had almost forgotten about the unfortunate prisoners. “St. Precious did not protest the taking of Palmaris citizens?” he asked.

“Rumors say that Abbot Dobrinion was not pleased at all,” Brother Braumin replied. “There was a confrontation with Baron Bildeborough’s men, over his nephew, who was reportedly once married to the woman who accompanied Brother Avelyn. And many say that Abbot Dobrinion was in league with the Baron against the Father Abbot.”

Jojonah chuckled helplessly. It all made sense, of course, and now he was even more certain that no powrie had murdered Abbot Dobrinion. He almost said as much to Brother Braumin, but wisely held his tongue, understanding that such terrible information might break the man, or launch him on a course so bold as to get him killed.

“Brother Dellman has paid attention to the events, then?” he asked. “He is not closing his eyes and ears to the truth about him?”

“He has asked many questions,” Brother Braumin reiterated.

“Some bordering on being openly critical of the Father Abbot. And of course, we are all concerned about the two brothers who did not make the return trip to St.-Mere-Abelle. It is no secret that they were in the Father Abbot’s highest favor, and their demeanor has ever been a conversation point among the younger brothers.”

“We would all do well to watch closely the hunting dogs of Father Abbot Markwart,” Master Jojonah said gravely. “Do not trust Brother Youseff or Brother Dandelion. Go now to your duties, and do not visit me unless your news is most urgent. I will contact you when I see the opportunity; I will wish to hear of Brother Dellman’s progress. Pray ask Brother Viscenti to befriend the man. Viscenti is enough removed from me that his conversations with Brother Dellman will not be noticed by the Father Abbot. And Brother Braumin, do find out about the prisoners, where they are and how they are being treated.”

Brother Braumin bowed and turned to go, but stopped as Master Jojonah called to him once more.

“And keep in mind, my friend,” Jojonah warned, “that Brother Francis and some of those other, less obvious hunting dogs of Father Abbot Markwart will never be far away.”

Then Master Jojonah was alone with the ancient texts of the Abellican Order, parchments and books, many of which had not been viewed in centuries. And Jojonah felt the ghosts of his Church in the adjoining crypts. He was alone with that history now, alone with what he had spent his life accepting as divine guidance.

He prayed he would not be disappointed.

CHAPTER 22

Jilly

“Jilly,” Connor repeated, as softly and gently as he could.

The look on the woman’s face was caught somewhere between sheer incredulity and horror, the expression of a child faced with impossible and terrible circumstances.

Elbryan, gazing up at his love, had seen that expression on her face only once before, upon the north slope overlooking Dundalis, when their first kiss had been interrupted by the sounds of their town dying. He put a hand firmly on Pony’s thigh, supporting her, holding her in place, for she was surely swaying unsteadily on Symphony’s broad back.

The moment passed; Pony pushed aside the troubling emotions and found the same inner resolve that had carried her through the trials of so many years. “Jilseponie,” she corrected. “My name is Jilseponie, Jilseponie Ault.” She glanced down at Elbryan, gathering strength from his unending love. “Jilseponie Wyndon, actually,” she corrected.

“And once, Jilly Bildeborough,” Connor said quietly.

“Never,” the woman spat, more sharply than she had intended. “You erased that title, proclaiming before the law and before God that it had never been. Is it now convenient for the noble Connor to reclaim that which he disposed of?”

Again the ranger patted her firmly, trying to calm her down.

Her words stung Connor profoundly, but he accepted them as earned. “I was young and foolish,” he replied. “Our wedding night . . . your actions hurt me, Jilly . . . Jilseponie,” he corrected quickly, seeing her grimace. “I—”

Pony held up her hand to stop him, then glanced down at Elbryan. How painful this must be to him, she realized. Certainly he did not need to suffer through a recounting of the night she was wed to another man!

But the ranger stood calm, his bright eyes showing nothing but sympathy for the woman he so loved. He didn’t even let those green orbs reflect his anger, jealous anger, toward Connor, for he knew that to do so would be unfair to Pony. “You two have much to discuss,” he said. “And I have a caravan to watch over.” He patted Pony’s thigh one more time, this time gently, almost playfully, showing her that he was secure in their love, and then, with a playful wink, the perfect gesture to lessen the tension, he walked away.

Pony watched him go, loving him all the more. Then she glanced about, and, seeing that others were too near and might overhear, she kicked Symphony into a walk. Connor and his mount followed closely.

“It was not meant against you,” Connor tried to explain when they were alone. “I did not mean to hurt you.”

“I refuse to discuss that night,” Pony said with finality. She knew better, knew that Connor had indeed tried to hurt her, but only because her refusal to make love with him had wounded his pride.

“You can so easily dismiss it?” he asked.

“If the alternative is to dwell on that which needs no explanation and can only bring pain, then yes,” she answered. “What is past is not as important as what is to come.”

“Then with your dismissal, allow forgiveness,” Connor begged.

Pony eyed him directly, looked deeply into his gray eyes and remembered those times before the disastrous wedding night, when they had been friends, confidants.

“Do you remember when we first met?” Connor asked, reading her expression. “When I came out into the alley to protect you, only to find rogues raining down about me?”

Pony managed a smile; there were some good memories, many good ones, mixed in with the ultimately painful ending. “It was never love, Connor,” she said honestly.

The man looked as though she had slapped him with a wet towel.

“I did not know what love was until I came back and found Elbryan,” Pony went on.

“We were close,” the man protested.

“We were friends,” Pony replied. “And I will value the memory of that friendship before we tried to make it more than that. I promise you.”

“Then we can still be friends,” Connor reasoned.

“No.” The answer came straight from Pony’s heart before she could even spend a moment to consider it. “You were friends with a different person, with a little lost girl who did not know from where she had come, and did not know to where she was going. I am not that person anymore. Not Jilly, not even Jilseponie, in truth, but Pony, the companion, the lover, the wife, of Elbryan Wyndon. My heart is his, and his alone.”

“And is there no room in that heart for Connor, your friend?” the man asked gently.

Pony smiled again, growing more comfortable. “You do not even know me,” she replied.

“But I do,” the nobleman argued. “Even when you were, as you proclaim, that little lost girl, the fire was there. Even when you were most vulnerable, most lost, there was, behind your beautiful eyes, a strength that most people will never know.”

Truly Pony appreciated the sentiment. Her relationship with Connor had never been properly resolved, had been left on a note too sour to do justice to the enjoyable months they had spent together. Now, with his simple words, she felt a sense of closure, a true sense of calm.

“Why did you come out here?” she asked.

“I have been out north of the city for months,” Connor replied, a bit of the swagger finding its way back into his voice. “Hunting goblins and powries—and even a few giants, I dare say!”

“Why did you come out here now?” the perceptive woman pressed. She had seen it on his face: Connor had not been nearly as surprised to see her as she to see him, and yet, given the last each knew of the other’s whereabouts, the surprise to him should have been greater. “You knew, did you not?”

“I suspected,” Connor admitted. “I have heard tales of magic being used against the monsters up here, and you have been linked to the enchanted gemstones.”

That gave Pony pause.

“Call back your . . . husband,” Connor said. “If you are, as you say, ready to let go of the past and pay attention to the future. I did indeed come out here for a reason, Jill . . . Pony. And more of a reason than to see you again, though I would have traveled the length and breadth of Honce-the-Bear for that alone.”

Pony bit back her response, questioning why, then, Connor had not done just that in all the years she had been indentured to the army. There was no need for such bickering, no need to tear the scabs from old wounds.

They met shortly thereafter, Connor, Pony, and Elbryan, and with Juraviel comfortably tucked within the sheltering boughs of a nearby tree.

“You remember Abbot Dobrinion Calislas,” Connor started, after pacing nervously for what seemed like an hour, trying to figure out where to begin.

The woman nodded. “The abbot of St. Precious,” she said.

“No more,” Connor explained. “He was murdered a few nights ago, in his own room at the abbey.” The nobleman paused, studying their reactions, and was at first surprised that none of them seemed overly concerned. Of course, Connor realized, they did not really know Dobrinion and his good heart; their experience with the Church was less than enamoring.

“They said a powrie did it,” Connor went on.

“Dark times indeed if a powrie can so easily get into what should be the most secure building in a city braced for war,” Elbryan remarked.

“I think that he was killed by the Church he served,” Connor said outright, watching the ranger closely. Now Elbryan did lean forward a bit, growing more than a little intrigued. “The monks from St.-Mere-Abelle were in Palmaris,” Connor explained. “A great contingent, including the Father Abbot himself. Many had just returned from the far north, from the Barbacan, so it is said.”

He had their attention now.

“Roger Lockless saw such a caravan flying swiftly to the south past Caer Tinella and Landsdown,” Pony reminded.

“They are looking for you,” Connor said bluntly, pointing to Pony. “For those gemstones, which they claim were stolen from St.-Mere-Abelle.”

Pony’s eyes went wide. She stuttered a few undiscernible words as she turned to her lover for support.

“We feared as much,” Elbryan admitted. “That is why we were insistent on bringing the folk to the safety of Palmaris,” he explained to Connor. “Pony and I cannot remain with them—the risk for the folk is too great. We would see them to safety, then go our own way.”

“The risk is greater than you believe,” Connor put in. “The Father Abbot and most of his companions have left, heading back to their own abbey, but he left a pair—at least a pair—behind, men trained to kill, do not doubt I believe it was those two who killed Abbot Dobrinion. They came after me, as well, for my connection to Pony is known to them, but I managed to elude them, and now they will hunt for you.”

“Brothers Justice,” the ranger reasoned, shuddering at the thought of dealing with another like Quintall—apparently a pair of them this time.

“But why would they murder Abbot Dobrinion?” Pony asked. “And why would they come after you in such a manner?”

“Because we opposed the Father Abbot’s methods,” Connor replied. “Because . . .” He paused and cast a truly sympathetic look Pony’s way. She would not like this news, not at all, but she had to be told. “Because we did not approve of his treatment of the Chilichunks—treatment he had planned for me, as well, before my uncle the Baron intervened.”

“Treatment?” Pony replied, leaping to her feet. “What treatment? What does that mean?”

“He took them, Pony,” Connor explained. “In chains, back to St.-Mere-Abelle, along with the one called Bradwarden, the centaur.”

Now the stunned Elbryan was on his feet, as well, moving before Connor, too overwhelmed to even voice the question.

“Bradwarden is dead,” came Juraviel’s voice from the trees.

Connor spun about but saw nothing.

“He was killed in Aida,” the elf went on. “Upon the defeat of the demon dactyl.”

“He was not killed,” Connor insisted. “Or if he was, then the monks found a way to resurrect him. I have seen him with my own eyes, a beleaguered and pitiful creature, but one very much alive.”

“As I saw him,” put in Roger Lockless, coming out of the trees to join the group. He moved to Elbryan’s side and dropped a hand on the man’s strong shoulder. “The caravan, at the back of the caravan. I told you as much.”

Elbryan nodded, remembering well Roger’s description, remembering his own emotions when Roger had told of the monks’ passage by the two towns. He turned to Pony then, who was eyeing him directly, those telling fires burning brightly behind her blue orbs.

“We must go to them,” she said, and the ranger nodded, their path suddenly clear.

“The monks?” Roger asked, not understanding.

“In time,” Connor interrupted. “And I will go with you.”

“This is not your affair,” the ranger said suddenly, wanting to retract the words, words prompted by his desire to get this man far from Pony as soon as possible, even as he spoke them.

“Abbot Dobrinion was my friend,” the nobleman argued. “As are the Chilichunks, all three. You know this,” he said, looking to Pony for support, and the woman nodded. “But first, we, you, must deal with the killers. They are not to be taken lightly. They got to Dobrinion and made it look enough like a powrie assassination to deflect all attention. They are cunning and they are deadly.”

“And they will be dead, soon enough,” the ranger said with such determination that none would dare offer a doubt.

“We will meet again,” Elbryan assured Belster O’Comely early the next morning, taking the man’s hand firmly. Belster was holding back tears, Elbryan knew, for he suspected, and Elbryan could not disagree, that this was the last time they would see each other. “When the war is settled and you open your tavern again in the Timberlands, then know that Nightbird will be there, drinking your water and scaring away your other patrons.”

Belster smiled warmly, but he didn’t expect that he would be making the journey back to Dundalis even if the monsters were driven away very soon. He was not a young man, and the pain of the memories would be great indeed. Belster had fled Palmaris because of debt, and only because of debt, but that time seemed many centuries ago, given all that had happened, and he was quite sure he could open an establishment right in the city without fear of his past coming back to haunt him. There was no reason to tell all of that to the ranger, though. Not now, and so he only held fast his assuring smile.

“Lead them well, Tomas,” the ranger said to the man standing beside Belster. “The road should be clear, but if you find trouble before you find Palmaris, then I trust you will see them through.”

Tomas Gingerwart nodded gravely, and stamped his new weapon, the pitchfork, on the ground. “We owe you much, Nightbird,” he said. “As we owe Pony, and your little unseen friend, as well.”

“Do not forget Roger,” the ranger was quick to reply. “To him the folk of Caer Tinella and Landsdown owe perhaps the most of all.”

“Roger would never let us forget Roger!” Belster said suddenly, jovially, in a voice that reminded Elbryan so much of Avelyn.

That gave them all a laugh, a proper note to end the discussion. They shook hands and parted as friends, Tomas running to the front of the caravan and calling for them to move along.

Pony, Connor, and Juraviel joined Elbryan soon after, watching the train depart, but not so far down the road Tomas stopped the group momentarily and a lone figure moved away, running back toward the ranger and his friends.

“Roger Lockless,” Pony said, not surprised. Behind him the caravan started away once more, drifting to the south.

“You were to serve as Tomas’ principal guide,” Elbryan said when Roger moved to join him.

“He has others who can serve in that role,” the young man replied.

The ranger’s look was stern and uncompromising.

“Why is he to stay?” Roger protested, pointing to Connor.

“Why are you, with Palmaris only three days’ march? Would not Elbryan and Pony prove of great value to the city’s garrison in these dark times?”

“There are other matters which you do not understand,” Elbryan said calmly.

“Matters that concern him?” Roger asked, pointing again at Connor, who resisted the urge to walk over and punch the young man.

Elbryan nodded gravely. “You should go with them, Roger,” he said, speaking in the tone of a friend. “We cannot, for there is a matter that must be settled before any of us show our faces in the city. But trust me when I say that the danger here is greater for you by far than any danger you might find in Palmaris. Be quick now, and catch Tomas and Belster.”

Roger shook his head resolutely. “No,” he answered. “If you are to stay up here, fighting on, then so am I.”

“There is nothing left for you to prove,” Pony put in. “Your name and reputation are secured and well-earned.”

“Name?” Roger balked. “In Palmaris, soon enough, I will be Roger Billingsbury again. Just Roger Billingsbury. An orphan, a waif, a cast-aside.”

“My uncle the Baron would value one of your talents,” Connor offered.

“Then when you are able to return to your uncle to tell him about me, I will join you,” the young man quickly replied with a smirk. That flippant look disappeared at once, though, and he cast a very serious stare at Elbryan. “Do not make me return,” he begged. “I cannot go back to being Roger Billingsbury again. Not yet. Out here, fighting monsters, I was able to find a side of myself that I never knew existed. I like that side of me, and fear to lose it in the mundane life of a secure city.”

“Not so secure,” Connor quipped under his breath.

“You’ll not lose your new mantle,” the ranger said in all seriousness. “You will never go back to being that person you were before the invasion of your home. I know this, better than you can imagine, and I tell you honestly that, here or in Palmaris, you are, and will remain, Roger Lockless, hero of the north.” He looked over to Pony and considered the weight of such a responsibility, thought of the vow of celibacy that he and his lover had been forced by circumstance to accept, and added, “That may not be as grand a thing as you believe, Roger.”

The young man straightened a bit and managed a nod, but his overall expression, begging for acceptance, did not change, leaving the issue squarely on the shoulders of the ranger.

Elbryan looked to Pony, who nodded.

“There are two men hunting for Pony and for me,” the ranger began. “And for Connor; they tried to kill him in Palmaris, which sent him on the road in search of us.”

“He knows you two?” Roger asked. “And knew you were up here?”

“He knows me,” Pony put in.

“He came in search of the one wielding magic, though he knew not who that might be,” the ranger explained. “We are outlaws, Roger, both Pony and me. You heard us express as much that time we spoke with Juraviel soon after the caravan passed the northern towns. The Church wants the magic stones back, yet on the grave of our friend Avelyn, we’ll not return them. Thus have they sent assassins in search of us, and they are not far away, I fear.” Despite the grim words, the ranger flashed a comforting smile to Roger. “But easier will our task be if Roger Lockless desires to join in our cause.”

Roger’s grin nearly took in his big ears.

“Understand that you, too, will then be considered an outlaw in the eyes of the Church,” Pony remarked.

“Though my uncle will remedy that situation when this is finished,” Connor was quick to add.

“Do you plan to run from them, or fight them on your own terms?” Roger asked determinedly.

“I’ll not spend my days glancing over my shoulder for assassins,” the ranger replied in a tone so grim that it sent a shudder coursing along Connor’s spine. “Let them look back for me.”

Her spirit walked through the shadowed forest. She saw Belli’mar Juraviel working his way along the mid-level boughs of a grove and brushed right past him. The perceptive elf perked up his ears, for though Pony’s spirit was invisible and silent, Juraviel’s keen senses felt something.

Then down to the ground the woman went, flying as if on the wind. She found Connor, pacing his golden horse in a defensive perimeter about the small encampment. She even saw her own body, sitting cross-legged, far behind the man. And even farther back, behind her corporeal form, she saw the large elm, and the dark hole at its base. Elbryan was in that hole, at Oracle, and Pony did not dare enter and disturb that deepest of concentrations.

Instead her thoughts lingered on Connor, trying to gain some perspective on all that had happened between them. She found his protectiveness of her as he paced his horse somewhat comforting, and indeed the nobleman had touched her simply by coming out here to find her and warn her. He had known all along that it was she with the gemstones, or at least had suspected as much, and knowing, too, that those stones were the Church’s main focus, he could have gone south, to more populated regions, in his flight from the assassins. Or had he betrayed her openly, he might have remained in the comforts of Palmaris, for the Church would not even consider him an enemy. But he had not; he had come north, to warn her. And had stood behind his friends, the Chilichunks.

Pony had never hated Connor, not even on the morning after their tragic wedding night. He had been wrong, she believed with all her heart, but his actions were based on very real frustrations that she had inspired. And in the final analysis of that night, Connor had not been able to follow through with forcing himself upon her, had cared for her too much to take her in that way.

So Pony had forgiven him, long ago, within the first days of her service in the King’s army.

But what did she feel now, in looking on this man who had been her husband?

It wasn’t love, was never that, she understood, for she knew how she felt when she looked upon Elbryan and that was something very different, very much more special indeed. But she did care for Connor. He had been a friend when she had needed one; because of his gentleness in those months of courting, she had begun the road to recovery of her memory and her emotional health. If things had been better on her wedding night, she would have stayed married to him, would have borne him children, would have—

Pony’s line of thought ended abruptly as she realized she no longer regretted the events of that wedding night. For the first time, she came to understand the benefits of what she had deemed a horrible experience. That night had set her on a course to become who she now was, had put her in the army, where she received superb training and discipline for her natural fighting talents. That experience had subsequently brought her to Avelyn’s side, where she learned of deeper truths, where she gained her spirituality, and that turn of events in Palmaris had, ultimately, brought her back to Elbryan. Only now, measuring her feelings for the ranger against the feelings she had held for another man in another time, did Pony realize just how special was their love.

They had battled for months against the invading monsters, had lost dear friends, and now her adoptive family and another friend were apparently in danger, and still Pony would not trade who she was, this very moment, this very place, for any feasible alternative. The lessons in life were often bitter, but they were necessary building blocks.

So Pony was warmed by the sight of Connor Bildeborough pacing a stoic guard about her—and about Elbryan. At that moment she put her past to rest.

But she knew she could not linger and savor the scene, and so her spirit went out again, into the forest. She found Roger, and then Juraviel above him, and she went out ahead, searching the shadows, looking for some sign.

I do fear the weight of the Church, Uncle Mather, Elbryan admitted, sitting back against a stone in the cramped cave, staring into the depths of the barely visible mirror. How many of these assassins will come after us?

The ranger leaned back and sighed. The Church would not give up, that much was obvious to him, and eventually, some day in some remote place, he and Pony would lose. Or they would lose in St.-Mere-Abelle, where Elbryan knew they must go for the sake of Bradwarden and the Chilichunks who had been Pony’s family.

But I have to fight on, he said to the ghost of his uncle. We have to fight on, for the sake of Avelyn’s memory, for the truth that he found within the twisted ways of his Order. And soon we will take that fight right to the spider’s web.

But first . . . ah, Uncle Mather one Brother Justice nearly defeated me and Pony and Avelyn before. How might we handle the likes of two such expert killers?

Elbryan rubbed his eyes and stared into the mirror. Images came back to him of the first fight with the Church, when Avelyn’s old classmate Quintall, carrying the title of Brother Justice, had battled him in a cave. First the assassin had sealed that cave from magic using a sunstone, the same gem that was on the pommel of Elbryan’s sword.

And he had used a garnet to locate Avelyn, for that stone detected magic.

A garnet . . .

A smile found its way onto Elbryan’s face, the answer coming clear before him. He leaped up and squirmed out the narrow cave opening, rushing to Pony and shaking her vigorously, trying to break her trance.

Her spirit, sensing the disturbance at her corporeal body, soared back, and in but a few moments she blinked open her physical eyes.

Elbryan stood over her, behind him, Connor was slipping down from his horse, coming to see what the commotion was about.

“No more use of the soul stone,” the ranger explained.

“With my spirit freed, I can scout out far more than the others,” the woman argued.

“But if our enemies are using garnet, they will feel the vibrations of your magic,” Elbryan reasoned.

Pony nodded; they had already talked about that potential problem.

“We have garnet,” Elbryan explained. “The one taken from Quintall. How much more effective will your search be with the broader sight of that stone?”

“If they are using magic,” Pony reasoned.

“How could they hope to find us in this vast land without such aid?” the ranger countered.

Pony paused and studied him for a long moment, and Elbryan noted the look of curiosity that came over her face.

“You seem very sure of yourself suddenly,” she noted.

Elbryan’s smile widened.

“Quintall was a deadly enemy,” Pony reminded. “Alone he nearly defeated me, you, and Avelyn.”

“Only because he shaped the battlefield to his liking,” the ranger replied. “He held the element of surprise, and in a place of his choosing and his preparation. These two killers will prove formidable in battle, but if we hold the element of surprise, in a place of our choosing, then the battle will be decided quickly, I do not doubt.”

Pony did not seem convinced.

“One fault in Quintall’s plan was arrogance,” the ranger explained. “He played his hand early, in the Howling Sheila, because he felt that he was supreme, that his training had elevated him above all others in matters of battle.”

“There was some truth in that belief,” said Pony.

“But his training, and that of our present foes, does not equal that which I received at the hands of the Touel’alfar, that which you have received by me and by Avelyn, and that which we have both learned through months of fighting. And we have three powerful allies. No, my fear for this situation has lessened considerably. If you can use the garnet to track our adversaries, we will bring them in to a place we have prepared and to a battle for which they cannot be prepared.”

It made perfect sense to Pony, and she believed she could indeed track the assassins in the manner Elbryan had described. The monks would be using magic to detect magic, and thus she could use magic to detect their magic.

“And once we have located them, we will know that they have likewise seen us,” the ranger went on. “We will know their destination, but they will have little understanding of ours.”

“The time and the place will be ours to choose,” Pony said. She went to work immediately, and soon sensed the use of magic, the monks probably employing garnet. It was short-lived, though, and Pony figured that the pair had sensed her magic use and altered their general direction accordingly.

“They put up a sunstone shield, I would guess,” the woman explained to Belli’mar Juraviel, opening her eyes to see that the elf had come to join her.

“But is this not also magic use?” the elf inquired. “Can you not detect it as well?”

Pony’s face crinkled at the simple but somehow errant logic. “Not the same,” she tried to explain. “Sunstone is antimagic. I could enact such a shield using the stone in the pommel of Tempest, and our enemy’s use of garnet would be for naught.”

Juraviel shook his delicate head, not believing a word of it. “All the world is magic, so say the elves,” he explained. “Every plant, every animal, is possessed of magical energy.”

Pony shrugged, seeing no sense in arguing the point.

“If sunstone defeats all magic, there will be a hole in the continuum,” Juraviel explained. “An empty spot, a hole in the blanket of magic that fills all the world.”

“I cannot—” Pony began.

“Because you have not learned to see the world through the eyes of the Touel’alfar,” the elf interrupted. “Join with me in spirit, as you and Avelyn used to join, that we might search together, that we might find the hole, and thus our enemies.”

Pony thought it over for just a minute. Her joining through hematite with Avelyn had been personal, intimate, and left her incredibly vulnerable, but when she considered her elven friend, she felt no threat whatsoever. She didn’t believe that Juraviel was right about this matter, thought that his perspective was just that—a different way of looking at the same things—but she did produce the soul stone, and then together the pair went out through the garnet.

Pony was quickly amazed at how vibrant all the world seemed, a glow of magic about every plant and every animal. Soon, very soon, they found the hole Juraviel bad described, tracking the monks as easily as if the pair were using garnet instead of sunstone.

Guide me, Juraviel imparted to her, and then she sensed that he was physically gone from the spot, following the trail out to meet their foes.

When he returned to the encampment, barely three hours later, his report of the monks exceeded anything Elbryan could have hoped for. The elf had found them and studied them from the hidden boughs of the trees. Of particular note were their weapons, with nothing of range, except one or two small daggers and any magical stones they might possess. Juraviel had even overheard some of their conversation, a discussion about capturing Pony, that she might be brought to Father Abbot Markwart alive.

The ranger smiled. With their bows and Pony’s gemstones, they could more than counter any such distance attacks, and their discussion of taking a captive proved to him that these two did not comprehend the power that would come against them. “Lead them into us,” he bade Pony. “Let us prepare the battleground.”

The small plateau seemed an obvious choice for an encampment, set on a ledge on a rocky hillside with but one approach, and that being steep and dangerously exposed. There was one open area, a small campfire burning, surrounded on three sides by more rocks and on the fourth by a small copse of trees.

Brother Youseff smiled wickedly; the garnet indicated that magic was in use up there. He put the stone away in a pouch on the rope belt of his brown robes, which he and Dandelion had donned again when they left the city, and took out the sunstone, bidding Dandelion to take his hand, that they might combine their powers to make the antimagic shield that much stronger.

“They will try to use magic against us,” Youseff explained. “That is their primary weapon, no doubt, but if we are strong enough to defeat that use, then their conventional weapons will prove worthless against our training.”

Dandelion, so physically strong and skilled, grinned at the prospect of some solid hand-to-hand fighting.

“We kill the woman’s companions, first,” Youseff explained. “Then we go after her. If we must kill her, then so be it. Otherwise we will take her and the gemstones and be on our way.”

“To Palmaris first?” Dandelion asked, for he wanted another chance at Connor Bildeborough.

Youseff, understanding the supreme importance of this part of their mission, shook his head. “Straight through the city and back to St.-Mere-Abelle,” he explained. He closed his other hand over Dandelion’s. “Concentrate,” he instructed.

A few moments later, the antimagic shield strong and in place, the pair began easily scaling the rocky cliff, moving silently and confidently.

Near the top they peeked over the ridge, and both smiled even wider, for there, sitting beside the woman, was Connor Bildeborough—all the eggs in one basket, it seemed.

With a look to each other to coordinate the movement, the two monks hauled themselves over the lip, landing gracefully and in a defensive posture.

“Welcome!” Connor cried, his tone light—and to the monks, confusing. “Remember me?”

Youseff glanced at Dandelion, then took a sudden stride forward, covering a third of the distance to the still-sitting man. Then he lurched, a small arrow boring into the back of his calf, cutting right into the tendon.

“Oh, but my friends will not allow you to approach,” Connor said happily.

“You do not understand how hopeless your situation is,” added Roger Lockless, stepping out from behind some rocks directly behind Pony and Connor. “Have you, by chance, met the one called Nightbird?”

On cue, the ranger, looking splendid atop Symphony and with Hawkwing in hand, stepped out of the copse of trees.

“What are we to do?” Brother Dandelion whispered.

Youseff snapped his angry glare over Connor. “You have discredited and disgraced your uncle and all your family,” he growled. “You are an outlaw now, as surely as are these ragged fools you call friends.”

“Brave words for one in your position,” Connor replied casually.

“Think you that?” Youseff remarked, suddenly calm. With the hand that was clenching his wounded leg, he gave a subtle signal to Dandelion.

Suddenly, brutally, Dandelion charged past his companion, springing upon Connor as the man rose, and drew out his sword, moving too quickly for anyone to react. He slapped aside Connor’s sword, then laid the man low with a wicked forearm smash to the throat. Then he ran right over the falling Connor, forcing Roger back against the stones.

Youseff sprang forward from his good leg right behind Dandelion, thinking to get to the woman, to put her in a deadly hold that he might bargain his way out. But as in the initial assault, the confident monk underestimated his opponent, did not appreciate just how powerful Pony was with the gemstones. The antimagic shield was still strong, though not as much so with both its creators otherwise engaged, but even if Youseff and Dandelion were doing nothing but concentrating on the sunstone, they would not have defeated Pony’s power.

Youseff felt his feet slip out from under him, not to fall, but rather to rise, harmlessly, into the air. His momentum continued to carry him forward, toward Pony, but when he reached for her in this unfamiliar weightless state, he tumbled headlong, turning a half somersault. Then he felt the sudden sting in his back as Pony rolled over and kicked out, both feet landing squarely, propelling Youseff back the way he had come, back out over the cliff to dangle helplessly in midair.

Overwhelmed by the charge, Roger was in no position to counter as Dandelion swung back the other way, again smashing Connor as the man tried to rise, then falling down atop him, pinning him to the ground. Up came the big man’s arm, fingers stiff and straight, poised for the killing slash into defenseless Connor’s exposed neck.

Connor growled and tried to cry out, tried to wriggle free. He closed his eyes for just an instant.

The blow did not fall. Connor opened his eyes to see Dandelion still poised above him, struggling to drop the punch, a look of absolute incredulity on his face that anything could so hold back his powerful arm.

Nightbird held him fast by the wrist.

Dandelion spun with amazing agility for one so large, turning and putting his feet under him, at the same time dipping his shoulder to bowl the ranger over. But Elbryan, too, was moving, spinning right under Dandelion’s arm, turning about with a vicious jerk that popped the man’s elbow out of joint.

Howling with pain, Dandelion spun about and launched a heavy punch—which never came near to hitting Nightbird, the ranger sidestepping, then wading right back in with a powerful combination of blows on Dandelion’s face and chest.

On came the big monk, growling past the pain in his arm, accepting more punches, that he could get close enough to wrap Elbryan in a tight hug.

The ranger cupped Dandelion’s chin with one hand, grabbed the back of the man’s hair with the other, meaning to turn him aside. He stopped, though, feeling a curious prodding in his chest. At first he thought Dandelion had somehow deceived him and brought a dagger to bear, but when he looked past the man, to Connor Bildeborough standing behind him, the ranger understood.

Dandelion, Connor’s sword right through his back and chest; slumped in the ranger’s arms.

“Bastard,” Connor muttered grimly, shifting to keep his hold on the sword as dead Dandelion rolled to the ground.

Nightbird let the man fall free, then went to Symphony and took up Hawkwing, fitting an arrow and turning his attention to Youseff. He leveled and drew back.

But the threat was ended, the monks obviously defeated, and Elbryan could not simply kill this man.

“Do not,” Pony said, in full agreement as the ranger eased his bowstring back to rest.

“I will kill him,” Connor said grimly, finally extracting his sword from the heavy corpse.

“As he hangs there helpless?” Pony asked skeptically.

Connor kicked at the ground. “Drop him to the rocks, then,” he said, but he wasn’t serious; he could no more kill this helpless man than could Elbryan.

Pony was glad for that.

“We are going to find our friends,” the ranger said to Youseff, “whom your Father Abbot has unjustly imprisoned.”

Youseff scoffed at the sheer folly of such a claim.

“And you will lead us, every step,” the ranger finished.

“To St.-Mere-Abelle?” the monk replied incredulously. “Fool. You cannot begin to comprehend the power of such a fortress.”

“As you could not comprehend the force prepared against you in this place,” Elbryan calmly replied.

That hit Youseff hard. He narrowed his eyes dangerously and glared at Elbryan. “How long can you hold me here?” he asked, his voice even and deathly calm. “Kill me now, fools, else I promise to avenge—”

His bluster was lost suddenly as a small form rushed past him, spinning him over in the air. He flailed and tried to respond, and realized that he had lost his grip on the sunstone. When he finally straightened out again, Youseff saw the winged elf land easily on the ledge beside the others.

“Sunstone, as you guessed, Nightbird,” Juraviel said, displaying the pilfered stone. “I suspect the garnet is in his belt pouch, if not on the dead man.”

Elbryan watched Youseff closely as Juraviel spoke, and saw that the elf’s words, too, were unnerving the man.

“He may have a soul stone, as well,” Pony interjected. “Some way to keep in contact with his leaders.”

“Of course, we’ll not let him use that,” Connor said with a chuckle. “But I must disagree with your decision,” he said to the ranger. “He’ll not lead us to St.-Mere-Abelle, but will be returned to St. Precious, where he can answer for the murder of Abbot Dobrinion. I will take him myself, with Roger Lockless beside me, and let the Church learn the truth of its Father Abbot!”

Elbryan looked long and hard at Connor, considering for just a moment the implications of his actions, which had saved the man’s life. If he had hesitated for just an instant, then Connor Bildeborough, this man who had so wronged Pony, would also be dead.

The ranger would tolerate no such weakness within himself, and so he dismissed those dark thoughts out of hand, and knew in his heart that he would have thrown himself in the way of the deadly monk’s strike if that was the only way to save Connor, or any of his companions.

He looked back to Youseff then, and considered the truth of Connor’s words. He remembered the fervor of the first Brother Justice, and understood that Youseff would be no willing guide, no matter the threats. But if they did as Connor suggested, then perhaps they would not be alone in their quest to free their friends. Would not the Church have to admit its complicity, thus discrediting the Father Abbot?

It seemed plausible. “Bring him in,” the ranger instructed.

Belli’mar Juraviel flew out from the ledge, moving behind the dangling Youseff. Using his bow as a pole, the elf prodded the man toward the ledge. At first Youseff offered no resistance, but then, as he neared the lip, as the drop beneath him became not so far, he spun suddenly, grabbed at the elf and caught hold of the bow as Juraviel wisely let it go. The monk had no way to stop his momentum, though, and so he continued to rotate right around.

To see Elbryan at the edge of the lip, fist cocked.

The blow sent Brother Youseff spinning head over heels away from the ledge, and sent the man’s mind flying into unconsciousness.

Juraviel, laughing at the outrageous sight, retrieved his bow and prodded the now limp monk to the ledge.

CHAPTER 23

The Other Brother Francis

Of all the duties for the young monks at St.-Mere-Abelle, Brother Dellman found this one the most painful. He and two other monks were braced against spokes on a giant wheel crank, bending their backs to turn the thing, grunting and groaning, digging in their heels, but slipping often against the tremendous weight.

Down below, far, far below, supported by heavy chains—which themselves weighed more than a thousand pounds—was a great block of stone. Good stone, solid, taken from an underground quarry just inside the southernmost courtyard of St.-Mere-Abelle. The wide expanse of that quarry was reached through the lower tunnels of the original abbey—in fact, Master Jojonah, huddled in the lower libraries, could sometimes hear the chipping of the stones—but the best way to bring stones needed for the upper walls of the abbey was by use of this crank.

The pain and the struggle were good for the young monks, in the eyes of the masters and the Father Abbot.

Another day, Brother Dellman might have agreed with that. Physical exhaustion was good for the soul. But not today, not so soon after his return from a long and difficult journey. He wanted nothing more than to go to his eight-foot-square chamber and curl up on his cot.

“Push on, Brother Dellman,” scolded Master De’Unnero in his sharp voice. “Would you force brothers Callan and Seumo to do all the work?”

“No, Master De’Unnero,” Brother Dellman grunted, bending his shoulder to press harder against the spoke and driving on, the muscles in his legs and back straining and aching. He closed his eyes and issued a long and low groan.

But then the weight seemed to grow suddenly, the wheel pushing back. Dellman’s eyes popped open wide.

“Hold it fast, brother!” Dellman heard Callan cry. He saw the man, lying on the ground, then noted Seumo skittering, off-balance, to the side.

“Peg it!” Master De’Unnero shouted, meaning that someone, anyone, should drive the locking peg back into the crank.

Poor Dellman fought with all his strength, pressed as hard as he could against the wheel. But his feet were inevitably beginning to slide. Why wasn’t Callan back at the wheel? he wondered. And why wouldn’t Seumo get up? Why were they moving so slowly?

He thought to let go and spring out of harm’s way, but knew that to be impossible. With no one bracing the wheel, the spin would be too fast, too sudden, and he would be smashed and thrown.

“Peg it!” he heard De’Unnero cry again, but everyone seemed to be moving in so slowly!

And the wheel was winning now, Dellman’s muscles strained past their breaking point.

Then he was moving backward, bending over, all his joints seeming to go the wrong way. He heard the sudden snap, like a whip, as one of his legs exploded in pain, and then he was rolled over backward. One of his arms was hooked, though, and the spinning wheel took him on a wild ride, finally throwing him far and wide, to smash hard against a water trough, shattering its side, and his shoulder.

He lay there, barely conscious, drenched and covered with mud and blood.

“Carry him to my private chambers,” he heard a voice, De’Unnero’s, he thought.

Then the master was right before him, leaning over, seeming truly concerned. “Fear not, young Brother Dellman,” De’Unnero said, and though it appeared he was trying to be comforting, his voice still held that wicked edge. “God is with me, and by His power I will help to mend that broken body.”

The pain grew more intense suddenly as Callan and Seumo took the battered young monk by the arms and lifted him. Waves of agony rolled over poor Brother Dellman, fires ignited within every muscle of his body. And then he was sinking, sinking, into a profound blackness.

The days blended into one, for he did not notice their passing. Time held no meaning for Master Jojonah now. He left the lower library only when the physical needs of his body forced him out, and returned as soon as possible. He had found nothing useful among the stacks and stacks of tomes and parchments, but knew he was close. He felt it, in his heart and soul.

He glanced often at the shelf of forbidden books, wondering if, perhaps, they had been placed off-limits not because of any evil penning, but because they held a truth that would prove damning to the present leaders of the Abellican Order. After many such musings, even one point where he rose and took a few steps for the shelf, Master Jojonah laughed aloud at his own paranoia. He knew those books, for he had helped to inventory them as one of his requirements before he attained the rank of immaculate. There were no hidden truths there; those were the books of evil, of dactyl earth-magic and of perverting the powers of the sacred stones for evil purposes, for summoning demons or animating corpses, for causing plague or withering crops—unacceptable practices even in times of war. From a private Masters’ Gathering, Jojonah knew that one of the books, in fact, described a massive crop destruction the Church leveled on the southern kingdom of Behren in God’s Year 67, when Behren and Honce-the-Bear had been embroiled in a bitter war for control of the passes through the Belt-and-Buckle mountain range. The famine had turned the tide of battle, but the cost in terms of innocent lives and lasting enmities had not, in retrospect, been worth the gain.

No, those books shelved in the dark corner of the lower library held no measure of justice and truth, unless that was in the lessons to be learned from terrible past mistakes.

But Jojonah had to remind himself of that quite often as the days wound on without any dramatic success. And one other thing began to nag at the sensibilities of the gentle master, growing in him until it proved a tremendous distraction: the plight of Markwart’s prisoners. They were paying dearly, perhaps had already paid the supreme price, for the sake of his delay here. A large part of Jojonah’s conscience screamed at him to go and see to those poor people and to the centaur, who, if he had been with Avelyn when the dactyl demon was defeated, was indeed heroic.

But Jojonah could not pull himself away, not yet; and so he had to sublimate his worries about the prisoners. Perhaps his work here would save them, he told himself, or perhaps it would prevent any such atrocities from being committed by the Church in the future.

He was beginning to make some progress, at least. The library was not as haphazardly laid out as he had first believed. It was divided into sections, and those, roughly, were set out chronologically, dating from the very earliest days of the Church to the time less than two centuries before, when the newer libraries were constructed and this place became a vault and not a working area. Fortunately for Jojonah, most of the writings of the time in which Brother Allabarnet lived, at least those collected from outside St.-Mere-Abelle, were stored down here.

As soon as he discovered the general layout, Master Jojonah began his search among the very earliest tomes, those dating back before God’s Year 1, the Great Epiphany, the Renewal, which separated the Church, Old Canon and New Canon. Jojonah figured that his answers might lie in the time before the Renewal, at the very inception of the organized Church, the time of Saint Abelle.

He found no answers there; what few pieces remained—and fewer still that remained legible—were decorous works, songs mostly, exalting the glory of God. Many were written on parchments so brittle that Jojonah did not dare to even handle them, and others were carved on tablets of stone. The writings of Saint Abelle were not down here, of course, but were on display in the higher library. Jojonah knew them by heart, and remembered nothing about them that would help in his quest. The teachings were general mostly, wise words about common decency, and open to many interpretations. Still, the master vowed to go and view them again, when the time presented, to see if he might read them in a new light with his new insights, to see if they might afford him some hint of the true precepts of his Church.

What Jojonah most wanted down here was to find the Abbot’s Doctrine of that momentous year of the Great Epiphany, but he knew that to be impossible. It was one of the great travesties of the Abellican Order that the original Abbot’s Doctrine had been lost, centuries before.

So the master went on with what was available, moving to the writings immediately following the creation of the New Canon. Jojonah found nothing. Nothing.

A man of lesser heart would have surrendered to the daunting task, but the thought of quitting never entered Jojonah’s mind. He continued his chronological scan, found some promising hints among the writings of the early Father Abbots, a turn of a phrase, for instance, that he could never imagine Markwart saying.

And then he found a most interesting tome indeed, a small book, bound in red cloth, and penned by a young monk, Brother Francis Gouliard in God’s Year 130, the year after the first journey to Pimaninicuit following the Great Epiphany.

Jojonah’s hands trembled as he gingerly turned the pages. Brother Francis—and how ironic that name seemed!—had been one of the Preparers on that journey, and he had returned and penned his story!

That alone hit Jojonah profoundly; monks returning from Pimaninicuit now were discouraged, indeed even prohibited, from ever speaking of the place. Brother Pellimar had come back wagging his tongue, and not coincidentally, he had not survived for long. Yet back in Francis Gouliard’s time, the Preparers were encouraged, according to the text, to detail their accounts of the journey!

Though it was cool in the dark room, Jojonah felt sweat beading on his forehead, and he took care so that it did not drop on the delicate pages. Fingers trembling, he gingerly turned the page and read on:

to finde thee thy smallst stones of greye and redde, that thee may prepare ample to bringe Godly healing to all the knowne worlde.

Master Jojonah sat back and took a deep and steadying breath. Now he understood why the abbey held such a huge cache of small hematites, the small stones of gray and red! The next passage, in which Brother Francis Gouliard wrote of his fellow voyagers, struck the master even more profoundly:

Thirty-and-three brothers did crewe the Sea Abelle, men

younge and stronge, trained well and trusted well to bringe

we two Preparers to

Pimaninicuit and back

And then did all thirty-and-one (for two had died on the

voyage) join in the final cataloguing and preparing.

“Brothers,” Jojonah mouthed softly. “On the Sea Abelle. They used monks.” The master found it hard to speak through breath that would not come. A flood of tears streamed down his face as he recalled the fate of the Windrunner and her unfortunate crew, hired men, and one woman, and not brothers. It took him a long time to compose himself and read on. Brother Francis Gouliard’s style was difficult, many of the words too arcane for Jojonah to decipher, and the man tended to pen in a stream-of-consciousness manner, instead of purely chronologically. A few pages on and Francis was describing the departure from St.-Mere-Abelle, the beginning of the voyage.

And there it was before Jojonah, an edict from Father Abbot Benuto Concarron in his farewell speech to the good ship and crew, demanding that the Abellican Order spread the wealth of God, the gemstones, along with the word of God.

Piety, dignity, poverty.

The tears came freely; this was the Church that Jojonah could believe in, the Church that had coaxed in a man as pure of heart as Avelyn Desbris. But what had happened to so alter this apparent course? Why were the stones of greye and redde still within St.-Mere-Abelle? Where went the charity?

“And where is it now?” he asked aloud, thinking again of the poor prisoners. Where had the Church of Brother Francis Gouliard and Father Abbot Benuto Concarron gone?

“Damn you, Markwart,” Master Jojonah whispered, and he meant every word. He tucked the book under his voluminous robes and left the cellars, going straight to the privacy of his room. He thought that he should look in on Brother Braumin, but decided that course could wait, for there was another matter that had been weighing heavily on Jojonah for several days.

So he was soon descending once more into the lower levels of St.-Mere-Abelle, on the other side of the great abbey, down to the rooms Father Abbot Markwart had converted into dungeons. He was not really surprised when he was met by a monk standing guard, the young man moving to block his path.

“I’ll not stand and argue with you, young brother,” Jojonah blustered, trying to sound imposing. “How many years have passed since you traveled the Gauntlet of Willing Suffering?”

Indeed the formidable master was imposing to the poor young brother! “One year, Master,” he said softly. “And four months.”

“One year?” Jojonah boomed. “And yet you dare to block my way? I attained the rank of master before you were born, and yet you stand before me now, telling me that I cannot go on.”

“The Father Abbot—”

Jojonah had heard enough. He reached across, bringing his arm along the young monk’s side, and bulled his way past, staring hard at the young man, daring him to try and stop the move.

The young monk stuttered over a few protests, but only stamped his foot in impotent frustration as Jojonah continued on down the stairs. At the bottom two more young monks stood to block Jojonah’s way, but he didn’t even bother to speak with them, just continued on, pushing through, and again they didn’t dare try to physically stop him. One did follow, though, complaining every step, while the second ran back the other way—to inform Father Abbot Markwart, Jojonah knew.

He was treading on dangerous ground here, Jojonah knew, perhaps pushing the Father Abbot too far. But the book he had found had only bolstered his resolve to stand strong against Markwart’s injustices, and he vowed silently that he would not be turned away, whatever the punishment, that he would check on the poor prisoners, just to make sure they were alive and not being treated too badly. Jojonah was risking a great deal, and could rationally argue that the long-term greater good called for him to continue to remain quiet and obscure. But that course would not do much to help the poor Chilichunks and the heroic centaur; that argument, Jojonah knew, was one that men such as Markwart often used to justify ungodly or cowardly actions.

So he didn’t even care that he might be pushing Markwart to the very edge of rage. He pressed on, through one door, by another startled young monk, and down another stair. Then he paused, Brother Francis standing before him.

“You should not be down here,” Francis remarked.

“By whose command?”

“Father Abbot Markwart,” Francis answered without hesitation. “Only he, myself, and Master De’Unnero are to be allowed past the lower stairs.”

“A worthy crew,” Master Jojonah said sarcastically. “And why is that, Brother Francis? That you might torture the poor innocent prisoners in privacy?” He said it loudly, and took some satisfaction in the uncomfortable shuffling of feet he heard from the young guard standing behind him.

“Innocent?” Francis echoed skeptically.

“Are you so ashamed of your actions that they must take place down here, away from all prying eyes?” Master Jojonah pressed, moving forward another step as he spoke. “Yes, I have heard the tale of Grady Chilichunk.”

“An accident on the road,” Francis protested.

“Hide thy sins, Brother Francis!” Jojonah replied. “Yet they remain sins all the same!”

Francis snorted derisively. “You cannot comprehend the meaning of this war we wage,” he protested. “You show pity for criminals, while innocents pay dearly for their crimes against the Church, against all of Mankind!”

Master Jojonah’s answer came in the form of a heavy left hook. Brother Francis was not caught completely unawares, though, and managed to turn so the blow only grazed his face, and as Master Jojonah overbalanced from the miss, the younger monk leaped behind him, locking him in a tight choke hold and twisting hard, stealing the man’s balance.

Master Jojonah squirmed and twisted, but only for a moment; for the blood supply was cut short and his brain, starved, fast drifted into unconsciousness.

“Brother Francis!” the younger monk yelled, panicking, and he rushed forward, trying to separate the two. Francis willingly let go, allowing the heavy Jojonah to slump to the floor.

He heard the footsteps sharp against the wood. Pacing, pacing, and he fell into the rhythm of that stride, went along with it, let it carry him back to the world of the living. The light seemed harsh to his eyes, which had known so much darkness in the previous days, but as soon as he found his focus, he knew exactly where he was: propped in a chair in the private room of Father Abbot Markwart.

Markwart and Brother Francis stood before him, neither appearing very pleased.

“You attacked another monk,” Father Abbot Markwart began curtly.

“An impertinent subordinate needing a scolding,” Master Jojonah replied, rubbing the bleariness from his eyes. “A brother desperately in need of a good thrashing.”

Markwart looked over at the smug Brother Francis. “Perhaps,” he agreed, merely to deflate the puffy young man. “And yet,” Markwart continued, turning his attention squarely back to Jojonah, “he was only acting as I instructed.”

Master Jojonah fought hard to maintain control, for he wanted, desperately wanted, to burst loose of his pragmatic bonds and tell Markwart, wicked Markwart, exactly what he thought of him and his so off-course Church. He just chewed his lip and let the old man continue.

“You abandon your duties to support the cause of Brother Allabarnet,” the Father Abbot fumed. “A worthy cause, so I thought, given the fate of poor Abbot Dobrinion, for the monks of St. Precious are in need of some morale at this dark time. And yet you abuse the free time I allow you and find yourself across the whole of the abbey, meddling in affairs which do not concern you.”

“Am I not to care that we have innocent prisoners hanging from dungeon walls?” Master Jojonah replied, his voice firm and strong. “Am I not to care that people who have committed no crimes and no sins, and a centaur who may indeed be a hero, stand in this supposedly holy sanctuary’s dungeons in chains, and are subjected to torture?”

“Torture?” scoffed the Father Abbot. “You know nothing of it!”

“Thus I tried to find out,” Jojonah countered. “Yet you would deny me that, would deny all eyes.”

Again Markwart scoffed. “I would not subject the frightened Chilichunks and the potentially dangerous Bradwarden to the private inquisitions of others. They are my responsibility.”

“Your prisoners,” Jojonah corrected.

Father Abbot Markwart paused and took a deep breath. “Prisoners,” he echoed. “Yes, they are. No sins, say you, yet they are in league with the thieves who hold the stolen stones. No crimes, say you, yet we have every reason to believe that the centaur was in league with the demon dactyl, and only the accidental destruction of Aida prevented him from joining in the rampage against all the godly people of the world!”

“Accidental destruction,” Jojonah echoed incredulously, sarcastically.

“That is the decision of my investigation!” Markwart yelled suddenly, moving very near the sitting master, and Jojonah thought for a moment that the man meant to strike him. “You chose at this time to pursue another course.”

If only you understood the truth of that, Jojonah silently replied, and was quite glad then that he had hidden the ancient book in his room before he tried to get to the prisoners.

“And yet you could not even hold true to that course!” Markwart went on. “And while you were at your work, buried in ancient writings that bear no importance to the present dangerous situation, one of our younger brothers nearly met his doom!”

That perked up Jojonah’s ears.

“In the courtyard,” Markwart went on. “Doing work that Master Jojonah would normally oversee, but that Master De’Unnero had to watch over, in addition to the other laborers he was directing. Perhaps that was why he could not react in time when two of the three brothers slipped off the wheel, when the third, poor Dellman, was nearly broken in half by the sudden weight.”

“Dellman!” Jojonah cried, nearly coming out of his seat, forcing Markwart to take a step back. Panic crept through Jojonah’s mind; he worried suddenly for Brother Braumin, whom he had not seen in days. How many “accidents” had there been?

He realized, though, that his excitement only implicated Dellman as a fellow conspirator, and so he worked hard to control himself, to settle back into his chair. “The same Brother Dellman who accompanied us to Aida?” he asked.

“The only Brother Dellman,” Markwart sternly replied, seeing right through the ruse.

“Such a pity,” Jojonah remarked. “He is alive, though?”

“Barely, and perhaps not for long,” the Father Abbot answered, going into his pacing once more.

“I will see to him.”

“You will not!” the Father Abbot snapped. “He is under the care of Master De’Unnero. I forbid you from trying to so much as speak to him. He does not need to hear your apologies, Master Jojonah. Let the guilt of your absence weigh on your mind. Perhaps that will lead you back to your true duties and purpose.”

The thought that he was somehow responsible was preposterous, of course, but Jojonah understood the subtle meaning behind it. Markwart was only using that excuse to keep him away from Brother Dellman, to keep his influence from the man while De’Unnero, the master so proficient at bending the minds of the brothers sent on Avelyn’s trail, worked his wicked way.

“You are my witness to this, Brother Francis,” Markwart said. “And I warn you, Master Jojonah, if I hear that you go anywhere near Brother Dellman, the consequences will be dire—for you and for him.”

It surprised Jojonah that Markwart had drawn so clear a line in the sand, had all but openly threatened him. Things were going Markwart’s way, it seemed to Jojonah, so why had he taken such a bold step as that?

He didn’t press the issue, simply nodded and left, and had no intention of crossing Markwart’s line anytime soon. It would be better for Brother Dellman, he reasoned, if he broke all connection with the man for the time being. Besides, Jojonah was only beginning his work. He took a quick meal, went to his room and sighed profoundly in relief to find the tome still in place. Then he went right back to the lower stairs, heading again for the ancient libraries, for more pieces to this ever-more-interesting puzzle.

The doors were sealed, barred by heavy planks. One young monk, a man Jojonah did not know, was standing guard.

“What is the meaning of this?” the master asked.

“No entrance to the lower libraries at this time,” the man mechanically replied. “By order of—”

Before he had even finished, Master Jojonah stormed away, taking the stairs two at a time. He was not surprised to find Father Abbot Markwart waiting for him in his private quarters, this time alone.

“You said nothing about ending my work,” Master Jojonah began, feeling his way cautiously into this fight, for he believed this one might prove conclusive.

“Now is not the time to worry about Brother Allabarnet’s sainthood,” the Father Abbot replied calmly. “I cannot afford to have one of my masters wasting precious time in the dungeons.”

“A curious choice of words,” Jojonah came back, “considering that you have many of your most trusted brothers wasting time in dungeons of another sort.”

He saw the flicker of anger in the old man’s eyes, but Markwart got it quickly under control. “The canonization process will wait until the war is ended,” he said.

“By all reports, it may already be over,” Jojonah was quick to reply.

“And until the threat to our Order is ended,” Markwart added. “It is reasonable to assume that if a powrie could get to Abbot Dobrinion, then none of us are safe. Our enemies are desperate now, for their war is going badly, and it is prudent to believe that they might begin a larger campaign of assassinating important leaders.”

Jojonah had to fight very hard to hold his tongue, to stop from accusing Markwart then and there of facilitating Dobrinion’s murder. He didn’t care anymore for his personal well-being, would have laid into Markwart openly, publicly, beginning an internal struggle that would likely cost him his life. But he could not, he reminded himself many times in the next few seconds. There were others to consider—Dellman, Braumin Herde, Marlboro Viscenti, and the poor prisoners. For their sake, if not his own, he could not begin the open battle against Markwart.

“The process will also wait until the stolen gemstones are returned,” Markwart went on.

“Thus I will sit idle, wasting my time in the upper levels,” Jojonah did dare to remark.

“No, I have other plans for you,” Markwart replied. “More important matters. You are obviously well again—fit enough to attack another monk—and so you should prepare yourself for the road.”

“You just said that the sainthood would wait,” Jojonah responded.

“So I did,” Markwart replied. “But your destination is no longer St. Honce. You will go to Palmaris, to St. Precious, to witness the appointment of a new abbot.”

Master Jojonah could not completely hide his surprise. There was no monk at that abbey prepared for the job, and thus, as far as he knew, nothing of succession had even been discussed, and would be a matter for the College of Abbots later that year.

“Master De’Unnero,” Father Abbot Markwart answered his unspoken question.

“De’Unnero?” Jojonah echoed incredulously. “The junior master in all of St.-Mere-Abelle, a man prematurely promoted due to the death of Master Siherton?”

“The murder of Master Siherton, by Avelyn Desbris,” Markwart was quick to remind.

“He will assume the leadership of St. Precious?” Jojonah continued, too engrossed to even feel the sting of that last verbal barb. “Surely that position is of utmost importance, given the fact that Palmaris remains closest to the lines of battle.”

“That is exactly why I chose De’Unnero,” Markwart replied calmly.

“You chose?” Jojonah echoed. There was little precedence for such a move; the appointment of an abbot, even one coming from within the ranks of the affected abbey, was no small matter, one open to the collective reasoning of the College of Abbots.

“There is no time to convene the College prematurely,” Markwart explained. “Nor can we wait until the scheduled meeting in Calember. Until then, acting on what I deem to be emergency circumstances, I have appointed Master De’Unnero as Dobrinion’s replacement.”

“Temporarily,” Jojonah said.

“Permanently,” came the stern reply. “And you, Master Jojonah, will accompany him.”

“I just returned from many weeks on the road,” Jojonah protested, but he knew he was defeated, and understood that he had erred in trying to get to the prisoners, in pushing hard against Markwart. And now he would pay. Markwart had been well within his rights to halt the canonization process for the time being, and whether or not the Father Abbot’s choice of De’Unnero for abbot would stand would be decided at the fall College of Abbots, and not before. Jojonah was out of excuses and out of dodges.

“You will remain at St. Precious to aid Master . . . Abbot De’Unnero, as his second,” Markwart went on. “If it pleases him, you may return to St.-Mere-Abelle with him for the College.”

“I outrank him.”

“No more,” Markwart replied.

“I . . . the College will not stand for this!” Jojonah protested.

“That will be determined in mid-Calember,” Markwart replied. “If the other abbots and their voting seconds see fit to overrule me, then perhaps Jojonah will be appointed abbot of St. Precious.”

But by that time, Jojonah knew, Markwart would likely have his gemstones back, and all of those monks (who had been in league with, or even friendly to, Jojonah’s cause) would have been weeded out of St.-Mere-Abelle, the victims of “accidents” like the one that befell Brother Dellman, or converted to Markwart’s way of thinking by a barrage of lies and threats. Or, for those brothers of conviction like himself, Markwart would find missions in faraway, dangerous lands. Until this moment, Master Jojonah had not truly appreciated how formidable a foe the old Father Abbot would prove to be.

“Perhaps we will meet again,” Markwart said, waving his hand dismissively. “For the sake of peace of mind for both of us, I hope not.”

And so it ends, Master Jojonah thought.

CHAPTER 24

Resolution

They came in sight of the clusters of houses, farms mostly, just to the north of Palmaris, and were heartened indeed to see that many of the folk had come out of the walled city and returned to their homes.

“The region is returning to normal,” Connor remarked. He was sitting astride his horse, riding next to Pony, who along with Belli’mar Juraviel was up on Symphony, while Elbryan and Roger walked in front, flanking Brother Youseff, whose hands were bound tightly behind his back. “We will know peace again, and soon,” Connor promised, and that seemed a likely notion to all the others, for they had seen no monsters all the way to this point.

“Caer Tinella and Landsdown may have been the last monstrous strongholds in the region,” the ranger reasoned. “What few remain there should prove of little trouble to Palmaris’ garrison.” The ranger stopped then, taking Symphony’s bridle and bringing the horse to a halt. He looked up at his two friends, and both Pony and Juraviel understood.

“We do not dare enter the city,” Elbryan said to Connor “Nor even get close enough that those folk in the farms might see us.” He looked at Brother Youseff as he finished the thought. “Even knowing of us seems to endanger people.”

“Because you recognize that you are rightly branded as outlaws,” Brother Youseff retorted sharply. “Do you believe that the Church will cease its hunt for you?” He laughed wickedly, seeming not at all the prisoner here.

“It may be that the Church will have other, more pressing problems when the truth of your actions at St. Precious becomes known,” Connor put in, stepping Greystone up between the monk and the ranger.

“And you have proof of these absurd accusations?” Brother Youseff was quick to reply.

“We shall see,” Connor answered, and turned back to Elbryan and the two on Symphony. “Roger and I will deliver him to my uncle,” he explained. “We will use the secular channels of power before trying to decide how much of the Church will side with this dog and his masters.”

“You might be starting a small war,” Pony reasoned, for it was well-known that the Church was nearly as powerful as the state— and some who had witnessed the magical powers of St.-Mere-Abelle considered the Church even more powerful.

“If such a war is to begin, then it was started by those who murdered Abbot Dobrinion, not by me or my uncle,” Connor replied with conviction. “I am only following the proper course in response to that heinous act, and in defense of my own life.”

“We will wait for word,” Elbryan put in, not wanting to belabor this point any longer.

“Roger and I will return to you as soon as possible,” Connor agreed. “I know that you are anxious to be on your way.” He was careful to end the thought there, for he did not want the dangerous monk prisoner to know that Elbryan intended to go straightaway to St.-Mere-Abelle. Given the wonders he had seen of stone magic, Connor had thought it foolish that the ranger openly declared to Youseff that they would be going after their captured friends. The less precise information this dangerous man held, the better for all of them.

Connor motioned to Elbryan and turned his horse aside, the ranger walking beside him, away from the others. “If l cannot get back out to you, then farewell, Nightbird,” the nobleman said in all sincerity.

Elbryan followed the nobleman’s gaze back to Pony.

“I would be a liar if I did not admit that I was envious of you,” Connor went on. “I, too, loved her, who could not, after witnessing her beauty?”

Elbryan had no practical response, and so he said nothing.

“But it is obvious where lies Jill’s . . . Pony’s heart.” Connor added after a long and uncomfortable pause. “That heart is for you,” he said, looking the ranger in the eye.

“You do not intend to return to us,” Elbryan suddenly understood. “You will deliver the monk, then stay in Palmaris.”

The man shrugged noncommittally. “It is painful to see her,” he admitted. “Painful and wonderful all at once. I have not yet decided which is the more prominent emotion.”

“Farewell,” Elbryan replied.

“And to you,” said Connor. He looked again to Pony. “May I say my good-byes to her privately?” he asked.

Elbryan offered a consenting smile—not that he considered this in any way his decision. If Pony wanted to speak privately with Connor, then she would do so, whatever he, Elbryan, might think of it. He made things easier for Connor, feeling some honest sympathy for the man, by walking back to Pony and delivering the message. After waiting for Juraviel to slip down from Symphony, the woman urged the horse out to join the man.

“I may not return,” Connor explained.

Pony nodded, still unsure why Connor had come out in the first place.

“I had to see you again,” he went on, understanding her unspoken question. “I had to know that you were well. I had to . . .” He paused and sighed deeply.

“What do you need from me?” Pony asked bluntly. “What can we say that has not been said?”

“You can forgive me,” Connor blurted, and then tried desperately to explain. “I was hurt . . . my pride. I did not want to send you away, but could not stand to see you, to know that you did not love me . . .”

Pony’s smile silenced him. “I never blamed you, so there is nothing for me to forgive,” she replied quietly. “I find what happened between us to be tragic, for both of us. We had a special friendship, and I shall always treasure that.”

“But what I did, on our wedding night . . .” Connor protested.

“It is what you did not do that allowed me to place no blame,” said Pony. “You could have taken me, and if you had, I would never have forgiven you—indeed, I might have used my magic to cut you down on the field when first I saw you again!” She knew that to be a lie as soon as she heard the words come out of her mouth. Whatever her feelings toward Connor, she could not use the gemstones, the sacred gifts of God, in such a vengeful way.

“I am sorry,” Connor said sincerely.

“As am I,” Pony replied. She leaned over and kissed the man on the cheek. “Farewell, Connor Bildeborough,” she said. “You see the enemy plainly now. Fight well.” And she turned her horse about and walked back to Elbryan.

Soon after, Pony, Elbryan, and Juraviel were heading back to the north, full of hope, but making plans for a journey that they knew might be as dark as their trip to Aida to face the demon dactyl. They hoped Connor’s mission would be fruitful, and quickly, and that the King, and the sensible and godly members of the Abellican Order, if there were any left, would turn against this wicked Father Abbot who had so wrongly imprisoned Bradwarden and the Chilichunks. They hoped, too, to find their friends healthy and free before they ever entered St.-Mere-Abelle.

But practicality told them otherwise, for such political actions might take months, even years. Bradwarden and the Chilichunks could not wait, did not deserve to wait, and so the three planned to set off for the abbey on All Saints Bay as soon as Roger, and perhaps Connor, returned to them.

It was with equal determination that Roger and Connor strode toward Palmaris. Connor held great faith in his uncle Rochefort. Ever since he was a child, Connor had looked up to the man as someone who could get things done, a great man who shaped life in the city. All the many times Connor had gotten himself into trouble, his uncle Rochefort had taken care of things quietly and effectively.

Brother Youseff recognized that confidence in the man, both from his boasts of what his uncle would now accomplish and the swaggering manner in which he sat in his saddle.

“You should understand, Master Bildeborough, the ramifications of being in league with those two,” the monk taunted.

“If you do not shut your mouth, I will gag you,” Connor promised.

“But the embarrassment to your uncle!” Youseff pressed. “What fun it shall be when the King learns that Baron Bildeborough’s nephew is traveling with outlaws.”

“I am indeed,” Connor said, looking down at the man. “Now.”

Brother Youseff was not amused. “Your accusation is ridiculous, of course,” he said. “And your uncle will recognize that fact and apologize profusely to the Church—and perchance the Church could be persuaded to accept the apology and not excommunicate him.”

Connor scoffed openly, not really impressed, and certainly not believing this dangerous monk’s words. Fear did lick at Connor’s thoughts, though, for himself and for his uncle. He tried to hold fast to his confidence in the great man, the Baron of Palmaris, but reminded himself repeatedly not to underestimate the power of the Church.

“Perhaps even you two could be forgiven,” Youseff went on slyly.

“Forgiven for defending ourselves?” Roger quipped.

“Neither of you was involved,” Youseff replied. “Only the girl and the other one. And perhaps the elf—no such creature was known to us, and thus his fate is yet to be determined.”

Again Connor scoffed. For this man who had stalked him at the Way, who had tried to catch him to kill him, to insist that he wasn’t involved was purely ridiculous.

“An yes, the girl,” Brother Youseff went on, changing his tone, looking up out of the corner of his eye to measure Connor’s response. “How sweet that capture will prove,” he said lewdly. “Perhaps I might find time to take pleasure with her before I present her to my superiors.”

The monk saw the strike coming—indeed he had invited it!— and he didn’t waver now, but let Connor smack him across the back of his head. It wasn’t a hard blow, but one that Youseff could convincingly use as he dove down to the ground, slamming his left shoulder squarely and pushing through the blow. He heard the popping sound as the bone dislocated, felt the waves of pain washing over him, and he cried out, seemingly from the pain, but really to cover the movements as he brought his arms closer together behind his back, changing the angle of the bindings.

“We are almost to the city!” Roger scolded. “Why did you hit him?”

“Did you not want to do exactly the same thing?” Connor replied, and Roger had no answer. Roger went for the fallen monk then, as did Connor, sliding down from Greystone.

The security of Youseff’s ties depended on not being able to bring his arms farther back behind him, but now, with the shoulder popped out of place, that was no longer true. He got his left hand free in moments, but held his position, keeping his hands close together, ignoring the numbing pain in his left shoulder.

Roger was beside him first, stooping to put his arms around the man.

Youseff bided his time—this one was not the most dangerous of the pair.

Then Connor was there, helping Roger hoist the monk back to his feet.

Faster than either of them could realize, Brother Youseff tucked his feet under him and came up straight. The binding ropes flew wide as his right arm swung about, fingers and thumb locked in a rigid C position. That deadly hook drove right into Connor’s throat, stunning the man, smashing against his exposed flesh, then driving right through so that Youseff held Connor’s windpipe in his hand.

He looked the nobleman right in the eye, unblinking, uncaring, then tore out Connor’s throat.

Connor Bildeborough fell away, clutching at his mortal wound, gasping for breath that would not come, trying futilely to stem the explosion of blood that rose about him in a crimson mist, that backed down his open windpipe into heaving lungs.

Youseff spun and struck, knocking stunned Roger to the ground.

The young man wisely discerned that he could do nothing for Connor and little against the powerful monk. He was moving as soon as he hit the ground, and while Youseff turned back to taunt the dying Connor, Roger managed to get to the horse.

“I think I will go and kill your uncle next,” Youseff said with an evil grin.

Connor heard him, but only from far, far away. He was falling, he felt, slipping deeper and deeper into a blackness, deeper within himself. He felt cold and alone, all noises diminishing to nothingness. His vision narrowed, became points of light.

Bright and warm.

He found one place of great comfort, one place of hope: he had made his peace with Jill.

Everything was gone now, except the light, the warmth. Connor’s spirit walked toward it.

Roger held on dearly to one stirrup as Connor’s frightened horse bolted, dragging him along. Behind him he heard the monk coming hard; Youseff had taken up the chase.

Growling against the pain, Roger pulled himself closer to the horse as he ran alongside it. He strengthened his grasp on the saddle, then reached back and slapped Greystone hard, spurring the horse on. He managed to glance back as he did, and saw Youseff, running fast, closing ground.

Using all of his agility, every ounce of his strength, Roger pulled himself up, up. He somehow got his feet off the ground, and with the drag gone, the horse put some ground between itself and the running monk.

Roger didn’t even try to gain a proper seat, but just pulled himself over the saddle sidelong, hanging head down, grimacing with each painful jolt.

The fine horse left the monk behind.

A frustrated Brother Youseff kicked hard at the ground. He glanced up and down the road, both ways, wondering which course he should take. He could go back to Palmaris—with Connor dead, there would likely be no accusations raised against him concerning the murdered abbot. Certainly the word of the rogues in the north would not be sufficient to bring such charges against the Abellican Church.

But while he didn’t fear the Baron of Palmaris or the monks of St. Precious, the thought of reporting back to Father Abbot Markwart with news of the disaster made the hairs on the back of Youseff’s neck stand up. Dandelion was dead, but so was the troublesome Master Bildeborough.

Youseff looked the way Roger had gone, to the north. He had to get to him before Roger could rendezvous with the others, had to ensure complete surprise when he sprang back upon the woman. And Youseff knew he would indeed go back after her, and her two companions. They had only beaten him the first time because they knew he was coming, but now . . .

Then he could report back to the Father Abbot.

Brother Youseff started to run, legs pumping tirelessly, carrying him over the miles.

Roger was riding easily, but quickly. The monk hadn’t given up, he suspected, for they both knew that Roger meant to get back to Elbryan and Pony, which Youseff could not allow. Still, Roger was not too worried, for with the horse he could keep ahead.

But barely, he saw when he climbed the side of one hillock, looking back down the road to see the monk, far in the distance, but still running!

“Impossible,” Roger muttered, for they must have covered more than five miles by then. Yet the monk’s speed seemed as great as if he had just taken up the chase!

Roger climbed back on the horse and started away at a faster pace. He could tell that the mount was tired—sweat glistened on the golden coat—but he couldn’t afford to let Greystone slow down. He glanced back many times, hoping, praying, that the monk could not outlast his mount. On and on he went, staying to the road, more concerned with speed than stealth, knowing that the monk, incredible as the man was, could not match his horse’s pace.

He was riding easily again soon after, confident that he had left his pursuer far behind, and plotting the best course to find his friends; they had arranged to meet at an abandoned farmhouse no more than ten miles farther.

The horse stumbled, and Roger’s eyes went wide when he saw the gleam of metal to the side of the road. Greystone was limping now, having thrown a shoe.

Roger was down to the ground in an instant, running to retrieve the shoe, then back to the horse to see what leg it had come from. The answer was obvious before he even approached, for the horse was limping badly now, favoring its rear left leg. Gingerly, Roger hooked his arm about that limb and bent it up at the knee.

The hoof was in bad shape. Roger didn’t know much about horses, but realized that this one couldn’t go on unless that shoe was replaced. And there was no way he could do that.

“Bloody powrie luck,” the young man cursed, glancing back nervously down the road. It took all of Roger’s willpower to control his mounting fears, to force himself to think clearly, to reason through the problem. First he considered running, but he dismissed that thought, sensing that the monk would find and catch him long before he got to Elbryan and the others. He then wondered if any houses this far north were inhabited once more, thinking he might find someone to replace the shoe, but again he understood that he had not the time.

“The fight is mine,” Roger said aloud, needing to hear the words as he continued to gaze back down the road. He went to the saddlebags then, for he and Connor had collected many items on the journey south, looking for something—anything!—-that might help him now.

Most of the items were simply general supplies for the road: ropes and a grapnel, a small shovel, pots and pans, extra clothing and the like. One item caught his attention, though. At the last stop, at the very farm where Elbryan and the others would wait, Roger had taken a come-along, a small block-and-tackle unit favored by farmers for hoisting bales, or even for pulling in stubborn bulls.

Roger held the item in his hand, studying it, trying to find some way to put it to use. Several images flashed in his mind, and he focused at last on one in particular, one that utilized his abilities. He couldn’t outfight the monk, he knew, but he might be able to outwit the man.

By the time Brother Youseff got to that spot, Roger and the horse were gone, but the horseshoe remained, right in the middle of the road. The monk stopped and examined the shoe, then stood and glanced all about curiously. He couldn’t imagine that the young man had been so foolish as to leave the telltale item behind.

Youseff searched ahead on the road and saw no fresh tracks beyond a dozen or so feet. To the side of the trail, he easily found signs of the limping horse’s passage, and on the other side, a spot of blood and a lighter set of tracks, the footprints of a light man. Now it made sense to the monk. The horse had thrown the shoe and had then thrown the young man. Smiling widely, the monk started down the sloping ground, toward a copse of trees, in which, he suspected, he would find his second victim.

From high in one of those trees, Roger Lockless, rope, grapnel, and come-along in hand, watched the monk’s confident approach. Youseff slowed as he neared the trees, moving with more caution, darting from cover to cover.

Roger lost sight of the monk when he entered the copse. Again he was amazed when Youseff emerged at another point, quite far into the trees, for the man had traveled many yards without even stirring the thick underbrush. Roger looked to his items, to the finger he had purposely pricked to leave a blood trail, and wondered if his wits would be enough.

It was too late to change his mind about his plans, though, for Youseff was right at the base of the tree now and had spotted the last drop of blood.

The monk’s head slowly turned up, staring through the leafy shadows, his gaze at last settling on the dark shape high among the branches, hugging tight to the trunk.

“If you come down, I will spare your life,” the monk called.

Roger doubted that, but still, he almost began a negotiation.

“If you make me climb all the way up there to drag you out, then know that your death will be most unpleasant,” Youseff went on.

“I never did anything against your Church!” Roger replied, playing the part of a frightened child, which at that moment did not seem to him to be too much of a stretch.

“And thus I will spare your life,” Youseff repeated. “Now come down.”

“Go away,” Roger cried.

“Come down!” Youseff yelled. “I give you one last chance.”

Roger didn’t reply, other than to whimper loudly enough for the monk to hear him.

As Youseff started to climb, following a predictable course among the branches, Roger watched the monk closely. He tugged on one rope for the hundredth time, testing it. One end was tied fast to the tree, the other secured to one end of the come-along. A second rope, fastened to the grapnel, was tied to the come-along’s other end.

The knots were secure and the ropes were the right length, Roger reminded himself, but still, when he considered the enormity of his plan, the need for perfect timing and more than a bit of luck, he nearly swooned.

Youseff was more than halfway up now, fully twenty feet from the ground.

“One more branch,” Roger muttered.

Up came the monk, planting his feet on the last solid limb of the lower trunk. He would have to pause there, Roger knew, and map out the rest of the climb, for he was in an open area that afforded no ready branches.

As soon as Youseff was in place, Roger Lockless took his rope firmly in hand and leaped out. He plummeted between a pair of branches, getting a few nasty scratches in the process. Then, some feet out from the trunk, he hit another branch, as he had planned, and kicked out, launching himself on a circuitous route about the tree. He crashed and bounced repeatedly but held fast to his circular, descending course, passing the startled Youseff barely an arm’s length away.

How Roger breathed easier as he continued around, for Brother Youseff had been too surprised to leap out at him.

“Damn you!” the monk cried. Youseff had at first thought that Roger was using the rope to get ahead of him to the ground, but suddenly, as the loop tightened about him, pinning him to the trunk, as Roger swung around and below, he understood.

On the last turn, Roger, holding the rope in only one hand now, took up the other rope and launched the grapnel at a cluster of white birch. Then, hoping it would catch, Roger braced his feet as he came around the base of the trunk, the first length of rope playing out to the end. He dug in then, pulling with all his strength to keep the rope taut about Youseff.

He knew he didn’t have long, for with the many branches interfering with the pull, the rope was not tight enough to hold the agile and strong monk for long.

Not yet.

Roger pulled on the rope in the birch trees with one hand, using the other to crank the come-along and take up some slack He groaned aloud as he felt the grapnel slipping through tangle. Finally, though, it caught fast.

Up above, Youseff was laughing and trying to extricate himself. He had the rope up above his elbows now and would soon slip under it.

Roger gave one final tug, and then, seeing that the slack was nearly gone, he dove for the come-along, cranking hard and fast with both hands.

Youseff had just started to lift the rope over his head when it snapped taut, slamming him back against the tree trunk “What?” he asked, for he knew that the skinny little man couldn’t pull so powerfully. He could see well enough below to know that no horse had come into the area, and so he stubbornly pushed back against the rope.

He heard the crack of a branch below, breaking under the strain, and was loose for just an instant before the rope pulled hard again, squeezing him against the trunk. Youseff’s left arm was free and under the rope now, but the binding crossed diagonally down his shoulder, right under his other arm, pinning him tightly. He continued his stubborn fight as the rope tightened even more.

Roger wasn’t looking up, was just pulling on the come-along’s crank with all his strength. The rope was no longer even vibrating, was out straight and tight, and so Roger finally stopped, fearing he would pull one of the birch trees right out of the ground.

He stepped out from under the tree and looked up to see the squirming, helplessly pinned monk. Now he did smile, with absolute relief. “I will return,” he promised. “With friends. It seems that you now have two murders to answer for!” And he turned and ran off.

Youseff paid the words little heed, just continued struggling against the impossibly tight binding. He squirmed and shifted, thought to try and slip out under the rope.

He realized that to be a foolish move almost immediately—but too late—as the rope slipped up an inch, creasing the side of his neck.

Belli’mar Juraviel was first into the copse, moving ahead of Elbryan, Pony, and Roger. The sun was low in the sky now, its bottom edge dipping below the horizon. The group had hurried back to the spot as soon as Roger had come to them, wanting to capture and secure the dangerous monk before nightfall.

Elbryan and the others waited outside the cluster of trees, the ranger watching Pony closely. She had been silent all the way back to this place; the news of Connor’s death had hit her hard.

Strangely, her mourning did not incite any jealous feelings within Elbryan, only an empathy for her. He understood, truly understood, the relationship between Pony and the nobleman, and he knew now that with Connor’s death, the woman had lost a part of herself, had lost that time of healing in her life. So Elbryan vowed silently to keep his own negative feelings private, to focus on Pony’s needs.

She sat straight and tall on Symphony now, cutting a stoic and strong figure in the fading light. She would get through this, as she had come through the first massacre at Dundalis, as she had come through the bitter war and all the losses, particularly the death of Avelyn. Once again the ranger found himself marveling at the woman’s strength and courage.

He loved her all the more for it.

“He is dead,” came a call from the tall grass, Juraviel returning to the group. The elf cast a glance at Roger, one that perceptive Elbryan didn’t miss, and explained, “He was just about free when I came upon him, stuck in the tree just as you described. I had to cut him down—it took several arrows.”

“You are sure he is dead?” Roger asked nervously, not wanting anything more to do with that one.

“He is dead,” Juraviel assured him. “And I believe that your horse, Connor’s horse, is just over there,” the elf added, pointing across the road.

“He threw a shoe,” Roger reminded.

“Which can be easily repaired,” Juraviel replied. “Go and get him.”

Roger nodded and started away, and Pony, on Elbryan’s signal, kicked Symphony into a trot after him.

“Your quiver is full,” the ranger noted when he and the elf were alone.

“I retrieved my arrows,” Juraviel replied.

“Elves do not retrieve arrows that have hit the mark,” the ranger replied. “Not unless the situation is desperate, which ours, now that the monks are both dead, is not.”

“Your point?” Juraviel asked dryly.

“The man was dead when you went into the copse,” Elbryan reasoned.

Juraviel agreed with a nod. “He apparently tried to get out of the bindings, choking himself,” he explained. “Our young Roger did well in tightening the bonds, and was quite clever in capturing the man in the first place. Too clever, perhaps.”

“I have battled with one called Brother Justice before,” Elbryan said. “And you saw the fanaticism at our ambush. Did you doubt that it must end like this, with the death of the monk?”

“I wish he had not died at young Roger’s hands,” Juraviel replied. “I do not believe that he is ready for that.”

Elbryan glanced to the road, to see Pony and Roger walking together, leading Symphony and Connor’s limping horse.

“He must be told the truth,” the ranger decided, and he looked to Juraviel, expecting an argument.

“He’ll not take it well” was all the elf warned, but Juraviel did not disagree with the ranger. The road ahead for all of them would be dark, no doubt, and perhaps it was better to get this unpleasantness over with here and now.

When the pair arrived with the horses, Juraviel took Greystone and, after examining the injured hoof, led the creature away, motioning for Pony to take Symphony and follow.

“Juraviel did not kill the monk,” Elbryan said to Roger as soon as the others were gone.

Roger’s eyes widened in panic and he glanced all around, as if expecting Brother Justice to leap out at him at any moment. The man had unnerved Roger more than any other foe, even Kos-kosio, ever had.

“You did,” Elbryan explained.

“You mean that I was the one who defeated him,” Roger corrected. “And that the kill by Juraviel was no large matter.”

“I mean that you killed him,” the ranger said firmly. “I mean that you tightened the rope and it somehow slipped about his neck, choking the life from him.”

Roger’s eyes widened again. “But Juraviel said—” he started to protest.

“Juraviel feared for your sensibilities,” Elbryan bluntly replied. “He was not certain how you would accept such grim reality, and thus feared to speak plainly.”

Roger’s mouth moved but no words came forth. The weight of the truth was hitting him hard, Elbryan realized, and he could see that he was swaying.

“I had to tell you,” Elbryan said, softly now. “You deserve to know the truth, and must get beyond it if you are to handle the responsibilities that have now been put on your young shoulders.”

Roger was hardly listening, was swaying more pronouncedly now and seemed as if he might simply topple over.

“We will speak later,” Elbryan said to him, walking up to him and dropping a comforting hand on his shoulder. Then the ranger continued past, going to join Juraviel and Pony, leaving Roger alone with his thoughts.

And with his pain, for truly Roger Billingsbury—and suddenly he craved for that title again and not the foolishly pretentious Roger Lockless—had never been hit by anything like this. He had known grief many times, too many times, in his young life, but that pain was different. That pain allowed him to keep himself up on a pedestal, to continue to view himself as the center of the universe, as somehow better than everyone else. In all the pain and all the many trials young Roger had ever known, he had been able to hold on to his somewhat childish Roger-centric view of the world.

Now, suddenly, that pedestal had been kicked out from under him. He had killed a man.

He had killed a man!

Without conscious choice, Roger was sitting in the grass. Desperately, his rational side battled against his conscience. True, he had killed a man, but what choice had the man given him? The monk was a killer, pure and simple. The monk had killed Connor right before his own eyes, brutally, evilly. The monk had murdered Abbot Dobrinion!

But even those truths did little to assuage Roger’s sudden sense of guilt. Whatever the justifications, and in spite of the fact that he had not intentionally killed Brother Justice, the man was dead, and the blood was on his hands.

He put his head down, laboring hard for breath. He craved all those things that had been torn from him at too young an age: family warmth and the reasonable, comforting words of adults he could look up to. With that thought, he looked over his shoulder to his three friends, to the ranger who had so bluntly told him of his crime and then left him alone.

For a moment Roger hated Elbryan for that. But it could not hold; soon enough he understood that the ranger had told him out of respect for him, out of confidence in him, and had then left him alone because an adult—and he was an adult now—had to work through such pain, at least in part, alone.

Pony came for him soon after, saying nothing of the monk’s death, but only informing him they were going to gather up the fallen monk and then go south to retrieve Connor’s body.

Silently, Roger fell into line, purposefully averting his eyes from the spectacle of Brother Justice, slung over Greystone’s back The horse was walking better now, for Juraviel had shaved its hoof to level, but still the pace was slow. Night fell in full, and still they walked, determined to get to Connor’s body before he was torn apart by some scavenging creature.

With some difficulty, for the night was quite dark, they at last found the man.

Pony went to him first, and gently closed his eyes. Then she walked away, far away.

“Go to her,” Juraviel said to Elbryan.

“You know what to do with him,” the ranger replied, and the elf nodded. Then, to Roger, Elbryan added, “Be strong and be sure. Your role is perhaps the most important of all now.”

And then he walked away, leaving Roger staring at Juraviel for an explanation.

“You are to take Connor, the monk, and the horse and head straight out to Palmaris,” the elf explained.

Roger inadvertently glanced at the dead monk, at the image that so shook his self-perception.

“Go to the Baron, not the abbey,” the elf explained. “Tell him what has happened. Tell him of Connor’s belief that these monks, and not any powrie, murdered Abbot Dobrinion, and that they chased Connor out of Palmaris, for he, too, had unwittingly become an enemy of the wicked Church leaders.”

“And then what for me?” the young man asked, wondering if this was the last time he would see these three.

Juraviel glanced around. “We could use another horse—another two,” he added, “if you plan to ride with us.”

“Does he want me to?” Roger asked, nodding toward the distant Elbryan.

“Would he have told you the truth if he did not?” Juraviel replied.

“And what of you, then?” Roger quickly asked. “Why did you lie to me? Do you think me a foolish young boy, unable to take responsibility?”

“I think you a man who has grown much in the last weeks,” the elf replied honestly. “I did not tell you because I was not sure of what Nightbird—and do not doubt that he is the leader of this group—had planned for you. If we meant to leave you in Palmaris, in safety with Tomas and Belster, if we had determined that your role in this fight was at its end, then what good would it have done you to let you know that you had the blood of a dead man on your hands?”

“Is the truth not absolute?” Roger asked. “Do you play God, elf?”

“If the truth is not in any way constructive, then it can wait for a better time,” Juraviel replied. “But since your course is yours to determine, then you needed to know now. Our road will be dark, my young friend, and I do not doubt that we will find other Brother Justices in our path, perhaps for years to come.”

“And each successive kill gets easier?” Roger asked sarcastically.

“Pray that is not the case,” Juraviel replied in a severe tone, eyeing Roger unblinkingly.

That demeanor set the young man back on his heels.

“Nightbird thought that you were emotionally strong enough to know the truth,” the elf added. “Take it as a compliment.”

Juraviel started to walk away.

“I do not know if he was right,” Roger admitted suddenly.

The elf turned about to see Roger, head down, shoulders bobbing in sobs. He went to stand beside him, put his hand on the small of Roger’s back. “The other monk was only the second man Nightbird ever killed,” he said. “He did not cry this time because he shed all those tears after killing the first, the first Brother Justice.”

The notion that this stoic and powerful ranger had been equally shaken hit Roger profoundly. He wiped his eyes and stood straight, looked to Juraviel and nodded grimly.

Then Roger was on the road south, too agitated to sit and wait out the remainder of the night. He had to move quite slowly, for the injured Greystone carried both bodies, but he was determined to speak with Baron Bildeborough before the midday meal.

PART FOUR

DOWN THE ROAD OF SHADOWS

As I learned more about the Church that Avelyn served—the Church of my parents and of every fellow human I have ever known—and as I met more of the Abellican monks, I began to recognize just how subtle the nature of evil might be. I had never spent time considering this before, but is the evil man inherently evil? Is he even aware that his actions are evil? Does he believe them to be, or has he tainted his perspective so that he believes himself to be in the right?

In these times, when the dactyl awoke and the world knew chaos, many, it seems, have come to question the very essence of evil. Who am I, or who is anyone, they might say, to judge which man might be considered evil and which good? When I ask is the evil man inherently evil, I am supposing an absolute distinction that many people refuse to acknowledge. Their concept of morality is relative, and while I’ll admit that the moral implications of many actions might be dependent upon a certain situation, the overall moral distinction is not.

For within that truth, I know a larger one. I know that there is indeed an absolute difference between good and evil, with individual perspective and justification notwithstanding. To the Touel’alfar, the common good is the measuring stick—putting the good of the elven folk first, but considering the good of all others, as well. Though the elves desire little contact with humans, they have for centuries taken humans under their tutelage and trained them as rangers, not for any gains to Andur’Blough Inninness, for that place is beyond the influence of the rangers, but for the betterment of the world at large. The elven folk are not aggressors, never that. They fight when they must, in defense and against imperialism. Had the goblins not come to Dundalis, the elves would never have sought them out, for though they have no love of goblins or powries or giants, and indeed consider the three races to be a scourge upon the very world, the elves would suffer them to live. To go to the mountains and attack these monsters, by elven standards, would reduce the Touel’alfar to the level of that which they despise above all else.

Conversely, the powries and the goblins have shown themselves to be warring and wicked creatures. They attack whenever they find advantage, and it is little wonder that the demon dactyl sought out these races for its minions. I tend to view the giants a bit differently, and wonder if they are, by nature, evil, or if they simply look at the world in a different way. A giant may look at a human and, like a hungry hunting cat, see its next meal. Still, as with powries and goblins, I feel no remorse in killing giants.

None at all.

Among the five races of Corona, then, I consider the humans most shrouded in mystery. Some of the very best people in all the world—Brother Avelyn, as a prime example—were human, as were, and possibly are, some of the very worst tyrants. In general, my own race is a goodly one, but not as predictable and disciplined as the Touel’alfar, certainly! Still, in temperament and general beliefs, we are much closer to the elves than to the other three races.

But those shades of gray . . .

Perhaps nowhere is the confusing concept of evil more evident than in the ranks of the Abellican Church, the accepted moral leader of the majority of humankind. Likely it is because this body has been entrusted with so high a standard, no less than to serve as the vanguard of human souls. An error in perspective among the Church leaders is a disastrous thing indeed, as Avelyn proved. To them he was a heretic, though in truth, I doubt there has ever been a man more godly, more charitable, more generous, more willing to sacrifice everything for the common good.

Perhaps the Father Abbot, who sent Brother Justice after Avelyn, can justify his actions—to himself at least—by claiming them to be for the betterment of all. A master was killed in Avelyn’s escape, after all, and Avelyn had no legal claim to the stones he took.

But the Father Abbot is wrong, I say, for though Avelyn might be technically labeled a thief the stones were his on purely moral grounds. Having watched his work, even before he sacrificed himself to rid the world of the demon dactyl, I have no doubt of this.

The capacity of any individual to justify his or her actions will forever amaze me, I fear.

—ELBRYAN WYNDON

CHAPTER 25

A Choice for Roger

By the time he neared the northern gate of Palmaris city proper, Roger Lockless and his grim luggage had attracted more than a little attention. Several farmers and their families, alert to anything moving in the area in these dangerous times, had noted the man’s passage, and many even came out to follow him, pestering him with questions.

He offered few explanations all the way to the gate, grunting his answers to general questions, such as, “Did you come from the north?” or “Any goblins up there?” The farmers accepted the vague answers without complaint, but the guards at the gate proved much more insistent. As soon as Roger drew near and it became apparent he had two human bodies strapped across his hobbled horse, one of the two great city gates cracked open and a pair of armored soldiers rushed out to intercept him.

Roger was very much aware of the fact that other guards watching from the walls had their bows drawn and ready, and aimed at his head.

“Your doing?” one of the soldiers snapped, moving to inspect the bodies.

“Not that one,” Roger quickly replied as the man lifted Connor’s head, his eyes widening in recognition and horror.

The other soldier was at Roger’s side in an instant, sword drawn and brought level with the man’s neck.

“Do you think I would walk openly into Palmaris bearing the body of the Baron’s nephew if I had killed the man?” Roger calmly asked, wanting these soldiers to understand that he knew the identity of the nobleman. “I have been called many things, but I do not number ‘fool’ among them. And besides, I considered Connor Bildeborough a friend. That is why, though I have other pressing business, I could not leave him on the road for the goblins and buzzards to pick over his corpse.”

“What about this one?” snapped the soldier standing beside the horse. “He is from the abbey, is he not?”

“Not from St. Precious, no,” Roger replied. “He is from St.-Mere-Abelle.”

The two soldiers looked to each other with trepidation; neither of them had been among those sent to St. Precious when the trouble with the Father Abbot had begun, but both had heard well the stories, and that put a sinister spin indeed on their suspicions when viewing the two bodies draped across Roger’s horse.

“You killed this one?” the soldier asked.

“I did,” Roger replied without pause.

“An admission of guilt?” the other soldier was quick to interrupt.

“For if I did not, then he surely would have killed me,” Roger finished calmly, looking the accusing soldier right in the eye. “I should think that, given the identity of these two, this conversation would be better served in the home of the Baron.”

The soldiers looked to each other, unsure of how to proceed.

“Unless you think it better to have the common folk pawing over Connor Bildeborough,” Roger added, a sharp edge to his tone. “Perhaps one will find proper use for Defender, or it might be that their rumors will reach the Baron, or the abbot of St. Precious, and who can tell what intrigue that might bring?”

“Open the gates,” the soldier standing beside the horse called to the guards on the wall. He motioned to his companion, and the man put his sword away. “Be gone to your homes,” he scolded the excited and whispering onlookers, and then he and his companion flanked Roger and started toward the city, grim baggage in tow. They stopped when they got inside the gate, other guards shutting it behind them. Out of sight of the farmers—for they weren’t sure whether or not this stranger had any allies among those folk—they grabbed Roger roughly and slammed him up against the wall, frisking every inch of his body and removing anything that even resembled a weapon.

A third guard brought out blankets to cover the bodies, then took hold of the horse’s reins and led the beast, while the first two grabbed Roger roughly by the elbows and half carried, half dragged him through the city streets.

Roger spent a lot of time alone in Chasewind Manor, the palatial home of Baron Rochefort Bildeborough. He wasn’t physically alone, but the two grim-faced soldiers assigned to guard him seemed in no mood for conversation. So he sat and waited, sang songs to himself, even counted the boards of the hardwood floor three times, as the hours passed.

When the Baron finally entered, Roger understood the delay. The man’s face was puffy, his eyes sunken, the hollow look of grief all about him. The news of Connor’s death had hit him hard, very hard; apparently Connor had not been exaggerating when boasting of his standing with his uncle.

“Who killed my nephew?” Baron Bildeborough asked before he had even taken his seat in the chair opposite Roger.

“His killer has been delivered to you,” Roger replied.

“The monk,” Baron Bildeborough stated more than asked, as though that fact held little surprise.

“That man and one other of St.-Mere-Abelle attacked us,” Roger began.

“Us?”

“Connor, myself, and . . .” Roger hesitated.

“Go on with your tale about Connor,” Baron Bildeborough said impatiently. “The details will wait.”

“In the fight, the monk’s companion was killed,” Roger explained. “And this monk was captured. Connor and I were taking him to you—we were on the very outskirts of the city—when he broke free and killed your nephew, a single thrust of his fingers to the throat.”

“My healer tells me that Connor has been dead longer than your story would suggest,” Baron Bildeborough put in, “if you then killed the monk, on the outskirts of my city.”

“It did not happen quite that way,” Roger stuttered. “Connor was dead immediately; I could see that, and so, being no match for the monk, I fled, taking Connor’s horse.”

“Greystone,” said Rochefort. “The name of the horse is Greystone.”

Roger nodded. “The monk would not give up his pursuit, and when Greystone threw a shoe, I knew that I would be caught. But I beat him with wits where my strength would not, and though I had only meant to capture him, that he might come back and stand open trial for his crimes, he was killed in the process.”

“I have been told that you are long on wits, Roger Billingsbury,” the Baron said. “Or do you prefer the name Lockless?”

The stunned young man had no reply.

“Fear not,” Baron Bildeborough reassured him. “I have spoken with a former companion of yours, a man who holds you in the highest regard and made no secret to me of your exploits against the powries in Caer Tinella.”

Still dumbstruck, Roger could only shake his head.

“By simple coincidence, I employ the daughter of a Mrs. Kelso on my staff,” Rochefort explained.

Roger relaxed and even managed a smile. If Baron Bildeborough trusted Mrs. Kelso, then he had nothing to fear from the man.

“I warned Connor—what an impetuous and cocky young man he was!” Rochefort said quietly, lowering his head. “If the powries could get to Dobrinion, then none of us was safe, I told him. But this rogue monk,” he added, shaking his head. “How could he have expected such an assassin? It makes no sense to me.”

“No powries got to Abbot Dobrinion,” Roger replied firmly, drawing the man’s attention. “And this monk was no rogue.”

The Baron’s expression was caught somewhere between outrage and confusion as he looked directly at the surprising Roger.

“That is why Connor and I were coming fast to see you,” Roger explained. “Connor knew that the monks, and no powrie, murdered Abbot Dobrinion. With the captured monk in tow, he thought he had his proof.”

“A monk of the Abellican Order killed Dobrinion?” Rochefort asked skeptically.

“This is much bigger than Abbot Dobrinion,” Roger tried to explain. He knew he had to be careful not to give away too much information about his three companions. “It is about stolen gemstones and a struggle within the Church powers. It is all beyond me,” he admitted. “All too complicated concerning areas with which I have little knowledge. But the same two monks who attacked my friends and me in the northland killed Abbot Dobrinion. Connor was certain of that.”

“What was he doing in the northland?” Rochefort wanted to know. “Did you know him before this incident?”

“Not I, but one of my companions,” Roger admitted, and then he took a deep breath and took a chance. “She was married to Connor once, for a short time.”

“Jilly,” Rochefort breathed.

“I can say no more, and please, for her sake, for my sake, for all our sakes, do not ask,” said Roger. “Connor came to warn us, that is all you need to know. And in saving us, he forfeited his own life.”

Baron Bildeborough sat back in his chair, digesting all that he had heard, weighing it beside the recent disturbances at St. Precious concerning the Father Abbot and his fellows of St.-Mere-Abelle. After a long while he looked back to Roger, then patted an empty chair beside him. “Come and sit with me as a friend,” he said sincerely. “I want to know everything about Connor’s last days. And I want to know all about Roger Billingsbury, that we two might discern our best course of action.”

Roger tentatively shifted to the chair closer to the Baron, taking more than a little hope in the fact that Bildeborough had referred to them as a team.

“That is him,” Juraviel insisted, peering down from the hillock with his keen eyes. “I can tell by the awkward way he sits in the saddle.” The elf gave a snicker. “It amazes me that a human as agile as Roger can appear so clumsy on a horse.”

“He does not understand the animal,” Elbryan explained.

“Because he chooses not to,” the elf replied.

“Not everyone was trained by the Touel’alfar,” the ranger said with a grin.

“Nor is everyone blessed with a turquoise stone that they might learn the heart of their mount,” Pony added, giving Symphony a gentle stroke on the neck.

The horse nickered softly.

The three friends and Symphony went down from the hillock, moving at an angle to intercept Roger.

“It went well!” he called excitedly, delighted to have found them. He kicked his horse into a faster trot and pulled harder on the reins of the horse trailing behind him, a horse the companions had seen before.

“You saw Baron Bildeborough,” Elbryan reasoned.

“He gave me the horses,” Roger explained. “Including Fielder here,” he added, patting the horse that had been Rochefort’s favorite. It struck Roger then how generous the Baron had been, almost mentorlike.

“Greystone is for you,” Roger said to Pony, pulling Connor’s beautiful palomino ahead. “Baron Bildeborough insisted that Connor would want you to have him. And this,” he added, taking a sword, Connor’s magnificent blade, Defender, from the side of his saddle.

Pony turned her wide-eyed expression to Elbryan, who only shrugged and said quietly, “It seems fitting.”

“But then the Baron knows of us,” Juraviel reasoned in less content tones. “Or of Pony, at least.”

“I did not tell him much,” Roger replied. “I promise. But he needed answers—Connor was as a son to him, and the sight of Connor dead nearly broke him.” He turned to Elbryan, whom he figured would judge his actions most critically of all. “I came to like the Baron,” he said. “And trust him. I do not think he is an enemy of ours, especially considering the identity of Connor’s killer.”

“It seems that the Baron came to like Roger Lockless, as well,” the ranger remarked. “And to trust him. These are no small gifts.”

“He understood the message,” Roger replied. “And the intent of the messenger. Baron Bildeborough knows that he is in dire straits when measuring his own strength against that of the Abellican Church. He needs allies as badly as we do.”

“How much did you tell him of us?” Juraviel interrupted, his voice still stern.

“He did not ask very much at all,” Roger calmly replied. “He did come to trust that I was a friend, and an enemy of his enemies. He asked nothing of your identities, other than what I offered about you,” he finished, motioning to Pony.

“You did well,” Elbryan decided after a few moments. “Where does it all stand now?”

Roger shrugged, fearing to face that question. “The Baron will not let the matter drop, of that I am sure,” he said. “He promised me that we would take it to the King, if need be, though I believe he fears to incite a war between crown and Church.”

“’We?’” Pony asked, picking up the cue.

“He wants me to bear witness,” Roger explained. “He bade me to come back to him presently, that we might plan a journey to Ursal, should his private conferences with some trusted monks of St. Precious fail to give him satisfaction.

“Of course I told him that I could not,” Roger added, seeing the curious expressions.

Now Roger was confused, as those expressions turned from curious to disapproving.

“We are on to St.-Mere-Abelle, so I believed,” Roger said. “Baron Bildeborough wants to be in Ursal before the turn of the season, for he has learned that a College of Abbots is to be assembled in mid-Calember and he is determined to speak with the King before Abbot Je’howith of St. Honce journeys north. Yet there is no possible way that I can go all the way to St.-Mere-Abelle beside you, finish our business there, and then return to Palmaris in time for the Baron’s departure.”

Still their expressions remained doubting.

“You don’t want me to go!” a horrified Roger reasoned.

“Of course we do,” Pony replied.

“But if the greater good will be served by having you at Baron Bildeborough’s side, then there you should be,” Elbryan added, both Pony and Juraviel nodding their assent.

“I have earned my place beside you,” Roger protested, lapsing back into his childish nature once again, a prideful mind-set which screamed at him that being left out was an affront. “We have learned to fight well together. It was I who killed Brother Justice!”

“Everything you say is true,” Pony answered, moving next to the young man and draping her arm about him. “Everything. You have earned your place, and we are glad and grateful to have you beside us, and surely we would be the better off for your particular abilities as we try to make our way into St.-Mere-Abelle.”

“But . . .” Roger prompted.

“But we do not think we can win,” Pony answered bluntly, her candor catching Roger by surprise.

“Yet still you go.”

“They are our friends,” said Elbryan. “We must go. We must try every means possible to get Bradwarden and the Chilichunks out of the Father Abbot’s clutches.”

“Every means,” Juraviel emphasized.

Roger started to argue, but stopped abruptly, closing both his eyes and his lips tightly as the point finally came through. “And if you cannot rescue them by force, then their only chance will come from an intervention by the King, or by those forces in the Church not under the Father Abbot’s wicked influence,” he reasoned.

“You may come with us if you desire,” Elbryan said sincerely. “And we will be glad to have you along. But only you have spoken with Baron Bildeborough, and thus only you can decide which course is the most important for Roger Lockless.”

“Only I can decide which course is the most important for Bradwarden and the Chilichunks,” Roger corrected. He went quiet then, and the others did, too, allowing him his private thoughts. He wanted to go to St.-Mere-Abelle, to take part in this grand adventure. Desperately.

But his reason overruled that desperation. Baron Bildeborough needed him more than did Elbryan, Pony, and Juraviel. Juraviel could more than fill his niche as scout, and between Elbryan’s sword and Pony’s magic, any contributions he might make should battle find them would be nominal at best.

“Promise me that you will find your way back to me when you again pass through Palmaris,” the young man said, choking up with every word.

Elbryan gave a laugh. “Could you doubt that?” he said lightheartedly. “Juraviel must come through or near to Palmaris on his road home.”

“As will Elbryan and I,” Pony added. “For when this is settled, when we again find peace, we will go back to Dundalis, our home, and Bradwarden’s. And on our way, I must take my family back to Fellowship Way in Palmaris.” Pony offered a quiet smile and hugged the man close, nearly pulling him from his saddle. “And even if our destination lay the opposite way, we would not leave Roger Lockless behind.” She kissed the man on the cheek, drawing a deep blush.

“We each have our duties spread clear before us,” Pony went on. “Two paths to defeat the one enemy. We will win out, and then we will celebrate—together.”

Roger nodded numbly, too overcome to verbally reply. Elbryan came over and patted him on the shoulder, and he looked past the ranger, to see Juraviel offering a confirming nod. He didn’t want to leave them! How could he go away from the first real friends—the first friends who had bothered to point out his faults as well as praise his talents—he had ever known?

And yet, precisely because of that, because these real friends were in dire trouble with the powerful Abellican Church, he knew he had to go back to Baron Bildeborough. Roger had known many trials in his life, but never before had he been asked by his own conscience to willingly sacrifice so very much. This time, unlike his jaunt into Caer Tinella behind the raiding Elbryan, his decision was motivated by altruism, and not jealousy, not fear of being outdone by the ranger. This time Roger acted out of love for Pony and Elbryan, and for Juraviel, the most blunt friend of all.

He said not a word, but took Elbryan’s hand in a shake that became a hug, then took up Fielder’s reins and rode away.

“He has grown,” Belli’mar Juraviel observed.

Pony and Elbryan silently agreed; both were as upset by this farewell as was Roger. Pony slipped down from Symphony and went to Greystone; the ranger taking Symphony by the bridle, they walked the horses back to their small camp.

They packed what few supplies they needed and set out on the road south. Juraviel wrapped himself in a blanket to hide his wings and weapons, appearing as a young boy, and took a seat on Greystone behind Pony. They decided to go straight into Palmaris, through the northern gate, for, with the monsters retreating, the city had become more open of late, and they didn’t believe they would be denied passage.

There was little conversation among them as they crossed through the northern outskirts, past the houses, most empty, but some with family returned. They actually caught sight of Roger on the road ahead of them several times, but thought it best to let him go in alone. Given what had just transpired between Roger and Baron Bildeborough, approaching the gate beside him would cause unwanted attention.

So much so that, on Juraviel’s advice, they decided to set camp outside the city that night, to wait a day and let all thoughts of Roger Lockless pass from the minds of the city guards.

Still, things were quiet between them, and Elbryan in particular seemed in a somber mood.

“Is it Bradwarden?” Pony asked him as they ate supper, a fine stew of coneys Juraviel had shot.

The ranger nodded. “I was remembering his days in Dundalis, before you returned,” he admitted. “Or even back before that, when you and I were on the northern slope awaiting our fathers’ return from the hunt, when we heard the music of the Forest Ghost.”

Pony smiled, recalling that long-past, innocent time. She understood the source of Elbryan’s melancholy to be more than simple nostalgia, though, understood, and surely empathized with, the pangs of guilt that resonated through her lover’s every word.

Juraviel, sitting off to the side, recognized it, too, and was quick to jump into the conversation. “You thought he was dead,” the elf remarked.

Both Pony and Elbryan turned to regard him.

“To blame yourselves is foolish,” Juraviel went on. “The mountain fell on him, so you believed. What were you to do, begin digging your way back in with your bare hands? And you, Nightbird, with your arm torn and broken?”

“Of course we do not blame ourselves,” Pony argued, but her words sounded hollow, even to her.

“Of course you do!” Juraviel replied with a burst of mocking laughter. “That is the way with humans—and too often for my taste, their self-blame is justified. But not this time, and not with you two. You did all that you could, loyally, valiantly. Even with all you have heard, you doubt that it could be Bradwarden.”

“The evidence seems solid,” Elbryan remarked.

“But so does the evidence that the centaur was killed,” Juraviel replied. “There is something to this which you do not understand, and rightly so, for if it is indeed Bradwarden, then some force beyond your comprehension has kept him alive—or has brought him back from the dead. True?”

Elbryan looked to Pony, then both turned back to Juraviel and nodded.

“That alone should alleviate your guilt,” the elf reasoned, catching them in his logic trap. “If you were so certain that Bradwarden was killed, then how can you be blamed, by others or by yourselves, for leaving that foul place?”

“True again,” Elbryan admitted, managing a smile, glad indeed that the wisdom of the Touel’alfar remained by his side.

“Then look not to the road behind,” Juraviel said. “But to the road ahead. If it is indeed Bradwarden, if he is indeed alive, then he needs you now. And when we are done, when the centaur is freed, how much better all the world shall be.”

“And we can return to Dundalis with him,” Pony put in. “And all the children of those who return to that town to rebuild will know the magic of the song of the Forest Ghost.”

Now they were at ease. They finished their dinner, speaking of the days they would know when this dark road was traveled and put well behind them, speaking of their plans when peace again reigned in Honce-the-Bear, when the Timberlands were reclaimed, when the Church was put aright.

They went to sleep early, vowing to make the gates before the break of dawn, and both Pony and Elbryan slept soundly, their elven friend keeping a watchful guard.

CHAPTER 26

The Newest Abbot

A frustrated and angry Master Jojonah shuffled down the main hallway in the upper level of St.-Mere-Abelle, the long and grand corridor running along the top of the cliff wall overlooking All Saints Bay. Windows were spaced every few feet to the monk’s right, the eastern view, while the left-hand wall was dotted sporadically by wooden doors layered with carvings of intricate detail. Each door told a separate story, one of the fables that formed the basis of the Abellican Church, and usually Jojonah, who had only fully examined a score of the fifty doors in all his decades at St.-Mere-Abelle, would pause and look at a portion of yet another. After an hour of perusal, he might have fully scrutinized a six-inch square block, reflecting on all of the hidden meanings. This day, though, feeling particularly foul, and in no mood for reflections on his strayed Order, the master just put his head down and rambled on, chewing his lips to keep from mumbling aloud.

He was taken by complete surprise, then, when a man blocked his path. He jumped back, startled, then looked up into the smiling face of Brother Braumin Herde.

“Brother Dellman is doing well,” the younger monk informed him. “They believe he will live, and will walk again, though not smoothly.”

Master Jojonah didn’t blink, his expression holding that angry stare and focusing it, not quite intentionally, on Brother Braumin.

“Is something wrong?” Braumin asked.

“Why would I care?” Jojonah blurted before he could consciously formulate a reply. He silently chastised himself immediately, using the unintentionally sharp retort as a personal lesson concerning just how angry and out-of-control he had become. He had erred badly because of that anger and frustration, had pushed Markwart too far. Of course he cared about Brother Dellman! Of course he was glad that the sincere young man was healing well. And of course, Master Jojonah did not want to take his outrage out on Brother Braumin Herde, in effect, his closest friend. He looked at the hurt and surprised expression on Braumin’s face, and formulated an apology.

Jojonah quickly bit back that reply, though, conjuring another image of Brother Braumin, one of the man lying lifeless in a wooden box. That image surely shook the old man, as painful a thought as a father might have for one of his children.

“Brother Braumin, you assume much,” Jojonah went on instead, keeping his voice sharp, and loud.

Braumin glanced around nervously, fearing they might be overheard, for there were indeed other monks in the long corridor, though none in the immediate area.

“Brother Dellman was injured badly,” Jojonah elaborated. “Through his own foolishness, I have been told. Well, men die, Brother Braumin. It is the greatest truth, the one inescapable fact of our existence. And if Brother Dellman had died . . . well, so be it. Better men than he have gone before.”

“What nonsense is this?” Brother Braumin dared to ask, quietly, calmly.

“The nonsense of your self-importance,” Jojonah snapped right back at him. “The nonsense to believe that any one man can make a difference, a real difference, in the course of human events.” The master snorted and waved his hand dismissively and started by. Brother Braumin reached out to grab him, but Jojonah roughly shoved the arm away.

“Get on with your life, Brother Braumin,” Jojonah scolded. “Find meaning where you will and secure your own little corner of the too-big world!”

Jojonah pounded off down the corridor, leaving poor Braumin Herde standing perplexed and wounded to his heart.

And Jojonah, too, was hurting. In the midst of his little speech he had almost succumbed to the despair he was spouting. But it was all for a noble purpose, he reminded himself now, finding again his inner center of harmony, throwing out all the bluster and a good deal of his anger in a great mental belch. He had berated Braumin, loudly, publicly, because he loved the man, because he wanted the man to keep away from him long enough for him to be far along the road with Master De’Unnero before Braumin even figured out that he was gone.

That was the safest course, Jojonah knew, given Markwart’s foul mood and increasing paranoia. Braumin had to lie low for the time being, perhaps for a very long time. Given the “accident” that befell Brother Dellman, the course Jojonah had set Braumin on, with his talk of Avelyn and the faults of the Church and his visit to Avelyn’s sacred grave, suddenly appeared to Jojonah as incredibly selfish. Battered by his own conscience, he had needed Braumin’s support, and thus, in his desperation, had pulled the man into his secret little war.

What consequences that might hold for Brother Braumin Herde stung Jojonah profoundly now! Markwart had won, it seemed, and he had been a fool all along to believe he could beat the powerful man.

The blackness of despair crept up around him again. He felt weak and sick, the same sickness he had known on the road to Ursal, as the strength and righteous determination ebbed away.

He doubted he would live to see the great doors of St. Precious.

Master Jojonah’s brutal treatment left Brother Braumin standing stunned in the long corridor. What could possibly have happened to so turn the master around?

Brother Braumin’s eyes widened, he wondered if that had indeed been Master Jojonah he had been speaking with, or if, perhaps, Markwart, or even Francis, had taken control of the man’s body.

Braumin calmed quickly, dismissing the notion. Possession was difficult enough on the unsuspecting who had never been trained in the use of the stones. Since Jojonah could use the soul stone, and use it well, he had definitely learned how to manipulate his spirit in such ways that would prevent such intrusion.

But what, then, had happened? Why had the master, after all these days, spoken so angrily and rudely to him? Why had the master practically disavowed all that the two of them had tried to accomplish, all that they considered Avelyn to stand for?

Braumin thought of poor Dellman and the unfortunate “accident.” Whispers among the younger monks hinted that it was no accident at all, but rather a coordinated maneuver by De’Unnero and the other two monks who had been working on the wheel with Dellman. And that line of thought led Braumin to only one answer: perhaps Jojonah was protecting him.

Braumin Herde was wise enough, and understanding enough of gentle Master Jojonah, to put aside his hurt and believe that to be the case. But still, it made little sense to him. Why would Master Jojonah change his mind now? They had already discussed in length the course this quiet rebellion must take, and that course was not one of great risk for Brother Braumin.

The monk was still standing in the long corridor, staring out the window at the dark waters of the cold bay below, musing over the possibilities, when a sharp voice from behind startled him. He turned to face Brother Francis, and in glancing around, had the distinct feeling that the monk had not been far away all along. Perhaps Jojonah had known of Francis’ spying, Braumin hoped.

“Saying your farewells?” Francis asked, smirking with every word.

Braumin looked back to the window. “To whom?” he asked. “Or to what? The world? Did you think I meant to jump out? Or perhaps you were only hoping as much.”

Brother Francis laughed. “Come now, Brother Braumin,” he said. “We really should not be arguing amongst ourselves. Not when such possibilities loom before us.”

“I admit that never have I seen you in so fine a mood, Brother Francis,” Braumin replied. “Has someone died?”

Francis let the sarcasm slide off his shoulders. “It is likely that you and I will be working together for many years to come,” he said. “We really must learn more of each other if we are to properly coordinate the training of first-year students.”

“First-year students?” Braumin echoed. “That is a job for masters, not immaculates . . .” As soon as he heard his own words, Brother Braumin could see where this all was leading, and he didn’t care for the path at all. “What do you know?” he asked.

“I know that there will soon be openings for two masters at St.-Mere-Abelle,” Francis said smugly. “Since few of the present group seems worthy, the Father Abbot will be left with difficult decisions, perhaps even waiting until those worthy in my class are promoted to immaculate in the spring. I had thought that your ascension to master would be assured, given that you are the highest-ranked immaculate and were chosen as second on the most important mission to Aida, but truthfully, it seems a bit doubtful.” He finished with another laugh and turned to leave, but Braumin wouldn’t let him get away that easily. He grabbed Francis roughly by the shoulder and spun him about.

“Another mark against you?” Francis asked, eyeing Braumin’s hand on his shoulder.

“What two masters?” Braumin demanded. He could guess easily enough that one of the departing masters would be Jojonah.

“Did not your mentor tell you?” Brother Francis replied. “I did see you speaking with him, did I not?”

“What two masters?” Braumin demanded more urgently, tugging hard on Francis’ robe as he spoke.

“Jojonah,” Francis answered, straightening and pulling away.

“How?”

“He is to depart on the morrow for St. Precious, to accompany Master De’Unnero, who will become the new abbot,” Francis was all too happy to explain, and he did indeed enjoy the crestfallen expression on Brother Braumin’s face.

“You lie!” Braumin yelled. He fought hard to hold control, reminding himself that he should not openly appear distressed by Jojonah’s departure. But this was more than he could bear. “You lie!” he said again, shoving Francis so hard that the man nearly fell to the floor.

“Ah, my temperamental Immaculate Brother Braumin,” Francis scolded. “Another mark against your possible promotion, I fear.”

Braumin wasn’t even listening. He shoved past Francis and started down the corridor, first in the direction Jojonah had gone, but then, too hurt and confused to even think of confronting the man at that time, he spun about and walked briskly, then broke into an open run, to his private room.

Brother Francis watched it all with great amusement.

Despite his protests, Brother Braumin knew that Francis was not lying. The Father Abbot had struck against Master Jojonah, it seemed, in a way that was at least as effective as Brother Dellman’s accident. With Master Jojonah far away in St. Precious, an abbey whose stature had been greatly diminished by the death of revered Abbot Dobrinion, and under the watchful eye of wicked De’Unnero, Father Abbot Markwart had all but neutralized the man.

Now Braumin better understood the treatment Master Jojonah had given him in the corridor, the abrupt dismissal and disclaimer of all they had hoped to achieve. Braumin realized that the man was defeated and despairing, and so he put aside his own hurt and anger and sought out Jojonah, going to the master’s private room.

“I find it difficult to believe that you would be stupid enough to come here,” Jojonah greeted him coldly.

“I should desert my friends when they need me most?” Brother Braumin asked skeptically.

“Need you?” echoed an incredulous Jojonah.

“Blackness has come to your heart and spirit,” Braumin pressed. “I see your pain clearly on your face, for I, above all others, know that face.”

“You know nothing, and babble like a fool,” Jojonah scolded, and truly it hurt him to speak so to Braumin. He reminded himself that it was in the young monk’s own interest, and so he pressed on. “Now be gone, back to your duties, before I report you to the Father Abbot and he pushes you even further down the list of promotions.”

Brother Braumin paused and considered the words carefully, and then he came to a new understanding. Jojonah talked of the list of promotions and his place on it, and relating that to their last discussion before they had met in the corridor, Brother Braumin could then see another course that the older man was following.

“I had thought that despair had defeated you,” he said quietly. “I came to you only because of that.”

His change in tone profoundly affected Jojonah. “Not despair, my friend,” he said comfortingly. “Only pragmatism. It would seem that my time here is ended, and that my road to Brother Avelyn has taken an unforeseen twist. That bend may make my journey longer, but I’ll not stop walking. However, it would seem that our time of walking together has reached its end.”

“Then what am Ito do?” Braumin asked.

“Nothing,” Master Jojonah replied somberly, but without hesitation, for he had thought through this situation quite carefully.

Brother Braumin gave an incredulous, even derisive, snort.

“The situation has changed,” Master Jojonah explained. “Ah, Braumin, my friend, I blame myself. When I learned of the plight of the Father Abbot’s unfortunate prisoners, I could not keep away.”

“You went to them?”

“I tried to go to them, but was stopped, and roughly so,” Jojonah explained. “I underestimated the Father Abbot’s reaction. In my foolhardiness, I overstepped the bounds of good sense, and have pushed Markwart too, too far.”

“Never could compassion be called foolhardy,” Brother Braumin was quick to put in.

“But still, my actions have forced Markwart to act,” Jojonah replied. “The Father Abbot is too strong and too entrenched. I have not lost my heart or my way, I assure you, and I will go against Markwart openly when I deem the time is right, but you must promise me here and now that you will take no part in that battle.”

“How could I ever make such a promise?” Brother Braumin firmly replied.

“If you ever loved me, you will find the way,” Master Jojonah replied. “If you believe in what Avelyn says to us from his grave, you will find a way. Because if you cannot make that promise, then know that my road has reached its end, know that I will not follow the course of opposing Markwart. I must be alone in this; I must know that no one else will suffer for my actions.”

There came a long pause, and finally Brother Braumin nodded. “I will not interfere, though I feel that your request is ridiculous.”

“Not ridiculous, my friend, but practical,” Master Jojonah replied. “I will go against Markwart, but I cannot win. I know that, and so do you, if you can put your bravado aside and be honest with yourself.”

“If you cannot win, then why raise the fight?”

Jojonah gave a chuckle. “Because it will weaken Markwart,” he explained, “and publicly raise issues which may find a root of truth in the hearts of many in the Order. Think of me as Brother Allabarnet, planting seeds in the hope that, in days when I am no more, they will live on and bear fruit for those who follow my footsteps. Think of me as one of the original craftsmen at St.-Mere-Abelle, who knew that they could not live long enough to see their vision of the abbey fulfilled, but who went to their dedicated labors anyway, some spending their entire lives working on the intricate carvings of a single door, or cutting the stone for the original foundation of this magnificent structure.”

The poetic words struck Braumin deeply but could not push him past his desire not only to wage battle, but to win. “If we truly believe in Brother Avelyn’s message, then we cannot stand alone,” he said. “We must take the fight—”

“We do believe and we will, in the end, win out,” Master Jojonah interrupted, seeing where this was going and knowing it to be a fool’s ending. “I must hold faith in that. But for both of us to go against Markwart now would set our cause far, far back, perhaps beyond retrieval. I am an old man, and feeling older by the day, I assure you. I will begin the war against Markwart, and against the current way of the Church itself, and that will perhaps entice some of the Order to begin looking at our routines, our supposed traditions, in a new light.”

“And what is my place in this hopeless war?” Brother Braumin asked, trying to keep the sarcasm out of his tone.

“You are a young man, and will almost certainly outlive Dalebert Markwart,” Master Jojonah calmly explained. “That is, forgoing any unfortunate accidents!” He didn’t have to speak the name of Dellman to conjure the unpleasant images into Brother Braumin’s mind.

“And then?” Braumin asked, his tone growing more composed. “You will quietly spread the word,” Master Jojonah replied. “To Viscenti Marlboro, to Brother Dellman, to all who will listen. Building on the little I will accomplish, you will find allies where you will, but take great care to make no enemies. And above all,” Jojonah said, moving to a corner of the rug beside his desk, then pulling it back to reveal a secret compartment in the floor, “you will protect this.” He took the ancient text out of the compartment and handed it to a wide-eyed Braumin.

“What is it?” the young monk asked breathlessly, understanding that he was holding something of great importance, that this old book was part of the reason for Master Jojonah’s surprising decisions.

“It is the answer,” Jojonah replied cryptically. “Read it quietly, secretly, and then hide it safely away and put it out of your thoughts. But not out of your heart,” he added, patting Braumin’s strong shoulder. “Play along with Father Abbot Markwart’s games if you must, even to the extent of ambitious Brother Francis.”

Braumin’s face screwed up with incredulity.

“I am counting on you to become a master of St.-Mere-Abelle,” Jojonah firmly answered that look. “And soon—perhaps even as my replacement. It is not out of the question, because Markwart wants to give open signs that he is waging no private battle against me, and our friendship is widely known. You must find your way to that spot and spend your years in ways that will place you in line for a position as abbot of one of the other abbeys, or perhaps even in line for the position of Father Abbot itself. Aim high, my young friend, because the stakes are so tragically high. Your reputation remains impeccable and impressive beyond Markwart’s inner circle. When you have attained the pinnacle of your power, however high that might be, then secure your friends and decide how to continue the holy war that Brother Avelyn began. That might mean passing the book and the dreams along to a younger, trusted ally, and following a course similar to mine. Or the situation might call for you and your allies to openly wage the battle within the Church. Only you will know.”

“You ask much.”

“No more than I have asked of myself,” Jojonah said with a self-deprecating chuckle. “And I believe that you are a finer man than ever was Jojonah!”

Brother Braumin scoffed at that remark, but Jojonah shook his head and would not back down. “It took me six decades to learn what you already have placed firmly in your heart,” the old master explained.

“But I had a better teacher,” Brother Braumin replied with a grin.

That brought a smile to beleaguered Jojonah’s sagging face.

Braumin turned his attention to the book, holding it higher between himself and the master. “Tell me more,” he insisted. “What is in here?”

“Brother Avelyn’s heart,” Jojonah replied. “And the truth of what once was.”

Braumin eased the book back down in front of him and tucked it under his voluminous robes, close to his heart.

“Remember all that I told you of the fate of the Windrunner, and hold that in comparison to the former ways of our Order,” Jojonah explained.

Braumin hugged the book even tighter, giving a solemn nod. “Fare well, my friend, my teacher,” he said to Jojonah, fearing he would never see the man again.

“Fear not for me,” Master Jojonah replied. “For if I were to die today, I would die contented. I have found my heart and the truth, and have passed that truth onto able hands. We will win out, in the end.”

Brother Braumin came forward suddenly and wrapped the large man in a great hug, holding it for a long, long time. Then he turned abruptly, not wanting Master Jojonah to see the moisture that had gathered in his eyes, and rushed out of the room.

Jojonah wiped his own eyes and quietly closed the door behind the man. Later that day, he, De’Unnero, and a score and five young escorts set out from the great gate of St.-Mere-Abelle. It was a formidable force accompanying the would-be abbot, Jojonah noted, twenty-five monks—fourth- and fifth-year students, he recognized—wearing heavy leather protection and well-armed with sword and heavy crossbow. The old master sighed at the sight; he knew that this group was more to ensure De’Unnero’s immediate and absolute dominance at St. Precious than to protect the would-be abbot on the road.

But what did it matter? Jojonah did not feel as though he had much fight in him; the road to St. Precious seemed imposing enough.

He hesitated as the gates of the abbey swung closed behind him, wondering if he should go back in and confront Markwart openly, should make his last stand here and now and be done with it, because he felt very mortal this day, as though he was running out of time.

But he felt weak and sick, as well, and did not turn about to go and find Markwart.

He lowered his head, in shame and out of sheer weariness, and gradually tuned in to the speech that sharp-tongued De’Unnero was giving to all the group, himself included. The man barked commands about how they would proceed, a marching order, protocol for the road, and he insisted from one and all, particularly from Jojonah, for he moved right up to stand before the man, that from this moment forward he be addressed as Abbot De’Unnero.

The title assaulted Master Jojonah’s every sensibility. “You are not an abbot yet,” he reminded the man.

“But perhaps some of you need practice with assigning me the title,” De’Unnero retorted.

Jojonah held his ground as the man crowded forward.

“This comes from the Father Abbot himself,” De’Unnero stated, unrolling a parchment with a snap of his arm. On it was written Markwart’s latest edict, proclaiming that henceforth, Brother Marcalo De’Unnero would be known as Abbot De’Unnero. “Have you anything else to argue, Master Jojonah?” the man asked smugly.

“No.”

“Just no?”

Master Jojonah didn’t back down, and didn’t blink, his gaze boring holes into the accursed document.

“Master Jojonah?” De’Unnero prompted, and his tone explained what he was waiting for.

Jojonah looked up to see that wicked smile, to see that De’Unnero was, in fact, putting him on trial in front of the younger monks. “No, Abbot De’Unnero,” he said, hating every word, but realizing that this was not the fight he wanted.

With Jojonah put in his place, De’Unnero motioned for the procession to begin, and so they marched, in precise order, to the west.

It seemed to Master Jojonah that the road had just become much longer.

CHAPTER 27

The Escape

“They are gone?” Father Abbot Markwart asked Brother Francis later that same afternoon, the old man remaining in his private room for most of the day, not wanting any confrontations with Master Jojonah, whom he suspected was on the very edge of explosiveness. He had pushed Jojonah right to that edge purposely, and then pushed him out of the way, for Markwart feared that the old master had some fight left in him, a public brawl Markwart did not want. Let Jojonah go to Palmaris and do battle with De’Unnero!

“Master . . . Abbot De’Unnero led them away,” Brother Francis explained.

“Now the interrogation of the prisoners might commence in full,” Markwart said, with such coldness that Brother Francis felt a shiver run along his spine. “Have you the enchanted armband that was taken from the centaur?”

Brother Francis reached into a pocket and produced the elvish item.

“Good,” Markwart said with a nod. “He will need it to survive this day.” He started for the door, Francis scurrying to keep up.

“I fear that the other prisoners will need it more,” the young monk explained. “The woman, in particular, is looking gravely ill.”

“They need it, but we do not need them,” Markwart said ferociously, turning on the younger man.

“Perhaps someone could tend them with the soul stone, then,” Francis stuttered.

Markwart’s laugh pierced him to the heart. “Did you not hear me?” he asked. “We do not need them.”

“Yet we’ll not let them go,” Brother Francis reasoned.

“Indeed we will,” Markwart corrected, and before the smile could widen on the younger man’s face, he added, “We’ll let them go to face the wrath of God. Leave them alone in their dark holes.”

“But Father Abbot—”

Markwart’s stare silenced him. “You worry about individuals when all the Church is at stake,” the old man scolded.

“If we do not need them, then why keep them imprisoned?”

“Because if the woman we seek thinks we have them, she may walk right into our grasp,” Markwart replied. “It matters little whether they are alive or dead, as long as she thinks they are alive.”

“Then why not keep them that way?”

“Because they can bear witness!” the Father Abbot growled, moving his wrinkled old visage right up to Brother Francis, nose-to-nose. “How might their tale be received? Will those listening understand the greater good served by their suffering? And what of the fate of the woman’s son? Would you desire to answer to those charges?”

Brother Francis took a deep breath and steadied himself, reminded once again of the depth of the old Father Abbot’s obsession, and of his own deep involvement. Again the young monk found himself at a crossroads, for in his heart, despite what his obedience to the Father Abbot and the Church might be telling him, he knew that this torture of the Chilichunks and the centaur was a wicked thing. Yet he, too, was inescapably a part of that wicked thing, and unless Markwart prevailed, his complicity would be revealed for all the world to see. The woman was sickly because her heart had broken on the road when her son had died.

“The woman’s perception is everything,” Markwart went on. “It matters not whether her parents are truly alive or dead.”

“Whether they are alive or have been killed,” Francis corrected aloud, though muttering it under his breath too low for the Father Abbot, who was stalking toward the stairs once more, to hear. The young monk took another deep breath, but when he blew it out, the flickering flame of compassion in his heart went dark yet again. This was a tasteless, nasty business, he decided, but it was all for the good, and he was following the edicts of the Father Abbot of the Abellican Church, the man closest to God in all the world.

Brother Francis picked up his pace, rushing past Markwart to open the doors to the stairwell.

“Pettibwa? Oh, Pettibwa, why don’t ye answer?” Graevis Chilichunk called repeatedly. The night before, he had been talking to his wife through the walls of their adjoining cells, and though he couldn’t see her, for the darkness was absolute, the sound of her voice had been comforting indeed.

Not that Pettibwa had offered much comfort with the content of her words. Grady’s death had grown like a canker in the woman’s heart and soul, Graevis knew, and though he had taken the brunt of the punishment, was battered and half starved, his old bones protesting his every movement—and with more than a few of them broken, he was sure—his wife was in worse shape by far.

He called out again and again, pleading with her.

Pettibwa couldn’t hear him, for her thoughts and all her sensibilities were turned inward, were locked in the image of a long tunnel and a bright light at its end, in the image of Grady standing at the exit of that tunnel, holding his hand out to her.

“I see him!” she cried. “ ’tis Grady, me boy.”

“Pettibwa?” came Graevis’ call.

“He’s showing me the way!” Pettibwa exclaimed, with more strength than she had shown in many, many days.

Graevis understood what was happening here, and his eyes widened in panic. Pettibwa was dying, was willingly leaving him and all this horrid world! His first instinct was to scream out to her, to bring her back to him, to plead with her not to leave him.

He remained silent; he caught himself in time to realize how selfish such a course would be. Pettibwa was ready to go, and so she should, for surely the next life would be a better place than this.

“Go to him, Pettibwa,” the old man called with a trembling voice, tears streaming from his dull eyes. “Go to Grady and hug him, and tell him that I love him, too.”

He went quiet then, all the world seemed to hush, so much so that Graevis could hear the rhythmic breathing of the woman in the adjoining cell. “Grady,” she muttered once or twice, and then there came a great sigh, and then . . .

Silence.

Sobs shook the old man’s broken body. He pulled against his chains with all his strength until one of his wrists popped out of joint and waves of pain made him lean back against the wall. He brought one hand in close to wipe the tears and snot from his face, and then, with strength that he didn’t believe he still possessed, Graevis stood straight and tall. This would be his last act of defiance, he understood.

Concentrating, conjuring images of his dead wife to bolster his courage, Graevis tugged with all his might against the shackle holding that injured hand. He ignored the pain, pulling the hand tight into the shackle, and then on some more. He didn’t even hear the crack of bone, but just pulled on, like a wild animal, tearing his skin, crushing his hand into the shackle.

Finally, after minutes of agony, the hand pulled free and Graevis’ legs went weak beneath him.

“No ye don’t,” he scolded, lifting himself straight and turning for the remaining length of chain. In one movement Graevis leaped up over his extended hand, twisted and turned and threw that shackled arm up over his head so that when he came back down, the chain was looped about his neck. He was up on his tiptoes and could relieve the choking pressure.

But not for long, he knew as his legs began to weaken and his body slumped, the chain pulling tight about his throat.

He wanted to find that tunnel, wanted to see Pettibwa and Grady beckoning to him.

“I told you he was evil!” Father Abbot Markwart roared at Brother Francis when they came upon the hanging man. “But even I did not understand the depth of it, apparently. To take his own life! What cowardice!”

Brother Francis wanted to agree wholeheartedly, but a nagging part of his conscience would not let him dismiss it that easily. They had found the woman, Pettibwa, in the adjoining cell, dead, and not by her own hand. Francis could only assume that Graevis knew she had died, and that had been the final burden, the one that pushed the battered old man past all sanity.

“It does not matter,” Markwart said dismissively, calming somewhat now that the shock of it all had worn off a bit. Hadn’t he and Francis just discussed this very probability? “As I explained to you upstairs, neither of them had anything valuable left to tell us.”

“How can you be certain?” Francis dared to ask.

“Because they were weak,” Markwart snapped at him. “As this—” He waved his hand at the limp form hanging against the wall. “—only proves. Weak, and if they had anything else to tell us, they would have broken under the strain of our questioning long ago.”

“And now they are dead, all three, the family the woman Pony once knew,” Brother Francis said somberly.

“But as long as she does not know they are dead, they remain useful to us,” the Father Abbot said callously. “You will tell no one of their demise.”

“No one?” Francis echoed skeptically. “Am I to bury them alone? As I did with Grady on the road?”

“Grady Chilichunk was your responsibility by your own actions,” Markwart snapped at him.

Brother Francis stuttered, searching for a reply but finding none. “Leave them where they are,” Markwart added, after he believed that the younger monk had squirmed long enough. “The worms can eat them in here as well as if they are buried in the ground.”

Francis started to argue, tentatively this time, to point out the problem of the stench, but he stopped short as he considered his surroundings. In these untended dungeons the smell of a couple of rotting corpses would hardly be noticeable, and would certainly not change the nasty aura of the place. Still, to leave these two unburied without proper ceremony, particularly the woman, who had done nothing to facilitate her death, struck Francis hard.

But he, too, was no longer on that holy pedestal, Francis reminded himself. His hands were not clean, and so, like all the other inconsistencies that assaulted the man who would be Markwart’s protégé, Brother Francis shrugged it away, put it completely out of mind, blew out the candle of compassion yet again.

Markwart motioned to the door, and Francis noted the nervous edge of the movement. They had come to the Chilichunks first, and had yet to establish whether or not Bradwarden, who by Markwart’s estimation was the more important prisoner, was still alive. Francis hustled out of the cell and down the smoky dirt and stone corridor, fumbling with his keys as he led the way to Bradwarden’s cell.

“Be gone, ye dog! I got nothing to tell ye!” came the defiant call from inside as Francis, a very relieved Francis, put the key in the lock.

“We shall see, centaur,” Markwart muttered quietly, wickedly. Then of Francis he asked, “Did you bring the armband?”

Francis started to pull the item from his pocket, then hesitated.

But too late, for Markwart saw the movement and reached over and took the armband. “Let us go to our duty,” the Father Abbot said, seeming quite amused.

His lighthearted tone sent a shudder along the spine of Brother Francis, for he knew that with the enchanted band secured about his arm, the centaur was in for a long and terrible episode.

CHAPTER 28

When Duty Calls

The wind was brisk across the wide waters of the Masur Delaval as Elbryan, Pony, and the disguised Juraviel boarded the ferry in Palmaris, with Juraviel getting more than a few curious looks. Pony held him close, though, pretending he was her son—her ailing son, and since disease was a too common and much feared event in Honce-the-Bear, no one dared move too close.

In truth, Juraviel’s moans held more than a little touch of realism, for the heavy blanket wrapped about him was sorely bending his wings.

The huge sails unfurled and the square-decked ship eased out of Palmaris harbor, wood creaking and waves snapping sharply against her low sides. There were more than fifty passengers standing about the wide and flat deck, with the crew of seven working methodically, lazily, having made this passage twice every day, when the weather permitted, for years.

“They say the ferry is a good place to gather information,” Juraviel whispered to Elbryan and Pony. “People crossing the river are often afraid, and frightened people often echo aloud their own fears in the hope that another will speak comfort.”

“I will move among them,” Elbryan offered, and he slipped away from his “family.”

“Yer boy sick?” came a question almost immediately when the ranger moved near a group of five adults, three men and two women, fishermen, by the looks of them.

“We have been in the north,” the ranger replied. “Our home was sacked, as was our entire village. For a month and more we have been dodging powries and goblins, scraping for food where we might, going hungry more often than not. My boy Belli . . . Belli ate something foul, a mushroom, I would guess, and has not yet recovered, nor may he ever.”

That brought some sympathetic nods, particularly from the women.

“And where are ye going?” the same man asked.

“East,” Elbryan answered cryptically. “And you?” he asked quickly, before the man could press the point.

“Just to Amvoy,” the man replied, referring to the city across the water, the destination of the ferry.

“We all live in Amvoy,” one of the women put in.

“Just visiting friends in Palmaris, now that it’s all calmed down,” the man added.

Elbryan nodded and looked away, out to the wide waters, the docks of Palmaris fast receding as the lumbering ship found some favorable and strong winds.

“Take care if ye’re going beyond Amvoy,” the woman offered.

“We are.”

“To St.-Mere-Abelle,” the fisherman reasoned.

Elbryan snapped an incredulous stare over the man, but was wise enough to hide it quickly, not wanting to give anything definite away.

“That’s where I’d go if I had a sick boy,” the man went on, and neither he nor his companions caught the expression on the ranger’s face. “They say them monks got cures for anything, though they’re not quick in giving them out!”

That brought a laugh from his companions, except from the woman who had been talking, who looked at the ranger earnestly. “Ye take care if ye’re to go east of Amvoy,” she said again, more deliberately. “There’ve been reports o’ powrie bands roving the land. And them monsters’re not to care for yer sick boy, don’t ye doubt.”

“And one nasty band o’ goblins,” the man added. “Rumor says they were left on their own by the powries, and now they’re running scared.”

“Nothing more dangerous than scared goblins,” another man put in.

The ranger gave her a grateful smile. “I assure you,” he said, “I am no novice in dealing with powries, or goblins.” With that, he bowed and moved about the deck. He heard again people expressing concerns about roving bands in the east, but garnered nothing truly valuable.

He made his way around, coming back to Pony and Juraviel. The elf reclined with his blanket tightly wrapping him, while Pony was at work tending the horses, for Greystone, in particular, had grown quite uncomfortable with the ferry rolling in the rough water. The horse stamped his foot repeatedly, snorting and whinnying, and sweat was beginning to glisten about his muscled neck.

Elbryan went to him and took a firm hold on his bridle. He gave a powerful tug, straight down, and that steadied the horse momentarily. Soon enough, though, Greystone was right back to stamping and tossing his head.

Symphony, meanwhile, had calmed considerably, and when Elbryan found the moment to consider the stallion, and Pony bent low against Symphony’s neck, her cheek to the magical turquoise, he understood. Pony had found communication with Symphony, an understanding, and managed to impress upon the spirited stallion the need for calm.

Greystone gave a tug that nearly launched Elbryan away. The horse tried to rear up, but the ranger dug in and pulled all the harder.

Several other people, a pair of crewmen among them, came over then, trying to help steady the beast, for a nervous horse on an open ship deck could be a dangerous companion indeed.

But then Symphony took control of the situation, pushing past Elbryan and laying his head across the top of Greystone’s neck. Both horses snorted and neighed, Greystone stamped the deck again and tried to rear, but Symphony would have none of that, pressing down harder, even lifting one front leg over the smaller stallion’s back, holding Greystone in place.

Then, to the amazement of all the onlookers, Elbryan and Pony included, Symphony came down from Greystone’s back and nuzzled up to the horse, snorting and shaking his head. Greystone issued a few more protests, but they sounded halfhearted.

And then both horses were calm.

“Good horse,” one man muttered to Elbryan as he started away.

Another asked if Elbryan wanted to sell Symphony.

“Avelyn’s stone proves itself useful now and then,” Pony remarked when the three friends were alone with the horses again.

“I understand the communication between yourself and Symphony, for we have each done that before,” the ranger said. “But am I wrong in believing that Symphony actually conveyed your message to Greystone?”

“Something of that nature, so it would seem,” Pony replied, shaking her head, for she had no practical answers.

“How full of arrogance you humans are,” Juraviel remarked, drawing looks from both of them. “Does it so surprise you that horses can communicate with each other, at least in a rudimentary way? How would they have survived all these centuries if they could not?”

Elbryan and Pony, defeated by the simple logic, just laughed and let it go at that. The ranger’s expression, though, changed quickly, back to serious.

“There is talk of powrie bands roving the eastern reaches of the kingdom,” he explained. “And of one band of particularly troublesome goblins.”

“Could we have expected any less?” Juraviel replied.

“From what I could gather, it would seem that our enemies east of the river are in similar disarray,” the ranger went on. “The powries deserted the goblins, so say the rumors, and the goblins are on a rampage as much out of fear as out of their generally wicked nature.”

Juraviel nodded, but Pony quickly added, “You mean that it would seem as though some of our enemies are in disarray. And by my estimation, neither goblins nor powries rank as our worst enemy at this time.”

That painful reminder of their destination and the potential disaster they faced at the place quieted them all and cast a somber pall over the group. They spent the next, and last, hour of the voyage in relative silence, tending to the horses, and all were glad when the ferry at last docked in the small city of Amvoy.

The ship’s captain, standing beside the entrance to the gangplank, reiterated warnings about goblins and powries to all the passengers as they disembarked, bidding them all take great care if they traveled out of the city.

Needing no supplies, the friends cut right through the walled city to the eastern gate, where again they were warned about potential dangers in the open lands beyond. Their passage was not hindered, though, and so they rode out from Amvoy that very afternoon, the two horses quickly putting miles behind them.

The terrain here was far less wooded than that north of Palmaris. The land was more cultivated, crisscrossed by wide roads, some covered in cobblestones—not that any were really needed, for the grassy fields were easily crossed. Paralleling the road from a safe distance, the group passed another town that same day, and though it wasn’t walled, they could see that its defenses—archers on rooftops, even a catapult in the town square—were securely in place.

Farmers stoically working the fields paused to note their passing, a few even giving a friendly wave or calling to them an offer of a free meal. But the friends pushed on, and as the sun moved low in the sky, they came in sight of yet another town, this one much smaller than the previous, as the land was more sparsely populated the farther they moved from the great river.

They swung around to the east of the settlement and camped with the black silhouettes of the buildings visible in the distance, deciding to keep a watch for the townsfolk that night.

“How far do we have to go?” Juraviel asked as they sat around a low fire, eating their supper.

Elbryan looked to Pony, who had spent years in this area.

“A couple of days,” she replied. “No more.” She took a stick from the fire and scratched a crude map in the dirt, marking the Masur Delaval and All Saints Bay. “St.-Mere-Abelle is no more than a hundred miles from the river, if I remember correctly,” she explained, and then she drew out the land farther to the east, marking Macomber Village and, finally, Pireth Tulme. “I was here, in Pireth Tulme, but after I met up with Avelyn, we went back to the river—not near to St.-Mere-Abelle, but along a course to the south of the abbey.”

“Two days,” Elbryan mumbled. “Perhaps three. We should begin to formulate our plans.”

“There is little to decide,” Juraviel said with cavalier flair. “We will walk up to the doors of the abbey and demand our friends be returned. And if they are not, and promptly, we will knock the place down!”

The attempt at humor brought grins, but nothing more, for all of them, Juraviel included, began to recognize how daunting this quest really was. St.-Mere-Abelle was home to hundreds of monks, they knew, many of them proficient in the use of the magical gemstones. If Elbryan, or particularly Pony, was discovered and recognized, the quest would be over, and quickly.

“You should not bring the gemstones into the abbey,” Elbryan remarked.

Pony looked at him wide-eyed; her use of the stones was among their most potent weapons, and a valuable scouting and infiltrating tool, as well.

“They might detect any use,” the ranger explained. “They might be able to sense the presence of the stones even if you are not using them.”

“A surprise strike is our only chance,” Juraviel agreed.

Pony nodded her agreement, not wanting to get into that debate just yet.

“And if we are discovered,” the ranger went on in grim tones, aiming his remark directly at Pony, “you and I must surrender ourselves, loudly and publicly, calling for an exchange.”

“The two of us for the release of the Chilichunks and Bradwarden,” Pony reasoned.

“And then Juraviel will retrieve Avelyn’s stones and go with them to the west, and then with Bradwarden back to Dundalis,” Elbryan continued. “Then you take the stones back to Andur’Blough Inninness,” he explained to the elf, “and bid your Lady Dasslerond to hold them forever safe.”

Juraviel was shaking his head before Elbryan finished. “The Touel’alfar will not be involved in the matter of the stones,” he said.

“You already are involved!” Pony insisted.

“Not so,” said Juraviel. “I am helping friends, repaying debts, and nothing more.”

“Then help us in this matter,” Pony continued, but Elbryan, with his better understanding of the aloof elves, had already given up the fight.

“You ask for political involvement,” Juraviel explained. “That we cannot do.”

“I ask for you to uphold the memory of Avelyn,” Pony argued.

“This is a matter for the Church to settle,” Juraviel was quick to answer. “They, and not the Touel’alfar, must decide their own course.”

“This is a matter for the humans to settle,” Elbryan agreed, putting his hand on Pony’s arm to quiet her. She looked him square in the eye, and he shook his head slowly, deliberately, conveying the hopelessness of such an argument.

“I would ask that you retrieve the stones and give them to Bradwarden,” the ranger said to the elf. “Let him take them far away and bury them deep.”

Juraviel nodded his agreement.

“And return Greystone to Roger,” Pony went on. “And Symphony to the forest beyond Dundalis, his home.”

Again the elf nodded and a long moment of silence ensued, broken only when Juraviel began to laugh suddenly.

“Ah, but a hopeful group we have become!” the elf said. “We are planning our defeat, not our victory. Is that as you were trained, Nightbird?”

Elbryan’s smile widened across his face, shadowed with the stubble of a three-day-old beard. “I was trained to win,” he said. “And we will find a way into St.-Mere-Abelle, and be out of the place with Bradwarden and the Chilichunks before the monks can ever know we were there.”

They toasted that thought with raised food and drink. Then they finished their meal and went about organizing the camp and its defense, Juraviel going out to scout the night, leaving Elbryan and Pony alone.

“I fear this,” Pony admitted. “I feel as though it is the end of the long road I began when first I met Avelyn Desbris.”

Despite his earlier bravado, Elbryan could not disagree.

Pony moved close to him then, and he put his arms around her. She looked up into his eyes, slid up to her tiptoes and gently kissed him. Then she moved back, locking his stare with her own, the tension building. She came back and kissed him again, more urgently, and he returned the kiss, brushing his lips against her, feeling her strong back under the press of his arms, his hands massaging the muscles.

“What of our pact?” he started to ask, but Pony put her finger across his lips, silencing him, then kissed him again, and again, pulling him down to the ground beside her.

It seemed to Elbryan that they two were alone in the wide world, under the sparkling stars and with the gentle summer breeze blowing across their bodies, licking their exposed skin, tickling them, cooling them.

They were on the road early the next day, running their horses hard, as dawn pinkened the eastern sky before them. Any discussions of how they might get into St.-Mere-Abelle secretly fell apart before they really began, for they would have no practical understanding of the place until they had glimpsed it and seen its fortifications and its state of readiness. Were the doors opened wide for refugees from any nearby towns, or were they sealed shut, with dozens of armed guards patrolling the monastery’s walls?

They could not know, and so, putting their discussion off until it could produce something tangible, they heightened their pace, determined to make the abbey by the next morning.

But then they saw the smoke, rising like demon fingers above a ridge lined with trees. All three had seen such plumes before, and knew it was from no campfire or hearth.

Despite the urgency of their mission, despite the high stakes, no one questioned their course. Elbryan and Pony together turned their mounts to the south, riding hard for the ridge, then up the grassy slope to the tree line. Juraviel, bow in hand, fluttered away from Greystone as soon as they made those trees, the elf climbing high to better scout out the area.

Elbryan and Pony slowed and dismounted, then walked over the lip of the ridge cautiously. Spread below them, along the main road in a bowl-shaped valley, was a caravan of wagons, laden with goods and turned into a defensive, roughly circular formation. Several wagons were burning, and Elbryan and Pony could hear the shouts from the men below, calling for water, or for preparation of the defenses. The pair could see, too, that many people were down, and the agonized screams of the wounded rolled up out of the bowl.

“Merchants,” the ranger remarked.

“We should go down to them,” Pony said. “Or at the least, I should, bringing the soul stone.”

Elbryan looked at her skeptically, not wanting to use that stone, or any other, so near to St.-Mere-Abelle. “Wait for Juraviel’s return,” he bade her. “I see no dead monsters about the ring, and so it seems likely that this battle has just begun.”

Pony nodded her agreement, though the wails of the wounded pained her greatly.

Juraviel was back soon enough, fluttering to a tree limb just above their heads. “The scene is both good and bad,” the elf explained. “First and most importantly, the attackers were goblins, and not powries, a lesser foe by far. But they are four score in number, and preparing a second strike.” He pointed across the dell, to the southern ridge. “Beyond the trees.”

Elbryan, ever the tactician, and understanding goblins’ ways, surveyed the area. “They are confident?” he asked Juraviel.

The elf nodded. “I saw few wounded, and none in argument of further attack.”

“Then they will come in right over that ridge,” the ranger reasoned, “using the down slope to speed their run at the merchants. Goblins never concern themselves about their own dead. They’ll not expend the time or the effort to coordinate a more comprehensive attack.”

“Nor will they have to,” Juraviel added, looking down at the wagons and the pitiful attempt at defense. “The merchants and their guards cannot hope to hold them off.”

“Unless we help them,” Pony was quick to put in, and her hand subconsciously slipped to the pouch of gemstones, a motion Elbryan did not miss.

He looked Pony in the eye and shook his head. “Do not use the gems unless we absolutely need them,” he instructed.

“Four score,” Juraviel remarked.

“But they are only goblins,” said the ranger. “If we can kill one of four, the rest will likely flee. Let us prepare the battlefield.”

“I will go and watch the goblins,” the elf said, and he disappeared from sight so quickly that both Elbryan and Pony blinked in disbelief.

The two led the horses around the dell, moving down across the road, out of sight of the merchant wagons, then up the southern slope to the tree line. “They are hungry and frightened,” Elbryan noted.

“The merchants or the goblins?”

“Likely both,” the ranger replied. “But I speak of the goblins. They are hungry and frightened and desperate, and that makes them doubly dangerous.”

“So if we kill one in four, they will not run?” Pony asked.

The ranger shrugged. “They are too far from home, with no prospects of getting back. I suspect the rumors are true, that the powries deserted them out here, in a land filled with enemies.”

Pony gave him a sidelong glance. “Do you intend to offer mercy?” she asked.

The ranger chuckled at the thought. “Not for goblins,” he said firmly. “Not after Dundalis. I pray they do not flee, for then they will live to cause more sadness. Let four score come over the hill, and let four score die at our hands.”

They were up to the top of the ridge by then, and the goblins were in sight, huddled on the side of a ridge half a mile to the south. There weren’t many trees between the two positions and the goblins, but both Pony and Elbryan quickly discounted any ideas of spotting Juraviel as he made his way down to them. They turned instead to the tree line, to see what surprises they could put together for the oncoming horde. Pony moved to the underbrush, looking for young trees suitable for snares, while the ranger focused on one large and dead elm, precariously perched on the very edge of the ridge.

“If we could drop this in their midst, it would cause more than a little confusion,” the ranger remarked when Pony moved to join him.

“If we had a team of plow horses, we might indeed,” Pony replied sarcastically, for the dead tree was indeed huge.

But Elbryan had an answer to that. He reached into a pouch and took out a packet of red gel. “A gift of the elves,” he explained. “And I think this trunk might be rotted enough for it to work.”

Pony nodded. She had seen Elbryan use that same gel in Aida, to weaken a metal bar so completely that a single swipe of his sword had cut right through it. “I’ve already set one snare, and I can see possibilities for several more,” she said. “Also, a few sharpened sticks in the underbrush might cause some havoc.”

The ranger nodded absently, too immersed in his own work to even notice as Pony went back to hers.

Elbryan found the weakest point along the trunk and tested its width and give. He was convinced that with several mighty swings of Tempest, he could fell the tree, but that would not be good enough, for he would never find the time in the midst of a horde of goblins. But if he could properly prepare it now . . .

He took up his sword and gave a light chop, then fell back cautiously as he heard the responding crackles of buckling wood. Again he found the proper place and cut into the tree, and then again. He went to the packet next and tore it open, then smeared a line of the reddish substance—a mixture the elves used to weaken items—across the critical point, putting it in line with a pair of trees farther down the slope.

As he finished, Pony came back to him, riding Greystone. “We should tell them,” she said, motioning toward the merchant caravan.

“They know that someone is up here already,” the ranger replied.

“But they should know of our plans to help,” Pony reasoned, “that they might properly prepare a complementary defense. We cannot hope to stop all the goblins, no matter how effective our traps and swords.” She pointed down the slope to a stump barely visible above the tip of the tall grass. “The descent is steep there, and the lead goblins will be at full speed and in range of any bows the merchants might have,” she explained. “That could be a critical point. If I can string a trip rope, we could slow the goblins’ progress and allow the merchants many more shots.”

“Three hundred feet,” Elbryan replied, surveying the distance from the stump to the nearest cover.

“The merchants likely have that length of rope and more to spare,” said Pony. She waited for his nod, then turned Greystone about and moved cautiously down the slope. Two-thirds of the way, less than fifty yards from the caravan and wide open in the grass, she noted the many bows leveled at her, though more and more were dipping low as the archers recognized that she was no goblin.

“My greetings,” she said, moving right up to the wagons and addressing a heavy man wearing clothing of the finest fabrics, who seemed, by his posture, to be one of the leaders of the embattled band. “I am no enemy, but an ally.”

The man nodded cautiously, offering no response.

“The goblins have not gone far, and are preparing to come back,” Pony said, and she turned and pointed back up the slope. “From there,” she explained. “My friend and I are preparing a few tricks for them, but we’ll not stop them fully, I fear.”

“When did this become your fight?” the merchant asked suspiciously.

“We always make battles against goblins our own,” she replied without hesitation. “Unless you would prefer that we do not help, and let the four-score goblins swarm over you.”

That took away a good measure of the man’s bluster. “How can you know they will come from the south?” he asked.

“We know goblins,” was Pony’s reply. “We know their tactics, or lack thereof. They are gathered in the south, and have not the patience to swing about and coordinate an attack from several different directions. Not when they think they have their prey cornered and defeated.”

“We’ll give ’em a fight!” one archer declared, shaking his bow in the air, a movement followed only halfheartedly by the other ten or so holding bows. All told, the caravan could offer less than forty able-bodied fighters, Pony surmised, and a single score of bows, likely wielded by inexperienced and untrained archers, would hardly dent the goblin onslaught before hand-to-hand combat was joined about the wagons. Elbryan could fight goblins three against one, even four to one, with a reasonable expectation of victory, but to the average man or woman, a single goblin could prove too difficult a foe.

Pony knew that, and so, apparently, did the merchant, for his shoulders sagged. “What do you offer?” he asked.

“Have you any rope?”

The merchant nodded to a man nearby, and he ran to a wagon and pulled aside the tarp, revealing loops and loops of fine cord, thin and strong. Pony motioned for him to bring it. “We will try to even the odds,” she explained. “And I will slow their charge there, along the line of that stump, well within range of your bows. Shoot well.”

She took the rope from the man, then placed it on the saddle behind her and turned Greystone away.

“What is your name, woman?” the merchant asked.

“There will be time for such discussions later,” she replied, kicking the horse into a fast canter to the stump.

Up on top of the hill Elbryan was putting the last touches on his array of traps. He made a lasso and tossed it high into the branches of the dead tree, looping it expertly out to the side, then tying it off on the horn of Symphony’s saddle. Then he guided the horse to a thick copse far to the side and went about disguising the rope, not wanting to tip off the goblins.

“More company,” he heard from above, Juraviel’s voice, as he was just finishing.

The ranger looked up, peering intently, finally discerning the lithe form of the elf.

“To the east,” Juraviel explained. “A band of monks, a dozen perhaps, approaching cautiously.”

“Will they be here in time for the battle?”

Juraviel glanced to the south. “The goblins are already moving,” he explained. “Perhaps the monks could get here in time if they hurried, but I saw no sign of that. They cannot have missed the smoke, but I do not know how anxious they are to join in the fray.”

Elbryan chuckled, somehow not surprised. “Go and tell Pony,” he instructed. “Tell her to keep the stones secure and unused.”

“If the situation demands, she will not hold back the magic,” Juraviel reasoned. “Nor should she.”

“But if she does use them, I suspect we will be fighting a dozen monks soon after the goblins are dispatched,” the ranger replied grimly.

The elf worked his way quickly along the edge of the ridge, taking care to stay out of sight of the men at the circled wagons below. He relayed the message to Pony, then rushed back into position, half flying, half climbing—for his small and fragile wings were getting sorely tired—into a tree even as the front-running goblins approached. With some relief, but not much surprise, Juraviel noted their helter-skelter formation, no more than a mob rushing into battle. As the three friends had hoped, the goblins did not pause as they crested the ridge, just rambled over the top and began their charge down the other side, not even taking the time to scout out the defenses of their intended prey.

And hardly noticing the misfortunes of some of their fellows, the elf realized, as a goblin tripped into one of Pony’s snares, loosing the bent sapling. The creature shrieked, but it was hardly heard above the battle cries of its companions, and was flipped head over heels and sent spinning into the air, to hang helplessly a few feet from the ground.

Several goblins ran right past their caught companion, paying it no heed, other than to laugh at its misfortune.

To the other side another goblin shrieked in startlement and sudden pain as it plunged into one of the small, nasty trenches Pony had quickly dug and disguised. The creature’s leg straightened violently, then bent too far forward, snapping the bone right below the kneecap. The goblin fell back, clutching its throbbing leg and howling, but again its comrades had no time for it.

And then a third went down, roaring in agony, its foot punctured by a carefully concealed spike.

Taking confidence in the goblins’ inattentiveness, Juraviel took up his small bow and started picking out his shots. One unfortunate goblin stopped right at the base of the elf’s tree, leaning on the trunk as it caught its breath. Juraviel’s arrow plowed right into the top of its skull, stunning it, then dropping it to its knees, one hand still braced against the tree trunk. It died in that position.

For all the effort, though, only one in twenty of the goblins had been thus slowed, and the leading runners continued to charge down the grassy slope. Juraviel got another shot, hamstringing a goblin as it broke clear of the tree line, and then he looked out to the west, a bit farther down the hill, to the pair of trees where Nightbird prepared the largest surprise of all.

The ranger was down on one knee, behind the shield of trees, bow leveled horizontally between the trunks. He let the lead goblins get past the trap, trying to hit the main group. In addition to causing the most damage, this would bring the goblins in at the merchants in an even more scattered manner, a few at a time, he hoped.

A dozen goblins came through the trees at the same time, a dozen more right behind them.

Nightbird let fly, but his shot, true to the mark, was intercepted at the last moment by an unsuspecting goblin, the creature taking it in the side. Undaunted, even anticipating that something like that might happen, Nightbird had the second arrow away immediately, this one slipping through the press to drive hard into the prepared trunk.

At that same moment, the ranger gave a whistle to his trusted horse and Symphony lurched forward, pulling the rope taut.

The dead tree gave a series of tremendous cracking noises in protest, and many goblins froze in place, suddenly afraid.

And then it came sweeping down amongst them, tons of wood, dozens of long and wide sharp-ended branches.

Goblins dove left and right, screamed and scrambled, but the ranger’s timing had been perfect. Three were killed outright, and many more, a dozen and four, were seriously gashed by splintering pieces, or slammed hard to the ground, or trapped under grabbing branches. About a quarter of the goblins had already gone beyond the area of the trap, and they kept up their run for the wagons. Of those caught in or behind the fallen tree, most simply scrambled on over the newest obstacle, too hungry for human blood to even consider the possibility that this might be an ambush, while others, confused and wary, milled about or searched for cover. That confusion, that breaking of any cohesive ranks, was exactly the outcome Nightbird had hoped for.

Not about to miss the opportunity, the ranger took up Hawkwing again, driving an arrow into a goblin that had wandered a bit too close, and then firing again, taking out a goblin as it tried to extract itself from the prickly branches.

Up the hill, Symphony tugged and pulled, breaking free the piece of the tree that was bound by the rope. One goblin moved near the heavy brush that concealed the great stallion, inspecting the commotion, but Nightbird promptly shot it down.

Symphony broke free of the copse, several goblins spotting him and giving a howl. Down the hill Symphony pounded, rushing to the ranger.

Nightbird, Tempest in hand, ran out to meet the horse, reaching around and cutting the rope with a single swipe of the magical blade. He pulled himself into the saddle, laying Tempest across his lap and readying Hawkwing yet again, fitting an arrow as he settled into his seat.

And how those closest goblins scrambled when they saw that bow come up their way!

Nightbird blew one down, and with a roar of defiance, he kicked Symphony into a short burst that brought them right into the open, the ranger letting fly another arrow—and scoring another hit—as they went.

The closest goblins skidded to an abrupt halt, some of them hurling spears, but Nightbird was too quick for that, spinning Hawkwing in his hands, then swiping it about like a club, parrying the missiles harmlessly aside.

Up came the bow in a quick circuit, left hand gripping it solidly in the middle as the right fitted yet another arrow. A split second later another goblin went squirming into the dirt.

On the ranger charged. He got one more shot, then set Hawkwing across the saddle horn and took up Tempest, bearing down on a group of three. He turned Symphony hard to the side at the very last second and leaped from the saddle, landing in a roll, coming up in a short run and using the sheer momentum of his charge to drive his slashing sword right through a goblin’s blocking club, and halfway through the creature’s head, as well.

A snap of his wrist sent the goblin flying away, sent Tempest in a sudden spin back over Nightbird’s hand. As the blade came around, he stabbed straight ahead, scoring his second kill, and he tore Tempest free and brought it about in time to block the downward-slicing sword of the third.

One against one, the goblin was no match for Nightbird. The ranger parried another blow, then a third, and this time he hit the goblin’s sword so hard that it went up high. Nightbird stepped forward, inside the opening, and, still using Tempest to brace the goblin’s sword above its head, he clamped his free hand about the creature’s skinny neck.

The ranger drove on, bending the goblin over backward, the tremendous muscles in his arm bulging and cording. With a grunt and a sudden, vicious burst, Nightbird snapped the creature’s neck, and dropped it dead to the ground.

More goblins were coming in about him; the ranger welcomed them.

The lead group of goblins heard the fighting but never bothered to look back, too intent on the apparently easy prey of the merchant caravan. Down the slope they ran, full speed, hooting wildly, hungrily. Arrows came out at them—one even went down—but that hardly slowed the fierce charge.

But then, suddenly, those in the lead were sprawling, flying headlong to the ground. More and more tumbled, the whole group becoming entangled and bogged down.

Off to the side, in the brush, Pony urged Greystone ahead, keeping the rope taut as goblin after goblin tripped across it. She had tied one end securely to the stump, then had strewn it across the grass to these trees, carefully noting the angle so that when the horse pulled, the rope would come up at the right height, just under a goblin’s knee. Before she tied off the other end to her mount, she had looped it under an exposed root to prevent the jerking of the tripping goblins from affecting Greystone directly. Now the powerful stallion, straining forward, kept the rope taut.

From below, the two-score archers at the caravan had more time to pick their shots, at relatively stationary targets, and their next barrage was far more effective. Even worse for the goblins, those that got back up had lost their momentum, had to begin their rush anew from a standstill barely forty yards from the bowmen.

The merchants and their guards, though not true warriors, were not fools, and several were not firing arrows, but were holding their shots for whatever goblin ventured too near. The monsters came at the wagons in random order, one or two at a time, and without the panic-inspiring confusion of a rushing mob. Thus the archers were able to focus clearly and most of their shots rang true.

Pony knew that her job here was done. She reached back with her sword and cut Greystone free, then turned the horse about, thinking at first to charge out into the midst of those goblins still pulling themselves up from the grass. But then she looked back up the hill and saw her love in the midst of yet another group. Resisting the urge to take out her magical gems, she drove her heels hard into Greystone’s flanks and the horse leaped away, thundering up the hill.

With the bulk of the goblin horde moving beyond the ridge, leaving the few dead and wounded behind, Juraviel could more freely pick his shots. At first he concentrated on those creatures battling the ranger, but as the extent of the disaster began to sink in to the goblins, several turned about and tried to flee, running back up over the hill, passing right below the elf’s position with no intention of stopping, or even slowing.

Juraviel’s bow hummed continuously, arrow after arrow stinging the frightened and fleeing monsters. He shot every goblin he could see, and had nearly emptied his quiver when one creature skidded to a stop at the base of his tree, hopping excitedly and pointing up at him.

Juraviel promptly drove an arrow into its ugly face, dropping it right beside its dead and kneeling companion. Then the elf shot two more of the creatures, who had come to see what the goblin was yelling about.

Juraviel reached back methodically for his quiver, to find that he had only one arrow remaining. With a shrug, he shot yet another, then hooked the bow over a jut in the limb, drew out his slender sword and moved lower in the tree, looking for the proper moment to strike hard.

He realized, though, that this fight was already nearing its end, for more than a score of goblins lay dead on the hill, another score were fast dying down by the merchant caravan, several had gone back over the ridge, and another substantial group were running full out down the slope, but angling to the east. The sight brought great hope to Juraviel, for these were the goblins of old, the cowardly, easily confused enemy that could not hold formation in the face of unexpected resistance. These were the goblins that, though much more numerous than the humans and elves of Corona, had never posed any organized threat of domination.

The goblins’ eagerness to get at the exposed warrior waned fast as one after another fell dead at the end of Nightbird’s glowing sword.

Fully surrounded by five, the ranger came ahead powerfully, then, seeing those before him falling back and knowing that those behind would be pressing forward, he quickly reversed his direction, spinning about with a powerful slash of his sword, knocking aside a swinging club and a stabbing spear. With the perfect balance of years of bi’nelle dasada, the ranger’s feet shuffled fast, before those goblins now behind him could come in at his back, and with these two taken by surprise with his sudden shift, he scored a solid stab in the club-wielder’s chest.

As that creature fell away, clutching its wound in a futile attempt to hold in its spouting lifeblood, its companion retracted its spear and let fly.

The throw was true, right for the ranger’s head, but a subtle twist and duck, and Tempest flashing up diagonally, deflected it harmlessly over his shoulder—harmless for Nightbird, that is, for the missile’s continuing flight caused those goblins behind the ranger to dodge aside frantically, slowing their progress, giving the ranger more time to press his newest attack.

The now unarmed goblin threw up its arms in a feeble defense. Tempest flashed three times repeatedly, the first slashing one arm aside, the second stabbing the other shoulder, dropping that defense, and the third going straight for the throat.

Nightbird spun about in time to defeat the charge of the remaining three, and was back in a low and balanced defensive crouch as two more replaced their fallen comrades, again surrounding the ranger, but this time seeming less eager to make the first attack.

Nightbird continued to turn about, ready to defend from every angle. Every so often he let Tempest out in a measured thrust, not to score a hit, but to entice those goblins behind the strike to come in. He thought to play on their mistakes, to let them lead and, inevitably, err, but then he came to a different understanding, a confident smile, so unsettling to the goblins, widening on his face.

They understood his contentment a moment later when Greystone thundered into their midst, plowing them aside, Pony’s slashing sword chopping one and then another to the ground. At first the woman moved to rush right beside her love, even freeing up her hand so she could reach down and help him onto the horse behind her.

But the ranger was motioning for her to come down and join in the fun.

Pony threw her leg over the saddle, quickly reversing her feet so her closest foot was in the lone stirrup. She waited for two more goblins to dive aside in the face of Greystone’s mighty charge, then she leaped free, slapping the horse to continue its run, and hitting the ground in a fierce charge.

One goblin stood between her and Nightbird, its sword out straight.

Pony’s rush was too fast. She went down low and came up hard, her sword lifting the goblin’s blade up high, sending it, along with a couple of goblin fingers, flying away. She continued her run, right beside the creature, turning the angle of her blade so it drove right through the goblin’s chest as she passed.

The goblin squealed and got yanked about, Pony tearing the sword free, leading her charge with her bloody blade slashing wildly.

Nightbird had not been idle, moving with a ferocity that stunned his enemies, opening the way and positioning himself so Pony could get in to join him. In the span of a few seconds the lovers were standing back-to-back.

“I thought you would stay low on the hill to check on the merchants,” Nightbird said, seeming not too pleased that Pony was with him in this dangerous situation.

“And I thought it was past time that I tried out this sword-dance you have been teaching me,” she casually replied.

“Do you have the stones ready?”

“We will not need them.”

The determination in her voice bolstered the ranger, even brought a smile to his face.

The goblins circled, trying to get a measure of these two. Their many dead companions lying about them vividly reminded them of the consequences of any foolhardy attacks. Still, they outnumbered Pony and Nightbird by more than five to one.

One creature hooted and rushed ahead, launching a spear at Pony. Up flashed her sword, at the last moment, deflecting the weapon high, over her shoulder, and taking most of its momentum. Pony hadn’t cried out at all, but she didn’t have to, for Nightbird, feeling her muscles against his back, recognized the movement as clearly as if he had made it. He half turned as the spear rebounded over Pony’s shoulder, and a quick snap of his hand snared it. In the same fluid movement, the ranger brought the goblin spear past him and heaved it hard right into the chest of another goblin that had ventured too close.

“How did you do that?” Pony asked, though she had never even glanced back to see the movement.

Nightbird only shook his head, and Pony sensed it and went quiet, as well, the two of them settling more comfortably into their defensive stance. They felt an amazing symbiosis growing between them, as though they were communicating through their very muscles as clearly as if using open speech. Pony anticipated every twitch, every bend, of Nightbird’s stance.

The ranger felt it, too, and was surely amazed by the intimacy. Despite his logical fears, Elbryan knew enough to trust in this strange extension of bi’nelle dasada. He did pause and wonder if the elves even knew that the sword-dance could be taken to this extreme. But his musing lasted only an instant, for the goblins were getting edgy, some skittering closer, another readying a spear as if to throw it—though the goblins across the way, having witnessed the first disastrous attempt, weren’t pleased by that prospect.

Pony understood that Nightbird wanted her to go out to the left. A quick glance that way told her the reason: a particularly bold goblin needed to learn a swift and painful lesson. She look a deep breath, eliminating all doubts from her thoughts, for she knew that doubt would bring hesitation, and hesitation would bring disaster. This was the real meaning of their morning ritual, she realized, a dance as intimate as lovemaking, and now was the real test of their trust. Her love wanted her to go out to the left.

Nightbird felt the tension in her back, then the sudden lunge, and as she moved, he moved, rolling around, off her back foot, a complete pivot that took the two goblins rushing in at the apparent opening completely by surprise. The closest goblin was prodding out at Pony with its spear when Tempest slashed down, taking both its arms at the elbows.

The second goblin at least managed to get its club in the way, though the ranger merely slapped the blocking weapon aside and stabbed the creature hard in the belly.

Now Pony was moving, rolling over Nightbird’s trailing foot, as he had gone over hers. And again, those goblins coming in at the apparent opening Nightbird’s movement had caused were caught by surprise, and by Pony’s slashing sword. One fell to the ground, grasping at its torn throat, while two others leaped into a short and hasty retreat.

And Pony and Nightbird were back-to-back again, crouched, in perfect defense and perfect harmony.

From the tree line, Belli’mar Juraviel watched in satisfaction as Symphony ushered the riderless Greystone to safety. Many times the elf had witnessed the intelligence of Symphony, but every time, as now, he was thrilled and awed by the display.

Even more awesome was the spectacle that Juraviel witnessed when he glanced back down to his human companions and saw the harmony of their movements, Pony and Nightbird complementing each other with absolute perfection. To the Touel’alfar, bi’nelle dasada was a personal dance, a private meditation of a warrior, but now, watching this, Juraviel soon understood why Nightbird had taught it to Pony, and why they danced together.

Indeed, at that moment on the grassy slope—a slope fast turning red with spilled goblin blood—Pony and Nightbird were as one, a single warrior.

Juraviel realized that his bow should not be idle, that he should be helping out his friends. They hardly seemed to need it, though, playing off each other’s movements so fluidly that the goblin circle was widening, not closing, and was thinning, the creatures giving more and more ground.

Juraviel did finally blink away his awe long enough to retrieve a single arrow, and his shot took a goblin in the back of the neck, just under the skull.

The line around Nightbird and Pony thinned considerably, with more goblins turning and running away than falling to the pair’s harmonious dance. Pony scored a kill, and the ranger cut down a goblin stupidly going for her back again as she turned, but then it all seemed to come to a standstill, with no monsters venturing near enough for any attacks.

Nightbird sensed the mounting fear and tension, saw the goblins looking as much behind them now as ahead. They wanted to break and run off, every one, and the battle was about to enter its most critical stage. He started to explain as much to Pony, but she cut him short before he had hardly begun, saying simply, “I know.”

And she did know, Nightbird recognized, from the subtle movements of her muscles as she dug herself in, finding balance and positioning her legs for a fast shift.

The spears came in at them in no coordinated fashion; the first goblin let fly, turned and fled, and a shower of missiles followed, the creatures using the barrage to cover their flight.

Nightbird and Pony spun and dove, came up with swords slashing, deflecting and dodging. There was no pause on the part of the ranger or his companion as they came through the volley unscathed, each rushing out at the closest goblins, cutting them down and running on to the next in line. No longer did the two work in concert, but neither did any of the goblins, so every fight became an individual contest, Pony worked her sword marvelously, weaving circles about her opponent until she found an opening, and then striking true, a measured thrust, her second or third hit usually finishing the task.

Nightbird, stronger and more skilled, was less finesse and more sheer power. As goblins raised their weapons to block, he merely smashed through the defense, and usually through the goblin in the same deadly strike. He darted back and forth, rushed ahead and turned completely about, whatever was needed to bring him to his next kill. The goblins should have calmed and organized a coordinated resistance, but they were stupid creatures, and frightened.

They died quickly.

Those few who managed to get up the hill to the tree line ahead of the ranger found yet another foe, a lithe little creature, hardly as tall as a goblin, wielding a sword so slender that it seemed more fitted to a dinner table than a battleground.

The leading goblin swerved to meet this newest foe, thinking it to be a human child, thinking to score a quick kill.

Juraviel’s sword smacked against the tip of the goblin’s blade, once, and then three more times, so rapidly that the creature had no time to react. And each time, the elf inched ahead, so that when the fourth parry rang out, Juraviel was only a foot from the surprised goblin.

The elf’s sword flashed again in rapid succession, once, twice, thrice, driving three holes into the goblin’s chest.

Out charged Juraviel, meeting the next, this one unarmed, having thrown its spear at the ranger. The goblin held up its hands.

Belli’mar Juraviel of the Touel’alfar had no mercy for goblins.

The rout on the slope ended at about the same time as the rout at the wagons. The lead group of goblins, the ones Pony had tripped up, fell dead to the last without ever getting into the ring.

There remained one more substantial group, though, running down the road to the east, out of the dale.

Pony spotted Juraviel first, sitting calmly on a low branch up the hill, wiping the blood off his sword with a rag of goblin clothing.

“I counted four who passed beyond me,” he called down to his friends. “Taking full flight down the back side of the ridge.”

Nightbird whistled, but Symphony was moving to him before he made a sound.

“Are none to get away to carry on the legend of the Nightbird?” Pony teased him as he reached for the saddle. In the northland war, Nightbird had often let one or two monsters run away, to whisper his name in fear.

“These goblins will only cause more mischief,” the ranger explained, swinging himself up. “There are too many innocents around whom they might harm.”

Pony looked at him quizzically, then to Greystone, wondering if she should join him.

“Keep watch on the merchants,” the ranger explained. “They will likely need your talents at healing.”

“If I see one close to death, I will use the soul stone,” Pony explained.

The ranger conceded the point.

“And what of them?” Pony asked, pointing to the band fleeing to the east. There had to be at least a score of the creatures, maybe thirty or more.

The ranger considered their course and gave a chuckle. “It would seem that the monks may yet be involved,” he said. “If not, we will hunt that band down when we are finished here. Our road is east anyway.”

He was off before Pony even nodded her assent, thundering Symphony up the ridge and down the back side, preparing Hawkwing as he went. He spotted the first of the goblins running through the grass and closed the distance quickly, meaning to go right past the creature and use his sword. Then he caught sight of the second, running in a completely different direction; the group had scattered.

No time for Tempest, the ranger decided, and up came his bow.

Only three remained.

CHAPTER 29

Hungry for Battle

“If we join in prayer, a single stroke of God’s lightning hand will destroy them all,” offered one young monk, who had also been on the expedition to Aida, including the battle outside the Alpinadoran village.

Master De’Unnero’s sharp eyes narrowed as he considered the monk and the assenting nods of those nearby, men who had heard the tale of the great victory in the northland, the tale of sparking fingers reaching down from the line of monks to utterly vanquish their enemies.

There was something else inspiring them, too, De’Unnero recognized. Fear. They wanted a clean and quick blow against the approaching goblin force because they were afraid of engaging these relatively unknown creatures in melee. The would-be abbot strode powerfully up to the speaker, his gaze setting the man back on his heels, draining the blood from his face. “Master Jojonah alone will use the magic,” he snapped, his head jerking side to side so that all could see his expression, so that none would dare question him. “He is too old and infirm to fight.”

Looking at the wretched man, Jojonah had an almost irresistible urge to rush over and prove him wrong.

“As for the rest of us,” De’Unnero went on, barking the words, “let us consider this an exercise of valuable training. We may yet see battle in our new home in Palmaris.”

“This ‘training’ could be deadly,” Master Jojonah piped in, and the measure of calm in his quiet voice only added to the sarcasm.

“All the more valuable, then,” De’Unnero said without hesitation, and when he saw Jojonah shaking his head, he stormed over to stand before him, crossing his strong arms defiantly over his chiseled chest.

Not now, Master Jojonah reminded himself quietly, not wanting to embarrass the man, for that would only make De’Unnero dig in all the more. “I beg of you to be done with this approaching band efficiently and cleanly,” he said. “Let us blast them away, a single, combined stroke of lightning, and go see to whoever is beyond that rise.” He pointed behind De’Unnero as he finished, to the plume of black smoke still drifting lazily into the air.

In response, De’Unnero handed him a piece of graphite, a single stone. “Use it well, brother,” he said. “But not too well, for I wish to have my new attendants properly trained in the pleasures of battle.”

“Pleasures of battle?” Jojonah echoed, but under his breath, as De’Unnero spun away, calling to the brothers to ready their crossbows. The old master could only shake his head in disbelief. He rubbed the graphite about his palm, thinking to hit the goblin troupe hard and fast, to kill them or scatter them, that few, if any, of the younger monks would see any real battle. His rubbing became more urgent when the forward scout signaled back that the goblins were approaching, for Jojonah could not feel the power of the stone.

The master fell within himself, seeking that special place of magic—in his mind, that special place of God. He dismissed thoughts of De’Unnero, believing that such negativity might be having an adverse effect. And he rubbed the graphite about his fingers, felt its every groove.

But not its magic. Jojonah opened his eyes to find he was alone in the road. Near panic, he glanced around, and then relaxed somewhat, seeing that De’Unnero had positioned the others in the brush to the side. The lead goblins were in sight now, running hard around a bend in the road. Jojonah looked down at the graphite, incredulous, feeling betrayed.

The goblins came on, their rush changing from one of retreat to a hungry charge.

Jojonah lifted his arm and closed his eyes, calling to the stone.

Nothing, no lightning, came forth, not even a sparkle, and the goblins were closer now. Jojonah tried again, but found no source of magic within that graphite. Then he understood the truth of it, that this stone was not enchanted, was just an ordinary rock. Fear gripped Jojonah; he thought that De’Unnero had set him up to die, here on the road. He was an old man and had no weapon, and could not possibly do battle! He gave a cry and turned about, hobbling as fast as his thick legs would take him.

He heard the goblins howling, closing. He expected a spear to take him in the back at any moment.

But then De’Unnero and the brothers struck hard at the goblin mob, monks leaping up from the brush at the sides of the road, firing heavy crossbows designed to take down powries, or even giants, point-blank. Thick bolts tore through goblin flesh, blasting holes in the diminutive creatures, and sometimes even in goblins behind the first victim. The goblin mob was leaping, spinning, falling, and the goblin cries of attack turned fast to screams of surprise and agony.

Jojonah dared to slow and glance back, to see that half the goblins were already down, some squirming, others dead, and that Master De’Unnero had leaped out onto the road in the midst of the rest. De’Unnero was a perfect killing machine now, leaping and twisting. Out snapped his extended fingers, hand rigid, driving through a goblin throat. He turned as another tried to club him on the head. Up came De’Unnero’s arms in a stiff cross above his head, catching the downswing between his forearms. Thrusting the arms out wide, he tore the club from the startled goblin’s grasp, caught it while it spun about, then snapped it hard across the creature’s face, and then again, even more forcefully, with a powerful backhand.

De’Unnero kept running, using the club to knock aside a spear thrust, then around again to smash the first goblin a third time—though it was already nearly unconscious on its feet—laying it out in the dirt.

Around he came, launching the club at the spear-wielder, then following the weapon’s flight with a quick rush, moving inside the tip of the spear and pushing it aside, while his free hand rained heavy blows about the creature’s face and throat.

Other monks were on the road now, overwhelming the goblins, breaking them apart. A few monsters scampered out to the side, whining, but De’Unnero had left several of his warriors in place, and they had their powerful crossbows ready by that time.

And then, with the goblin horde already falling apart, came perhaps the worst blow of all, as brutal De’Unnero fell into his signature gemstone, the tiger’s paw, as his arms, already deadly, transformed into the mighty limbs of a tiger and began raking apart those nearest goblins.

It was over before Master Jojonah could even get back to his companions.

When he did return, huffing and puffing, he found De’Unnero in an excited, almost frantic state, the man rushing all about the line of young monks, clapping them hard on the back, verily snarling at their great victory.

Only a few monks were down, and the worst injured of the group had been hit by a crossbow quarrel from across the road, the firing monk not taking care with the angle of his shot. Several goblins on the road were still alive, but in no condition to continue any fight, and several more had escaped, running fast across the fields to the sides of the road.

De’Unnero seemed not to care. The man even found a wide smile for Jojonah.

“It could not have been quicker even with the use of magic,” the would-be abbot said.

“Something you obviously never intended, other than your personal stone,” Jojonah replied sharply, tossing back the useless stone. “I do not like being a pawn, Master De’Unnero,” Jojonah went on.

De’Unnero glanced around at the young monks, and Jojonah did not miss the sly grin on his face. “You played a necessary role,” De’Unnero argued, not bothering to scold the man for referring to him as merely a master.

“With a true gemstone, I could have been more useful.”

“Not so,” said De’Unnero. “Your lightning stroke may have killed a few, but the rest would have scattered, making our task all the more difficult.”

“Several did get away,” Jojonah reminded him.

De’Unnero waved the thought away. “Not enough to cause any real mischief.”

“So you needed me frightened and running.”

“To lure them in,” De’Unnero replied.

“Me? A master of St.-Mere-Abelle?” Jojonah pressed, for he understood the more subtle reasoning of Marcalo De’Unnero. The man had humiliated him in front of the younger monks, thus securing his own standing among them; while Jojonah had run like a frightened child, De’Unnero had leaped into the midst of the enemy and personally killed at least a handful.

“Forgive me, my brother,” De’Unnero said insincerely. “You are the only one appearing infirm enough to so lure the goblins. The whole troupe of them might have fled from a younger, sturdier man, like myself.”

Jojonah went quiet, staring hard at this man, his nemesis. Such an action, such a deception upon an Abellican master, could be brought before higher authorities, with the likely result that De’Unnero would be severely punished for his presumption and for so embarrassing him. But to what higher authorities might he appeal? Master Jojonah wondered. To Father Abbot Markwart? Hardly.

De’Unnero had won this day, Jojonah accepted, but he also determined then and there that this personal fight would be a long, long battle.

“The hematite, if you please,” he said to De’Unnero. “We have wounded in need of assistance.”

De’Unnero glanced around, seemed less than impressed by the severity of any wounds, then tossed the stone to Jojonah. “Again you prove that you have some value,” he said.

Jojonah just turned away.

“You taught her,” Juraviel, sitting in a tree, stated accusingly when Elbryan came back to the ridge, his hunting successfully completed.

The ranger didn’t have to ask what the elf was talking about, for he knew that Juraviel had watched his dance with Pony, and that no two humans could ever find that level of grace and harmony without bi’nelle dasada. Without retort, Elbryan ignored the accusation. He looked down to the circled wagons, to see Pony moving among the merchants, helping out.

Juraviel gave a great sigh and rested back against the trunk. “You cannot even admit it?” he asked.

Now the ranger did snap a glare over the elf. “Admit it?” he echoed incredulously. “You speak as though it was a crime.”

“And is it not?”

“Is she not worthy?” Elbryan shot right back, waving his arm out toward the wagons and Pony.

That somewhat deflated the elf’s anger, but still he pressed on. “And is Elbryan to be the judge of who is worthy and who is not?” he argued. “Is Elbryan, then, to become the instructor in place of the Touel’alfar, who perfected bi’nelle dasada when the world itself was young?”

“No,” the ranger said grimly. “Not Elbryan, but Nightbird.”

“You presume much,” said Juraviel.

“You gave me the title.”

“We gave you your life and more,” the elf retorted. “Take care that you do not abuse the gifts, Nightbird. Lady Dasslerond would never suffer such an insult.”

“Insult?” the ranger echoed, as though the whole notion was ridiculous. “Consider the situation that I, that we, were put in. Pony and I had just destroyed the dactyl, and now had to fight our way through hordes of monsters, and that just to reach Dundalis. And so, yes, I shared my gift with her, for both our sakes, as she shared the gift that Avelyn had given to her, for both our sakes.”

“She taught you to use the stones,” Juraviel reasoned.

“I am nowhere near her level of power with them,” the ranger admitted.

“Nor is she near to your fighting prowess,” said the elf.

Elbryan was about to offer a stinging retort, for he wouldn’t suffer such an insult to Pony, especially one so obviously ridiculous, but Juraviel kept on talking.

“And yet, a human who can move with such grace, who can complement one trained by the Touel’alfar so very beautifully, is a rare find indeed,” the elf went on. “Jilseponie dances as though she had spent years in Caer’alfar.”

That brought a smile to Elbryan’s face. “She was trained by the master,” he said with a grin.

Juraviel didn’t even challenge the joking boast. “You did well,” the elf decided. “And yes, Jilseponie is worthy of the dance, as worthy as any human has ever been.”

Satisfied with that, the ranger looked down the dale and out to the east. “A large group went out that way,” he remarked.

“Likely they ran right into the approaching monks.”

“Unless the monks chose to hide and let the goblins pass,” Elbryan said.

Juraviel understood his cue. “Go to your companion and see to the merchants,” he offered. “I will scout to the east and find out what has become of our goblin friends.”

The ranger walked Symphony down the slope to the wagons. One frightened man raised a weapon as if to fend the newcomer away, but another nearby boxed him on the ear.

“Ye fool!” the second man said. “He’s just saved yer stinking life. Killed half the goblins by himself!”

The other man dropped his weapon to the ground and began dipping a series of ridiculous bows. Elbryan only smiled and walked Symphony past, right into the ring. He spotted Pony at once and slipped down from the horse, handing the reins to a young woman, barely more than a girl, who rushed over to help him.

“They have many sorely wounded,” Pony explained, and indeed at the time she was tending to one man who it seemed would not survive. “From the earlier fight, not the last one.”

Elbryan looked up, turning his nervous gaze to the east. “The monks are not far, I fear,” he said quietly. When he looked back down, he found Pony staring up at him, chewing her thick upper lip, her blue eyes wide, questioning. He knew what she meant to do, whether he argued against it or not, and realized she was only waiting for him to explain where he stood on the issue.

“Be quiet with the soul stone,” he bade her. “Wrap the wound as though you were tending it more conventionally. And use the gem only—” He stopped, seeing the transformation in Pony’s expression. She had wanted his opinion, out of respect, but she did not need his commandments. The ranger went silent then, nodding to show that he trusted her judgment.

He watched as she drew out the gray stone from her pouch, clutching it close and bending over the man. Elbryan, too, went down low, taking a bandage and beginning to wrap it about the man’s wound, a slash in the right side of his chest, through the ribs and quite deep, perhaps even through a lung. The ranger wrapped the wound, and tightly—he didn’t want to bring the man any more pain, but he needed him to cry out a bit to cover Pony’s secret work.

The man gasped, Elbryan offered words of comfort, and then, in mere seconds, the man relaxed, looking up at the ranger quizzically. “How?” he asked breathlessly.

“Your wound was not nearly as bad as it looked,” Elbryan lied. “The blade did not get past your rib bone.”

The man’s look was doubtful, but he let it go at that, just relieved that the pain was gone now, or nearly so, and that his breath was coming to him easily once more.

Elbryan and Pony made their way about the camp then, searching out any too injured for conventional methods. They found only one more, an older woman who had been hit in the head, whose eyes stared vacantly across the way, drool running freely from her mouth.

“Senseless,” a man attending her said. “I seen it before. The goblin club breaked her head. She’ll die tonight, in her sleep.”

Pony bent low, examining the wound. “Not so,” she replied. “Not if she’s properly wrapped.”

“What?” the man asked skeptically, but fell silent as Elbryan and Pony went to work, the ranger putting bandages about the old woman’s head, while Pony, the soul stone tucked under one palm, put her hands near the wound as if to hold the head together while it was being wrapped.

Pony closed her eyes and fell into the stone, sent the healing magic through her fingers. She felt stings of pain, the tenderness and swelling, but she had tended far worse in the battles of the northland.

She came out of her trance a moment later, the wound reduced so as to not be life-threatening, to the cries of “Approach! From the east!”

“Goblins!” one frightened merchant yelled.

“No!” another cried. “Brothers! St.-Mere-Abelle has come to our aid!”

Elbryan cast a nervous glance at Pony, who quickly pocketed the gemstone.

“I don’t know how ye did it, but ye suren saved Timmy’s life,” said a woman, rushing up behind Elbryan. Both Elbryan and Pony followed her gaze across the way, to the man with the chest wound, who was standing now and talking easily, even managing a laugh.

“It was not so bad,” Pony offered.

“It was to the lung,” the woman insisted. “Checked it meself, and thought he’d be dead afore the dinner bell.”

“You were nervous and shaken,” Pony offered. “And rushed, for you knew that the goblins were coming back.”

The woman’s face brightened with a disarming grin. She was older than the two, perhaps in her mid-thirties, with the worn but pleasant demeanor of an honest worker who had known a hard but satisfying life. She glanced by the pair, to the wounded old woman sitting on the ground, her eyes already showing signs of life once more.

“Not so shaken,” she said softly. “I seen much in the battles these last weeks, and lost a son, though me other five children are safe, God be praised. They only asked me along on the caravan to Amvoy because of me reputation for putting broken people back together.”

The ranger and Pony exchanged a serious look, something the woman didn’t miss.

“I’m not knowing what ye’re hiding,” she said quietly. “But I’m not for talking. I seen ye up on the hill, fighting for us, though ye know not a one in the group, from what I’m hearing. I’ll not betray ye.” She finished with a wink and turned away to join the commotion as the procession of monks approached along the eastern road.

“Where is our son?” Pony asked Elbryan with a smirk

The ranger looked around, though of course Juraviel was nowhere in sight. “Probably behind the monks,” he answered dryly. “Or under one of their robes.”

Pony, nervous that her use of the stones might have drawn these brothers in and that the quest might soon be over, appreciated the levity. She hooked her arm inside her lover’s and led him toward the gathering.

“I am Abbot De’Unnero, departing St.-Mere-Abelle for St. Precious,” they heard the lead monk, a man full of so much energy that his eyes verily glowed. “Who is the leader here?” Before anyone could answer, De’Unnero’s discerning eye settled on the pair, Elbryan and Pony. Their stride and the weapons they carried distinguished them.

The would-be abbot walked up to them, looking hard.

“We are as new to the group as are you, good friar,” the ranger said humbly.

“And you happened upon them by mere chance?” De’Unnero asked suspiciously.

“We saw the smoke rising, as you must have in the east,” Pony answered, her tone sharp and showing clearly that she was not intimidated. “And being folk of goodly heart, we rushed to see if we might help. When we arrived, the second fight was brewing, so we made it our own.”

De’Unnero’s dark eyes flashed, and it seemed to both Elbryan and Pony that he wanted to strike out at her for the implied accusation. She had, for all intents and purposes, just asked the monk why he and his fellows had not hustled to join in.

“Nesk Reaches,” came a call from a heavy man in bright clothing, the same man Pony had spoken with when she had first approached the caravan before the fight. The merchant hustled forward; extending his left hand, for his right was bandaged. “Nesk Reaches of Dillaman Township,” he said, “ ’tis my caravan, and glad we are to see you.”

De’Unnero ignored the man’s offered hand, his sharp gaze still scrutinizing Elbryan and Pony.

“Master De’Unnero,” a portly old friar interrupted, moving forward to stand beside the forceful man. “They have wounded. Pray give me the soul stone that I might tend them.”

Elbryan and Pony didn’t miss the flash of outrage crossing De’Unnero’s angular face, the man obviously not pleased that this other monk had so openly offered help, and magical help at that. Still, he had been put on the spot, in front of all the merchants and all his own procession, and so De’Unnero reached into his pouch and produced a hematite, handing it over.

“Abbot De’Unnero,” he corrected.

The portly monk bowed and walked past him, offering a glance and a smile at Elbryan and Pony as he moved into the group.

Predictably to Pony, for she had already made an accurate assessment of the man, Nesk Reaches started for the portly friar, holding up his slightly injured hand, playing the wound for all it was worth.

De’Unnero wouldn’t let the merchant leader go that easily, though. The monk grabbed Reaches roughly by the shoulder and turned him about. “You admit that this is your caravan?” he asked.

The merchant humbly nodded.

“What fool are you to be bringing people out in this danger?” De’Unnero scolded. “Monsters are thick in the region, and are hungry and hunting. The warning has been given across the land, yet here you are, out alone and hardly guarded.”

“Please, good friar,” Nesk Reaches stammered. “We were in need of provisions. We had little choice.”

“In need of good profits, more likely,” De’Unnero snapped. “Thinking to turn a few pieces of gold at a time when few caravans are running and goods are more valuable.”

Grumbles from the crowd told Elbryan and Pony, and De’Unnero, that the reasoning was sound.

De’Unnero let Nesk Reaches go then, and called out to the portly monk. “Be quick about it! We have been delayed too long already.” To Reaches, he added, “Where are you headed?”

“Amvoy,” the thoroughly intimidated merchant stammered.

“I will soon be sanctified as abbot of St. Precious,” De’Unnero explained loudly.

“St. Precious?” Nesk Reaches echoed. “But Abbot Dobrinion —”

“Abbot Dobrinion is dead,” De’Unnero callously stated. “And I will replace him. And, merchant Reaches, I expect that you and your caravan, owing a debt to me, will attend the ceremony. In fact, I insist upon it. And I remind you that you would be wise to be generous in your offerings.”

He turned away then to his procession, motioning the monks out of the wagon circle. “Be quick,” he called to Master Jojonah, spinning about. “I’ll not waste our entire day at this business.”

Elbryan used the distraction to slip away to the horses, remembering that Symphony carried a gemstone in his breast which might be quite significant and telling to monks of St.-Mere-Abelle.

Pony, meanwhile, kept her eyes on the portly monk tenderly attending the many wounded. When De’Unnero’s group was safely away, she went up to the man, offering to help with conventional healing, tearing bandages and the like.

The monk looked at her sword, at the blood spattered on her pants and boots. “Perhaps you should rest,” he said. “You and your companion have done quite enough this day, from what I have heard.”

“I am not tired,” Pony said with a smile, taking as much of an initial liking to this man as she had a disliking to the other, De’Unnero. She couldn’t help but measure that man against Abbot Dobrinion, whom he would apparently replace, and the contrast sent a shudder along her spine. This monk, though, so sincerely at work to relieve the suffering, seemed more like the former abbot of St. Precious, whom Pony had met on a couple of occasions. She bent low and held the hand of the man the friar was attending, applying pressure in just the right spot to slow the bleeding of his torn hand.

She noticed then that the monk was not looking at her, or at the wounded man, but had settled his gaze on Elbryan and the horses.

“What is your name?” he asked Pony, his eyes drifting to study her.

“Carralee,” Pony lied, using the name of her infant cousin who had been killed in the first goblin raid on Dundalis.

“I am Master Jojonah,” the monk replied. “Well met, I would say, and fortunate for these poor folk that we—particularly you and your companion—came along when we did!”

Pony hardly heard the last few words. She stared hard at the portly man. Jojonah. She knew that name, the name of the one master of whom Avelyn had spoken fondly, the one man at St.-Mere-Abelle, Avelyn had believed, who had understood him. Avelyn hadn’t talked much with Pony about his colleagues during his days at the abbey, but he made it a point one night after too many “potions of courage,” as Avelyn called his liquor, to tell her about Jojonah. That fact alone relayed to the woman just how dear this old man had been to Avelyn.

“Your work is truly amazing, Father,” she remarked as Master Jojonah put a soul stone to use on the injured man. In truth, Pony soon realized that she was more powerful with the gemstones than this master of the abbey, a fact that pointedly reminded her of just how powerful Avelyn Desbris had been.

“It is a minor thing,” Master Jojonah replied when the man’s gash was mended.

“Not minor to me,” the man said, and gave a laugh that sounded more like a cough.

“But what a good man you are to do such work,” Pony said enthusiastically. She was acting purely on instinct now, following her heart, though her thoughts were screaming at her to be cautious and shut up. She gave one nervous glance around, to make sure that no other monks had wandered back into the wagon circle, then continued quietly, “I once met another of your Church—St.-Mere-Abelle, is it not?”

“Indeed it is,” Master Jojonah replied absently, looking around for any others who might need his healing talents.

“A good man was he,” Pony continued. “Oh, such a good man.”

Master Jojonah smiled politely, but started to walk off.

“His name was Aberly, I believe,” Pony said.

The monk stopped abruptly and turned on her, his expression shifting from polite tolerance to sincere intrigue.

“No, Avenbrook,” Pony bluffed. “Oh, I cannot remember his name quite right, I fear. It was years ago, you see. And though I cannot remember the name, I’ll never forget the monk. I came upon him when he was helping a poor street beggar in Palmaris, much as you just helped that man. And when the poor man offered to pay him, fishing a few coins out of his raggedy pocket, Aberly, or Avenbrook, or whatever his name might have been, accepted graciously, but then arranged for the coins, along with more than a few of his own, to be returned to the poor man inconspicuously.”

“Indeed,” Jojonah muttered, nodding his head with her every word.

“I asked him why he did that—with the coins, I mean,” Pony went on. “He could have just refused them, after all. He told me that it was just as important to protect the poor man’s sense of pride as his health.” She finished with a broad smile. The story was true, though it had happened in a tiny village far to the south and not in Palmaris.

“Are you sure you cannot remember the brother’s name?” Jojonah prompted.

“Aberly, Aberlyn, something like that,” Pony replied, shaking her head.

“Avelyn?” Jojonah asked.

“That might be it, Father,” Pony replied, still trying not to give too much away. She was encouraged, though, by the warm expression on Master Jojonah’s face.

“I said be quick!” came a shout from outside the wagon circle, the harsh bark of St. Precious’ new abbot.

“Avelyn,” Master Jojonah said again to Pony. “It was Avelyn. Never forget that name.” He patted her shoulder as he walked past.

Pony watched him go, and for some reason that she had not yet discerned; she felt a bit better about the world. She moved to Elbryan then, the ranger still standing right against Symphony, hiding the telltale turquoise.

“May we leave now?” he asked her impatiently.

Pony nodded and climbed up on Greystone, and with a wave to the merchant entourage, the pair trotted their mounts out of the wagon circle, going back to the south, up the slope and away from the monks, who were back on the road, heading to the west. Just over the ridge, Elbryan and Pony met up with Juraviel again, and they were quickly heading east, putting as much ground between themselves and the monks as possible.

De’Unnero began scolding Master Jojonah as soon as the older man rejoined the monk procession. His tirade went on and on, long after the group exited the valley.

Jojonah tuned it out almost immediately, his thoughts still with the woman who had helped tend the wounded. He felt warm inside, calm and hopeful that Avelyn’s message had indeed been heard. The woman’s tale had touched him deeply, had reinforced his positive feelings toward Avelyn, had reminded him once again of all that was—or all that could be—right with his Church.

His smile as he pondered the tale only infuriated De’Unnero even more, of course, but Jojonah could hardly have cared less. At least in this tirade—on the edge of insanity, it seemed—De’Unnero was showing his temperament honestly to the younger, impressionable monks. They might be in awe of the man’s fighting prowess—even Jojonah was amazed by that—but his verbal lashing of an old, impassive man would likely sour more than a few stomachs.

Finally realizing that Jojonah’s serenity was too entrenched to be shaken, the volatile master backed off and the procession went on its way, with Master Jojonah falling into position at the end of the line absently, trying to conjure images of Brother Avelyn’s work with the poor and sick. He thought of the woman again, and was glad, but as he pondered her tale, as he considered her and her companion’s obviously mighty role in the battle, his contentment fast shifted to curiosity. It made little sense to him that a man and a woman, obviously powerful warriors, would be making their way to the east from Palmaris—and not in position as guard of one of the few, precious caravans that were trying to get through. Most heroes, after all, were making their name and reputation in the north, where the battle lines were more obvious. It occurred to Master Jojonah that this situation needed more investigating.

“The stone!” Abbot De’Unnero snapped at him from the front of the procession.

The man was hardly paying him any heed, so Jojonah bent low and quietly gathered another stone of similar size, then dropped it into the pouch in place of the hematite. Then he rushed over to De’Unnero, seeming obedient, and handed the pouch over. He breathed easier when the vicious master, no lover of magic other than his signature tiger’s paw, tucked the pouch away without a look.

They marched until the sun went down, putting several miles behind them before setting camp. A single tent was propped for De’Unnero, who went inside right after his meal with parchment and ink to further plan the grand ceremony of his appointment as abbot.

Master Jojonah said little to his companions, just moved off by himself quietly and settled amidst several thick blankets. He waited until all the camp had quieted, until several of the brothers were snoring contentedly, and then he took the hematite from his pocket. With one last glance around to make sure no one was taking any notice, he fell into the stone, connecting his spirit to its magic and then using that magic to let his spirit walk free of his body.

Without the corporeal bonds of his aged and too-heavy frame, the master set out at great pace, covering the miles in mere minutes. He passed by the merchant caravan, which was still circled in the valley.

The woman and her companion were not there, and so Jojonah’s spirit did not stay, but rather drifted up high, into the air, above the hilltops. He spotted a pair of campfires, one to the north and another in the east, and by sheer luck chose to investigate the eastern glow first.

Perfectly silent and invisible, the spirit glided in. He soon saw the two horses, the great black stallion and the muscled golden palomino, and then, beyond them, huddled about the fire, the two warriors talking to a third figure he did not know. He drifted closer cautiously, giving them all due respect, moving in a circuit about the perimeter of the camp to get a better look at this third member of the band.

If he had been in his corporeal forth, Jojonah’s gasp would have been audible indeed when he saw the lithe figure, the angular features, the translucent wings!

An elf! Touel’alfar! Jojonah had seen statues and drawings of the diminutive beings at St.-Mere-Abelle, but even at the abbey the writing on the Touel’alfar was indecisive as to whether there really were such beings, or whether they were merely legend. After encountering powries and goblins and hearing the tales of fomorian giants, Jojonah was not logically surprised to learn that there really were Touel’alfar, but the sight of one still startled him profoundly. He spent a long time hovering about that camp, his gaze never leaving Juraviel while he listened to the conversation.

They were speaking of St.-Mere-Abelle, of the prisoners Markwart had taken, particularly the centaur.

“The man was proficient with the hematite,” the woman was saying.

“Could you defeat him in a battle of magics?” the strong man asked.

Jojonah had to swallow his pride when the woman nodded confidently, but any anger he might have felt washed away as soon as she explained.

“Avelyn taught me well, better than I had understood before,” she said. “The man was a master, indeed the one that Avelyn had called his mentor, the one man that Avelyn had loved at St.-Mere-Abelle. Avelyn always spoke highly of Master Jojonah, but in truth, the man’s work with the stones was not so strong, not compared to Avelyn, and not compared to my own.”

She had not said it in any boastful way, but merely matter-of-factly, and so Jojonah took no further offense. Instead he considered the deeper, richer implications of it all. She had been trained by Avelyn! And under his tutelage, this woman, who did not look as though she was near her thirtieth birthday, was stronger than a master of St.-Mere-Abelle. That notion, and he found from her tone that he believed her words, served to reinforce Jojonah’s continually mounting respect for Avelyn.

He wanted to stay near and continue his eavesdropping, but realized then that time was short and that he would have to cover quite a bit of ground before the dawn. His spirit soared back to his waiting body, and when he was again corporeal, he breathed easier to learn that his out-of-body flight had not been noticed. All the camp was quiet.

Jojonah looked at the soul stone, wondering how to proceed. He might need this, he realized, but if he took it, then De’Unnero would likely make hunting him down a priority even above the journey to St. Precious. On the other hand, if he left the soul stone, then it might be used, much as he had used it this night, to search for him.

Jojonah found a third option. From inside the folds of his voluminous robes he produced parchment and ink, then set about writing a short note explaining that he was going to return to the merchant caravan and escort them to Palmaris. He would take the soul stone, he explained, because the merchants were far more likely to need it than were the monks, especially—and Jojonah took great care to play this part up—since the monks had Master De’Unnero, perhaps the greatest fighter ever to come out of St.-Mere-Abelle, at their head. Also, Jojonah assured De’Unnero that he would make sure that the merchants, and any compatriots they could muster, would attend the ceremony at St. Precious, bearing expensive gifts.

“My conscience will not allow me to leave these people out here all alone,” the note finished. “It is the duty of the Church to help those in need, and by so helping, we bring willing contributors into the flock.”

He hoped that the emphasis on wealth and power would calm De’Unnero’s expectedly vicious response. But he couldn’t really worry about that now, not with these three people, so potentially important to everything that he held dear, so very near. Carrying only the soul stone and a small knife, he crept out of the camp, taking care not to be noticed, and set out as fast as his old frame would carry him, back to the east.

His first destination was the valley where the merchants had settled, so he could get his bearings, and also from an honest desire to check in on the battered caravan. When he drew near the place, he found another potential gain. Improvising, Master Jojonah cut a piece of his robe, not a difficult thing to do since the material had grown threadbare from his many days of traveling. He broke a few low branches and scuffled his feet about to make it seem as if a fight had occurred, then cut his own finger, carefully soaking the ripped material in blood and dripping some more about the area.

He quickly sealed the wound with the hematite, then moved over the ridge to the slope above the valley. The camp seemed peaceful enough, a couple of fires burning, several figures moving about calmly, so the monk took a moment to gauge his position, then set out.

He came in sight of the low-burning campfire before the dawn, and crept up. He didn’t want to startle these people, certainly not to alarm them, but he figured that his best chance was to get close enough for the woman to recognize him.

He was soon in the bushes about the small campsite, the fire clearly in sight. He thought that he had been silent, and was glad to see the two bedrolls bulging with forms. How to wake them, he wondered, without frightening them into action?

He decided to wait until the dawn, to let them wake up on their own, but even as he started to settle down for perhaps an hour’s wait, he sensed that he was being watched.

Master Jojonah spun about as the large form crashed in. Though Jojonah, like all the monks of St.-Mere-Abelle, was a trained fighter, in the blink of an eye he was on his back, the edge of a very fine sword pressed against his throat, the strong man on top of him, pinning him helplessly.

Jojonah made no move to resist, and the man, upon recognizing him, backed off slightly.

“No others in the area,” came a melodic voice—the elf, Jojonah presumed.

“Master Jojonah!” the woman said, coming into view. She rushed over and put a hand on the strong ranger’s shoulder, and with a look and a nod, Elbryan got up from the monk and offered his hand.

Jojonah took it and was pulled to his feet with such ease that the man’s strength, like his incredible agility, stunned him.

“Why are you here?” the woman asked.

Jojonah looked right into her eyes, their beauty and depth not diminished in the least by the dim light. “Why are you?” he asked, and his tone, one that showed such understanding, gave both Pony and Elbryan pause.

CHAPTER 30

In Search of Answers

“Brother Talumus,” Baron Bildeborough went on slowly, calmly, his tone a futile attempt to hide the agitation that bubbled just beneath the surface, “tell me again of Connor’s visit here, of every stop he made, of everything he inspected.”

The young monk, thoroughly flustered, for it was obvious he wasn’t giving the Baron what he wanted, started talking so fast and in so many different directions that his words came out as a jumble. Prompted by the Baron’s patting hand, the man stopped and took a deep and steadying breath.

“The abbot’s room first,” Talumus said slowly. “He was not pleased that we had cleaned it up, but what were we to do?” As he finished the sentence, his voice rose up again with excitement. “The abbot must be in public state—tradition demands it! And if we were to have guests at the abbey—oh, and streams of them!—then we could not leave the room all gory and torn up.”

“Of course not. Of course not,” Baron Bildeborough said repeatedly, trying to keep the monk calm.

Roger watched his new mentor closely, impressed by the man’s patience, by how he was keeping this blubbering monk somewhat on track. Still, Roger could see the underlying tension on Rochefort’s face, for the man now understood, as did Roger, that they would get few answers and little satisfaction here. St. Precious, with no ranking masters behind Abbot Dobrinion, was in absolute disarray, with monks running every which way, and discussion of this or that rumor taking the place of even the prayer times. One confirmed bit of news had proven especially unnerving to Roger and Rochefort: St. Precious would soon get a new abbot, a master from St.-Mere-Abelle.

To Roger and to Rochefort, that fact seemed to lend even more credence to Connor’s suspicions that the Father Abbot himself had been behind the murder.

“We left the powrie, though,” Brother Talumus went on, “at least until after Master Connor had departed.”

“And then Connor went to the kitchen?” Rochefort inquired gently.

“To Keleigh Leigh, yes,” replied Talumus. “Poor girl.”

“And she was not injured other than the drowning?” Roger dared to put in, looking directly at Rochefort as he spoke, though the question was obviously for Talumus. Roger had previously explained to Rochefort that Keleigh Leigh’s lack of cuts—for dipping berets—had been a primary clue to Connor that the powrie had not committed these crimes.

“No,” replied Talumus.

“None of her blood was spilled?”

“No.”

“Go and find me the person who first discovered her body,” Baron Bildeborough instructed. “And be quick.”

Brother Talumus scrambled to his feet, saluted and bowed, then ran from the room.

“The monk who found her will likely have little to tell us,” Roger remarked, surprised by the Baron’s request.

“Forget the monk,” Rochefort explained. “I only sent Brother Talumus that we might find a few minutes alone. We must decide upon our course, my friend, and quickly.”

“We should not tell them of Connor’s suspicions, or of his demise,” Roger said after a few seconds’ pause. Baron Bildeborough was nodding as he went on. “They are helpless in the face of this. Not a single monk here, if Talumus is the highest-ranking remaining, could possibly stand against the coming master of St.-Mere-Abelle.”

“It does seem that Abbot Dobrinion was lax in developing any talents in his lessers,” Rochefort agreed. He gave a snort. “Though I might enjoy the sheer tumult of telling Talumus and all the others that St.-Mere-Abelle murdered their beloved abbot.”

“Not much of a fight,” Roger put in dryly. “From all that Connor told me of the Church, St.-Mere-Abelle would quickly dismantle the order at St. Precious, and then the Father Abbot would be even more entrenched in Palmaris than he will be when the new abbot arrives.”

“True enough,” Baron Bildeborough admitted with a sigh. He brightened his expression immediately for the sake of the two jittery monks entering the room, Talumus and the first witness. On with the questioning, he decided, but only for appearances—both he and Roger knew they would learn nothing more from this man or any other at St. Precious.

The two were back at Chasewind Manor soon after, Rochefort pacing the floor while Roger sat upon the man’s favorite stuffed chair.

“Ursal is a long ride,” Rochefort was saying. “Of course, I will want you with me.”

“Will we actually meet the King?” Roger asked, a bit overwhelmed by that possibility.

“Oh, but King Danube Brock Ursal is a good friend, Roger,” replied the Baron. “A good friend. He will grant me audience and will believe me, do not doubt. Whether or not he will be able to take any overt action given the lack of evidence—”

“I was a witness!” Roger protested. “I saw the monk kill Connor.”

“Perhaps you bear false witness.”

“You do not believe me?”

“Of course I do!” the Baron replied, again giving that customary pat in the air with his plump hand. “Indeed, boy, else why would I have gone to so much trouble? Why would I have given you Greystone and Defender? If I didn’t trust you, boy, you would be in chains, and tortured until I was convinced that you were speaking truly.”

The Baron paused and looked at Roger more closely. “Where is that sword?” he asked.

Roger shifted uncomfortably. Had he just compromised that trust? he wondered. “Both sword and horse have been put to good use,” he explained.

“By whom?” the Baron demanded.

“By Jilly,” Roger was quick to reply. “Her road is darker still, and fraught with battle, I fear. I gave them over to her, for I am no rider, nor much of a swordsman.”

“Both can be taught,” the Baron grumbled.

“But we’ve not the time,” Roger replied. “And Jilly can put them to good use at once. Do not doubt her prowess . . .” Roger paused, trying to gauge the great man’s reaction.

“Again I trust in your judgment,” the Baron said at length. “So we’ll not speak of this again. Now back to our primary business. I believe you—of course I do. But Danube Brock Ursal will be more cautious in his acceptance, do not doubt. Do you realize the implications of our claims? If King Danube accepted them as truth and spoke of them publicly, he might well begin a war between Church and state, a bloodbath that neither side desires.”

“But one that the Father Abbot of St.-Mere-Abelle began,” Roger reminded.

A cloud passed over Baron Rochefort Bildeborough’s face then, and he seemed to Roger so very old and tired indeed. “And so we must go south, it would seem,” he said.

A knock on the door cut short Roger’s response.

“My Baron,” said an attendant, entering, “word has just come to us that the new abbot of St. Precious has arrived. Master De’Unnero, by name.”

“Do you know of him?” the Baron asked Roger, who only shook his head.

“He has already requested your audience,” the attendant went on. “At St. Precious this very afternoon at high tea.”

Bildeborough nodded and the attendant left the room.

“I must hurry, it would seem,” the Baron remarked, glancing out the window at the westering sun.

“I will accompany you,” Roger said, rising from the stuffed chair.

“No,” Bildeborough replied. “Though I would indeed welcome your impressions of this man. But if the depth of this heinous conspiracy is as far-reaching as we fear, then better that I go alone. Let the name and face of Roger Billingsbury remain unknown to Abbot De’Unnero.”

Roger wanted to argue, but he knew that the man was right, and knew, too, that Bildeborough’s answer for not taking him was only half of the reason. Roger understood that he was still young and very inexperienced in matters politic, and Bildeborough feared— and Roger could not honestly dismiss those fears as folly—that this new abbot might glean a bit too much information from their high tea.

So Roger sat and waited at Chasewind Manor for the rest of that afternoon.

Mid-Calember was not so far away. Not when Father Abbot Markwart considered the preparations he must make for the momentous proclamations he intended. The old and wrinkled man paced his office at St.-Mere-Abelle, pausing every time he passed the window to view the summer foliage. The events of the last few weeks, particularly the discovery at the Barbacan and the trouble in Palmaris, had forced Markwart to change his thinking on many matters, or at least to accelerate his maneuvers toward his long-term goals.

With Dobrinion gone, the makeup of the College of Abbots had changed dramatically. Though he would be a new abbot, De’Unnero, by the mere fact that he presided over St. Precious, would be granted a strong voice at the College, possibly even third behind only Markwart and Je’howith of St. Honce. That would give Markwart great power to strike hard.

The old cleric smiled wickedly as he fantasized about that meeting. At the College of Abbots he would forever discredit Avelyn Desbris, would brand the man indelibly as a heretic. Yes, that was important, Markwart realized, for if he did not pass such sanctions against Avelyn, then the man’s actions would remain open for interpretation. As long as the brand of heretic had not been formalized, all of the monks, even first-year brothers, remained free to discuss the events of Avelyn’s departure, and that was a dangerous thing. Would some be sympathetic to the man? Might the word “escape” wriggle into such discussions in place of the commonly described murder and theft?

Yes, the sooner he made the declaration of heresy and it was approved by the Church leaders, the better. Once the brand was formalized, no discussion of Avelyn Desbris in any positive light would be tolerated at any abbey or chapel. Once Avelyn was declared a heretic, his entry into the annals of Church history would be complete, and ultimately damning.

Markwart blew a long sigh as he considered the road to that coveted goal. He would be opposed, he suspected, by stubborn Master Jojonah—if the man lived that long.

Markwart dismissed the possibility of yet another assassination; if all of his known enemies began dying, then probing eyes would likely turn his way. And besides, he knew that Jojonah was not alone in his beliefs. He could not strike out that hard. Not yet.

But he had to be prepared should the fight come to pass. He had to be able to prove his point about Avelyn’s heresy, for the devastation at the Barbacan was certainly open to interpretation. It was true, and indisputable, that Siherton had been killed on the night of Avelyn’s flight from St.-Mere-Abelle, but in that, too, Jojonah might be able to find some argument. Intent, and not mere action, determined sin, and only true sin could brand a man a heretic.

Thus Markwart knew he would have to prove more than his interpretation of the events on the night when Avelyn absconded with the stones. To get the complete confirmation of that brand—a brand the Church had never been quick to hand out—he would have to prove that Avelyn subsequently used those stones for ill, that the man’s degeneration to the dark side of human nature was complete. But he would never quiet Jojonah, Markwart realized. The man would fight him concerning Avelyn Desbris, would deny his plans to the last. Yes, he saw that now; Jojonah would return with the College of Abbots and would fight him. They were long overdue for that confrontation. Thus Markwart decided that he would have to destroy the master, and not just the man’s argument.

Markwart knew exactly where he could find allies to that cause, a preemptive strike against Jojonah. Abbot Je’howith of St. Honce held a position as a close adviser to the King, and could access that power, in the form of the fanatical Allheart Brigade. All that he had to do, Markwart thought, was prep Je’howith properly, have him bring along a few of those merciless warriors . . .

Satisfied, the Father Abbot turned his thoughts to the issue of Avelyn. He did have one remaining witness to Avelyn’s actions, Bradwarden, but from his interrogations of the centaur, both verbal and with the soul stone, he had a fair measure of the beast’s considerable willpower and feared that Bradwarden would not break, no matter how brutally they tortured him.

With that in mind, the Father Abbot moved to his desk and made a note to Brother Francis that he should work ceaselessly with the centaur until the College convened. If they couldn’t trust that Bradwarden had indeed broken and would say whatever they told him to say, then the centaur would be killed before the distinguished guests arrived.

Markwart realized yet another problem as he penned that note. Francis was a ninth-year brother, yet only immaculates and abbots would be allowed to attend the College. Markwart wanted Francis there; the man had his limitations, but he was loyal enough.

The Father Abbot ripped a corner of the parchment and noted a reminder, “IBF,” to himself, then tucked it away. As he had broken protocol, due to the emergency of the war, in appointing De’Unnero as abbot of St. Precious and in sending Jojonah to the Palmaris abbey to serve as De’Unnero’s second, so he would promote Brother Francis to the rank of immaculate.

Immaculate Brother Francis.

Markwart liked the sound of that, liked the notion of increasing the power of those who obeyed him without question. His explanation for the premature appointment would be simple, and surely accepted: with two masters sent to bolster St. Precious, St.-Mere-Abelle had been left weak at the top echelons. Though the abbey boasted scores of immaculates, few had attained the credentials necessary for promotion to the rank of master, few even continued to strive for such a rank, and Francis, given his vital work with the caravan to the Barbacan, would strengthen that stable considerably.

Yes, the Father Abbot mused. He would promote Francis before the College, and then again, soon after, to the rank of master, to replace . . .

. . . Jojonah, he decided, instead of De’Unnero. For De’Unnero’s replacement he would look among the scores of immaculates, perhaps even to Braumin Herde, who was deserving even if his choice of mentors had left a great deal to be desired. Still, with Jojonah so far away and unlikely to ever return—except for the three weeks of the College—Markwart figured that he might be able to bring Braumin Herde tighter into the fold by tempting him with the coveted rank.

The Father Abbot’s step lightened as he waded through these problems, as solutions became all too apparent. This new insight he had found, this new level of inner guidance, seemed nothing short of miraculous. Every layer of intrigue seemed to fall away, leaving him with answers crystal clear.

Except for the problem of branding Avelyn quickly, he reminded himself, and he slapped his hand against his desk in frustration. No, Bradwarden would not break, would remain defiant until the bitter end. Markwart, for the first time, lamented the loss of the Chilichunks, for they, he knew, would have been so much easier to control.

An image came to him then, of the small library wherein Jojonah had been digging for information about Brother Allabarnet. Markwart saw the room clearly in his mind, and couldn’t understand why—until one area of the back corner, a distant, unused shelf, came clear in the image.

Markwart followed his instincts, followed the inner guidance, first to his desk to retrieve some gemstones, then down from his office, down the damp and dark stairs that led to the ancient library. No guards were posted now, for Jojonah was supposedly far away, and Markwart, glowing diamond in hand, entered cautiously. He went past the shelves of books to the back corner, to the books which the Church had long ago banned. He knew logically that even he, the Father Abbot, should not be perusing these, but that inner voice promised him answers to his dilemma.

He studied the shelf for a few minutes, glancing at every tome, at the labels of every rolled parchment, then closed his eyes and replayed those images.

His eyes stayed closed, but he lifted his hand, trusting that it was being guided to the book he needed. Grasping gently but firmly, Markwart tucked the prize under his arm and shuffled away, and was back in the privacy of his office before he even inspected the work, The Incantations Sorcerous.

Roger expected that the Baron would be gone late into the evening, and was rather surprised when the man returned long before the sun had even touched the horizon. He went to meet Bildeborough full of hope that all had gone well, but those hopes were deflated as soon as he saw the huge man, huffing and puffing, his face red from explosive rage.

“In all my years, I have never met a more unpleasant man, let alone a supposed holy man!” Rochefort Bildeborough fumed, storming out of the foyer and into his audience room.

Roger, following quickly, thought he might have to take a second choice of seat this time, for the Baron plopped into his stuffed chair. But then the huge man was right back to his feet, pacing anxiously, and so Roger slipped in behind him to take what was fast becoming his customary seat.

“He warned me!” Baron Bildeborough fumed. “Me! The Baron of Palmaris, friend of Danube Brock Ursal himself!”

“What did he say?”

“Oh, it started well enough,” Bildeborough explained, slapping his hands together. “All polite, with this De’Unnero creature hopeful that the transition would be smooth as he took his place in St. Precious. He said that we might work together—” Bildeborough paused and Roger sucked in his breath, recognizing that some important declaration was forthcoming. “—despite the apparent shortcomings and criminal behavior of my nephew!” the Baron exploded, stomping his feet and punching at the air. The exertion overwhelmed him almost immediately, and Roger was quick to his side, helping him into the comfortable chair.

“The dog!” Bildeborough went on. “He does not know of Connor’s death, I am sure, though he will certainly learn of it soon. He offered to pardon Connor, on my word that Connor would be more careful of his behavior in the future. Pardon him!”

Roger worked hard to keep the man calm then, fearing that he would simply die of his rage. His face was puffy and bloodred, his eyes wide.

“The best thing that we can do is to go to the King,” Roger calmly said. “We have allies that the new abbot cannot overcome. We can clear Connor’s name—indeed, we can put all the blame for these troubles where it rightly belongs.”

The reminder did calm the Baron considerably. “Off we go,” he said. “To the south, with all speed. Tell my attendants to prepare my coach.”

De’Unnero had not underestimated Baron Bildeborough in the least. His forceful demeanor at their meeting had been purposefully designed to gamer both information from the man and understanding of the Baron’s political leaning, and in De’Unnero’s sharp eyes, their conversation had been extremely successful on both counts. Bildeborough’s outrage showed that he, too, might prove an open enemy of the Church, more troublesome than either his nephew or Abbot Dobrinion.

And De’Unnero was smart enough to understand the true culprit behind the removal of those troubles.

For, despite his words at the meeting, De’Unnero did indeed know of the death of Connor Bildeborough, and he knew, too, that a young man had brought the body back to Palmaris, along with the body of a man dressed in the robes of an Abellican monk. Again the angry abbot lamented that Father Abbot Markwart had erred in not sending him on the most important mission to retrieve the stones. Had he gone in search of Avelyn, this issue would have been settled long ago, with the gemstones returned and Avelyn and all of his friends dead. How much less a problem Bildeborough would be to him, and to the Church!

For now Markwart and the Church had a problem, a big one, De’Unnero believed. According to those monks of St. Precious whom De’Unnero had already interviewed, and those of St.-Mere-Abelle who had witnessed the near battle in St. Precious’ courtyard, Baron Bildeborough had thought of Connor as a son. The accusation of murder had no doubt been laid at the Church’s door, and Bildeborough, whose influence went out far from Palmaris, would not be silent on this matter.

The new abbot was not surprised, then, when one of his flock, a fellow monk who had made the journey with De’Unnero from St.-Mere-Abelle, returned from his assigned scouting post to report that a carriage had left Chasewind Manor, riding south, right out of Palmaris, along the river road.

The new abbot’s other spies soon returned, confirming the story, one of them insisting that Baron Bildeborough himself was in that coach.

De’Unnero did not betray his emotions, remained calm and went through the few remaining evening rituals as though nothing was amiss. He went to his room early, explaining that he was weary from the ride, a perfectly plausible excuse.

“This is where I hold advantage even over you, Father Abbot,” the abbot of St. Precious remarked as he looked out his window to the Palmaris night “I need no lackeys for my dark business.”

He pulled off his telltale robes and dressed in a loose-fitting suit of black material, then pushed open the grate on the window and climbed out, disappearing into the shadows. Moments later he crouched in an alleyway, his favorite gemstone in hand.

De’Unnero fell into the stone, felt the exquisite pain as the bones in his hands and arms began to reshape and twist. And then, spurred by the sheer excitement of the coming hunt, the sheer ecstasy that he could finally act, he fell deeper, and quickly kicked off his shoes as his legs and feet, too, transformed into the hind legs and paws of a tiger. He felt as if he was losing himself in the magic, becoming one with the stone. All his body jerked and spasmed. He raked a paw across his chest, tearing wide his clothing.

Then he was on all fours, and when he tried to protest, a great growl came out of his feline maw.

Never had he gone this far!

But it was wonderful!

The power, oh, the power! He was the hunting tiger now, in body, and all of that sheer power was under his absolute control. Soon he was running swiftly and silently on padded feet, bounding over the high Palmaris wall with ease and charging off down the southern road.

On the very first pages, the general description of the tome, the Father Abbot understood. Only a few months before, Father Abbot Dalebert Markwart would have been horrified at the thought.

But that was before he had found the “inner guidance” of Bestesbulzibar.

He reverently placed the book away in the lowest drawer of his desk, locking it tight.

“First business at hand,” he said aloud, drawing clean parchment and a vial of black ink from another drawer. He unrolled the parchment and secured its ends with weights, then stared at it for a long time, trying to determine the best manner of wording. With a nod, he titled the paper:

Promotion of Brother Francis Dellacourt to Immaculate Brother The Order of St.-Mere-Abelle

Markwart spent a long time preparing that important document, though the final draft was no more than three hundred words. By the time he finished, the day was nearing its end, the other monks gathering for dinner. Markwart swept out of his office, to the wing of St.-Mere-Abelle serving as residence for the newest students. He found the three he wanted and called them off to a private room.

“You will each provide me with five copies of this document,” he explained. One of the young brothers shifted nervously.

“Speak your mind,” Markwart demanded of him.

“I am not well-versed, nor very skilled, in illumination, Father Abbot,” the man stuttered, head bowed. In truth, all three were overwhelmed by the demand. St.-Mere-Abelle boasted of many of the finest scribes in all the world. Most of the immaculates who would never attain the rank of master had chosen the vocation of scribener.

“I did not ask if you were skilled,” Markwart replied to the man, to them all. “You can read and write?”

“Of course, Father Abbot,” all three confirmed.

“Then do as I asked,” the old man said. “Without question.”

“Yes, Father Abbot.”

Markwart let his dangerous stare linger on each of them individually, then, after what seemed like minutes of silence, threatened, “If any of you speak a word of this, if any of you give anyone else even a hint of the contents of this paper, you will, all three, be burned at the stake.”

Again came the silence, Markwart studying the young monks intently. He had decided to use first-year students, and these three in particular, because he was certain that such a threat would carry great influence. He left them, then, confident that they would not dare fail the commandment of their Father Abbot.

Markwart’s next stop was the room of Brother Francis. The man had already gone to dinner, but the old monk wasn’t deterred, sliding his instructions concerning Bradwarden under the door.

Soon after, back in his private quarters, in a little-used room to the side of his bedroom, the Father Abbot set about his next preparation. First he removed all items, even furniture, from the room. Then, with the ancient book, a knife, and colored candles in hand, he went back in and began tracing a very specific pattern, described in great detail in the tome, in the wooden floor.

The forest seemed a quiet place to Roger, full of peace and calm. Something about the very air was different here than in the northland, some serenity, as though all the woodland animals, all the trees and flowers, knew that no monsters were about.

Roger had come out from the small camp beside the wagon to relieve himself, but had stayed out as the minutes passed, alone with his thoughts and with the starry canopy. He tried not to think of his coming meeting with King Danube; he had rehearsed his speech many times already. He tried not to worry for his friends, though he suspected they would likely be approaching St.-Mere-Abelle by now, perhaps had already battled with the Church over the prisoners. For now, Roger wanted only rest, the calm peace of a summer’s night.

How many times had he reclined on a branch in the forest near Caer Tinella, alone in the quiet night? Most, if the weather was agreeable. Mrs. Kelso would see him for dinner, and then again for breakfast, and though the mothering woman believed him to be comfortably curled up in her barn, he was more often in the forest.

Try as he may, Roger couldn’t find that level of calm now, couldn’t find that deep, introspective serenity. Too many worries crept into the corners of his consciousness; he had seen and experienced too much.

He leaned heavily against a tree, staring up at the stars, lamenting his loss of innocence. All during his time with Elbryan, Pony, and Juraviel, they had applauded him for maturing, had nodded approvingly as his decisions became more based in responsibility. But accepting those responsibilities had taken a toll, Roger understood now, for the stars did not twinkle so brightly, for his heart was surely heavier.

He sighed again and told himself that things would get better, that King Danube would put the world aright, that the monsters would be driven far away and he could return to his home and his previous life in Caer Tinella.

But he didn’t believe it. With a shrug, he started back for the wagon, back for discussions of important matters, back for responsibility.

He paused, though, before he got near the campsite, the hairs on the back of his neck tingling.

The forest had gone strangely, eerily, quiet.

Then came a low, resonating growl, the likes of which Roger had never before heard. The young man froze in place, listening intently, trying to discern the direction, though the low roar seemed to fill all the air, as though it was coming from everywhere at once. Roger didn’t move, didn’t breathe.

He heard the draw of sword, another roar, this one more emphatic, and then the screams, sudden and horrible. Now he was moving, running blindly, stumbling on roots, taking more than one branch in the face. He saw the firelight from the camp, silhouettes darting back and forth before it.

And the screams continued, cries of fear, and now of agony.

Roger came in sight of the camp to see the guards, all three, lying about the fire, torn and broken. He hardly took note of them, though, for the Baron was halfway inside the carriage, struggling mightily to get all the way in that he might close the door.

But even if he could have done so, Roger knew that the door would prove a meager bather against the creature, a gigantic orange-and-black-striped cat that had a claw hooked about his boot.

The Baron spun over and kicked out, and the tiger let go long enough for the man to get inside. But the man never got close to shutting the carriage door, for the cat had only let go that it might settle back on its haunches, and before Bildeborough had even cleared the line of the door, the tiger sprang into the carriage, atop him, claws raking.

The carriage rocked violently, the Baron screamed, and Roger stared helplessly. He did have a weapon, a small sword, barely more than a dagger, but he knew that he couldn’t possibly get to Bildeborough in time to save the man, and in any case couldn’t possibly defeat, or even seriously injure, the great cat.

He turned and ran, tears streaming down his face, his breath coming in labored, forced gasps. It had happened again! Just like the incident with Connor! Again he was no more than a helpless bystander, a witness to the death of a friend. He ran on blindly, stumbling, brush and limbs battering him as the minutes became an hour. He ran until he dropped from exhaustion, and even then he dragged himself on, too frightened to even look back to see if there was any pursuit.

CHAPTER 31

Alternate Routes

Backlit by the rising sun, swathed in a veil of morning fog, the great fortress of St.-Mere-Abelle loomed in the distance, stretching far along the cliff top overlooking All Saints Bay. Only then, viewing the sheer size and ancient strength of the place, did Elbryan, Pony, and Juraviel truly come to appreciate the power of their enemies and the scope of their task. They had informed Jojonah of their course soon after he arrived at their campsite.

And then he had told Pony of her brother’s demise.

The news hit her hard, for though she and Grady were never close friends, she had spent years beside him. She didn’t sleep well the rest of that night, but was more than ready for the road before the dawn, a road that had led them here, to this seemingly indestructible fortress that now served as prison to her parents and her centaur friend.

The great gates were closed tight, the walls high and thick.

“How many live here?” Pony asked Jojonah breathlessly.

“The brothers alone number more than seven hundred,” he replied. “And even the newest class, brought in last spring, have been trained to fight. You would not get into St.-Mere-Abelle through use of force, if the King’s army stood behind you. In calmer times, you might find your way in posing as peasants, or as workers, perhaps, but now, that is not possible.”

“What do you plan?” the ranger asked, for it seemed obvious to all that if Master Jojonah could not get them in, their quest was hopeless. After their meeting in the wood, Jojonah had promised to do just that, assuring them that he was no enemy, but a very valuable ally. The four of them had started off together the very next morning, Jojonah leading the way to the east, to this place he had known as his home for many decades.

“Any structure this size has less noticeable ways to enter,” Jojonah replied. “I know of one.”

The monk led them to the north then, a circuitous route that took them far around the northern tip of the great structure, then down a winding, rocky trail to the narrow beach. The water was right up to the rocks, waves licking against the base of the stone, a dance that had continued for centuries untold. Still, the beach was certainly passable, so the ranger plunked one foot in, testing the water.

“Not now,” the monk explained. “The tide is coming in, and though we’ll get through before the water is too high, I doubt that we’ll find the time to return. When the tide recedes later this day, we will be able to make our way along the shore to the dock area of the abbey, a place little used and little guarded.”

“Until then?” the elf asked.

Jojonah motioned back up the trail, toward a hollow they had passed, and all agreed they could use the rest after their long day and night of hard travel. They set a small camp, sheltered from the chill sea breeze, and Juraviel prepared a meal, their first in many hours.

The conversation was light at this time, with Pony doing most of the talking, telling the eager master of her travels with Avelyn, retelling parts over and over again at Jojonah’s bidding. It seemed he couldn’t get enough of her stories, that he hung on every little detail, probing the woman repeatedly to go into more depth, to add her feelings to her observations, to tell him everything about Avelyn Desbris. When Pony at last got to the point where she and Avelyn had met up with Elbryan, the ranger joined in with his own observations, and then Juraviel, too, found much to add as they detailed their efforts against the monsters in Dundalis, and the beginning of the trip to the Barbacan.

Jojonah shuddered when the elf described his encounter with Bestesbulzibar, and then again when Pony and Elbryan told him of the battle outside Mount Aida, of the fall of Tuntun and the final, brutal confrontation with the dactyl demon.

Then it was Jojonah’s turn to speak—between bites, for the elf had prepared a wonderful meal. He told of the discovery of Bradwarden, of the centaur’s pitiful condition, but one that healed remarkably under the influence of the elven armband.

“Even I, even Lady Dasslerond, I suspect, did not know the true depth of the item’s powers,” Juraviel admitted. “It is a rare bit of magic, else we would all wear one.”

“Like this?” Elbryan said, smiling, and turning his body so his left arm was showcased, the green elven band tight about his muscles.

Juraviel only smiled in reply.

“There is one thing which I have not yet seen,” Jojonah interrupted, dropping his gaze over Pony. “Avelyn befriended you?”

“As I have told you,” she replied.

“And at his demise, you took the gemstones?”

Pony shifted uncomfortably and looked at Elbryan.

“I know that the stones were taken from Avelyn,” the monk went on. “When I searched his body—”

“You exhumed him?” Elbryan asked in horror.

“Never that!” Jojonah answered. “I searched with the soul stone, and with garnet”

“To detect his magic,” Pony reasoned.

“And there was little about him,” Jojonah said, “though I am certain—even more so from your descriptions of the journey—that he went to the place with a considerable cache. I know why his hand was extended upward, and I know who was first to find him.”

Again Pony looked over at Elbryan, and his expression was no less unsure than her own.

“I would like to see them,” Jojonah stated flatly. “Perhaps to wield them in the coming fight, if there is to be one. I have considerable talents with the gemstones and will put them to good use, I assure you.”

“Not so good as Pony,” Elbryan remarked, drawing a surprised look from the monk.

Despite that, Pony reached to her pouch and took the small satchel from it, opening it wide.

Jojonah’s eyes sparkled at the sight of the stones, the ruby, the graphite, garnet—taken from Brother Youseff—and serpentine, and all the others. He extended his arm toward them, but Pony shifted her hand away, out of his reach.

“Avelyn gave these to me, and so they are my burden,” the woman explained.

“And if I might better use them in the coming fight?”

“You cannot,” Pony said calmly. “I have been trained by Avelyn himself.”

“I spent years—” Jojonah started to protest.

“I saw your work with the merchant caravan,” Pony reminded him. “The wounds were minor, yet they took you tremendous effort to bind. I have measured your strength, Master Jojonah, and I speak now with no intent to insult, or to brag. But I am the stronger with the stones, do not doubt, for Avelyn and I found a connection, a joining of our spirits, and in that bond I came to understand.”

“Pony’s use of magic has saved me and so many others time and time again,” Elbryan added. “She does not boast, but merely speaks the truth.”

Jojonah looked from one to the other, then to Juraviel, who was also nodding.

“I did not use them in the fight for the merchant caravan because we knew that monks were in the area, and I feared we would be detected,” Pony explained.

Jojonah put his hand up in front of him, a signal that no further explanation was needed; he had heard this same story before when he was spiritually scouting out the three. “Very well,” he agreed. “But I do not believe that you should bring them into St.-Mere-Abelle—not all of them, at least.”

Pony looked to Elbryan again, and he shrugged and then nodded, thinking that the monk’s reasoning, offering the same argument that he and Juraviel had made to Pony earlier, might be sound.

“We do not know if we will get back out,” Juraviel reasoned. “But is it better,” he asked Jojonah, “that the stones be hidden out here instead of back in the hands of the monks of your abbey?”

Jojonah didn’t even have to think about that one. “Yes,” he said firmly. “Better that the stones are cast into the sea than to be given into the hands of Father Abbot Markwart. So I beg that you leave them out here, as we will leave these fine horses.”

“We shall see” was all that Pony would promise.

The discussion then turned to more practical matters at hand, with the ranger asking what they might expect in the way of guards at this seaside door.

“I doubt that any will be down there,” Jojonah replied with confidence. He went on to describe the massive door, backed by the huge portcullis, backed by yet another massive door, though that inner one was likely left open.

“That sounds little like any entrance for us,” Juraviel remarked.

“There may be smaller entrances nearby,” Jojonah replied. “For that is a very ancient section of the abbey, and at one time the docks were used extensively. The great doors are fairly new, no more than two centuries old, but there once were many other ways into the structure from the docks.”

“And you hope to find one of these in the dark night,” the elf said doubtfully.

“It is possible that I could open the great doors with the gemstones,” Jojonah said, glancing at Pony as he spoke. “St.-Mere-Abelle takes few precautions against magical attacks. If they are expecting a ship, the portcullis, the only obstacle against successful stone use, might be open.”

Pony didn’t reply.

“Our bellies are full, our fire warm,” the ranger remarked. “Let us find some rest now, until the time is right.”

Jojonah looked up at Sheila, the bright moon, and tried to recall the latest he had heard concerning the tides. He rose and bade the ranger to accompany him back to the waterfront, and when they got down there, they saw that the water was much calmer and almost back down to the base of the rocks.

“Two hours,” Jojonah reasoned. “And then we will have the time we need to get into St.-Mere-Abelle and complete our task”

He made it all sound so easy, Elbryan noted.

“You should not come here,” Markwart told Brother Francis when the man arrived at the Father Abbot’s private quarters, a place he had frequented often in the last few weeks. “Not yet.”

Brother Francis held his arms out wide, truly perplexed by the hostile attitude.

“We must turn our attention wholly to the College of Abbots,” Markwart explained. “You will be there, and so will the centaur, if we are successful.”

Brother Francis’ face screwed up even more with confusion. “I?” he asked. “But I am not worthy, Father Abbot I am not even an immaculate, and will not attain that title until next spring, when all of the abbots are back in their respective abbeys.”

The grin that splayed across the Father Abbot’s wrinkled and withered face nearly took in his ears.

“What is it?” Brother Francis asked, his tone edging on frantic.

“You will be there,” Markwart said again. “Immaculate Brother Francis will stand beside me.”

“But—But—” Francis stuttered, too overwhelmed. “But I have not reached my ten years. My preparations for promotion to immaculate brother are in order, I assure you, but the rank cannot be attained by one who has not yet spent a full decade—”

“As Master De’Unnero became the youngest abbot in the modern Church, so you will become the youngest immaculate brother,” Markwart said matter-of-factly. “These are dangerous times, and sometimes the rules must be bent to accommodate the immediate needs of the Church.”

“What of the others of my class?” Francis asked. “What of Brother Viscenti?”

Markwart laughed at the notion. “Many will attain their new rank in the spring, as scheduled. As for Brother Viscenti . . .” He paused and grinned even wider. “Well, let us just say that the company he keeps could well determine his future.

“But for you,” the Father Abbot went on, “there can be no delays. I must promote you to immaculate before I can then move you into the position of master. Church doctrine is unbending on that point, regardless of situation.”

Francis teetered and felt faint. Of course, he had predicted as much to Braumin Herde that day in the seawall corridor, but had no idea that his mentor would move so quickly. And now that he had heard the proclamation out loud, had heard firsthand that Father Abbot Markwart did indeed mean to promote him to one of the two vacant master positions, he was surely overwhelmed.

Brother Francis felt as if he was rebuilding the pedestal of self-righteousness he had broken by killing Grady Chilichunk, as if, by mere fact of his ascension in the Order, he was redeeming himself, or even that he needed no redemption, that it had been, after all, merely an unfortunate accident.

“But you must stay far from me until the promotion is finalized,” Markwart explained. “Better for protocol. I do have a most important job for you, in any case—that of breaking Bradwarden. The centaur will speak for us, against Avelyn and against this woman who now holds the gemstones.”

Brother Francis shook his head. “He thinks of them as kin,” he dared to disagree.

Markwart brushed the notion away. “Every man, every beast, has a breaking point,” he insisted. “With the magical armband, you can inflict upon Bradwarden such horrors that he will beg for death, and that he will give up his friends as enemies of the Church merely on your promise to kill him quickly. Be inventive, immaculate brother!”

The title was indeed inviting, but Francis’ face soured anyway at the thought of the distasteful job.

“Do not fail me in this,” Markwart said sternly. “That wretched beast may be the keystone of our declaration against Avelyn, and do not doubt that that declaration is vital to the survival of the Abellican Church.”

Francis bit his lip, his emotions obviously torn.

“Without the centaur’s confirmation against Avelyn, Master Jojonah and others will stand against us, and the very best we might hope for is that the labeling of Avelyn Desbris as a heretic will be taken under consideration,” Markwart explained. “Such a ‘consideration’ process will take years to complete.”

“But if he truly was a heretic—and he was,” Francis quickly added, seeing the Father Abbot’s eyes going wide with rage, “then time is our ally. Avelyn’s own actions will damn him, in the eyes of God and in the eyes of the Church.”

“Fool!” Markwart snapped at him, and the Father Abbot spun away, as if he couldn’t stand the sight of Francis, a gesture that profoundly stung the younger monk. “Each passing day will count against us, against me, if the gemstones are not recovered. And if Avelyn is not openly declared a heretic, then the general populace and the King’s army will not aid in our quest to find the woman and bring her to justice.”

Francis followed that reasoning; anyone officially deemed a heretic became an outlaw not only of the Church, but of the kingdom as well.

“And I will have those gemstones!” Markwart went on. “I am not a young man. Would you have me go to my grave with this issue unresolved? Would you have my presidency over St.-Mere-Abelle be marred by this black mark?”

“Of course not, Father Abbot,” Francis replied.

“Then go to the centaur,” Markwart said so coldly that the hairs on the back of Francis’ neck stood up. “Enlist him.”

Brother Francis staggered out of the room, as shaken as if Markwart had physically struck him. He ran his hand through his hair and started for the lower dungeons, determined that he would not fail his Father Abbot.

Markwart moved to the door and shut it, and locked it, scolding himself silently for allowing his office to be so open, given the secret and telling floor design in the adjoining room. He went to that room then, admiring his work. The pentagram was perfect, exactly as it had appeared in the book, scratched into the floor and with the grooves filled by multicolored wax.

The Father Abbot had not slept in more than a day, too engrossed in his work and in the mysteries the strange tome was showing him. Perhaps the Chilichunks would also attend the College of Abbots. Markwart could bring spirits up to reinhabit their bodies, and with hematite he could all but eliminate the natural decay.

It was a risky move, he knew, but it was not without precedence. The Incantations Sorcerous clearly spelled out a similar ruse, used against the second abbess of St Gwendolyn. Two of St. Gwendolyn’s masters had turned against the abbess, arguing that no woman should hold such a position of power—indeed, other than the abbey of St. Gwendolyn, women played only a minor role in all the Church. When one of those masters found that the other had died, merely of old age, he understood his predicament, for he knew that he could not battle the abbess alone. But through prudent use of The Incantations Sorcerous, the master had not been alone. He had summoned a minor malevolent spirit to inhabit his friend’s corpse, and together they waged war on the abbess for nearly a year to come.

Markwart moved back to his desk, needing to sit and consider his course. The Chilichunk imposters would only have to be in front of the College for a short while. It was possible that the deception would succeed, for only he and Francis knew with certainty that the couple had died, and then he would have two strong witnesses against the woman.

But what might be the cost of failure? Markwart had to wonder, and the possibilities seemed grim indeed.

“But I’ll not know until I see the animations,” he said aloud, nodding. He decided to follow the course. He would bring the Chilichunks—their bodies, at least—under his control, and see how fine the deception appeared. Then he could decide, while watching the progress of Bradwarden’s bending, whether or not to present them before the College.

Smiling, rubbing his hands with anticipation, Markwart took up the black book and a pair of candles and went into the prepared room. He placed the candles in the appropriate positions and lit them, then used diamond magic to pervert their glow, having them give off a black light instead of yellow. Then he sat between them, within the pentagram, legs crossed.

Soul stone in one hand, The Incantations Sorcerous in the other, Markwart walked free of his body.

The room took on strange dimensions, seemed to warp and twist before his spiritual eyes. He saw the physical exit, and then another, a portal in the floor with a long, sloping passageway behind it.

He took this darker route, his soul going down, down.

Sheila was directly above the abbey, and the water was far, far out when Jojonah led the ranger and his companions to the wharves and the lower door. Symphony and Greystone had been left far behind, as had many of the gemstones, Pony taking only those she thought might prove necessary. She now held a malachite, the stone of levitation and telekinesis, and a lodestone.

Jojonah led the way to the great doors in front of the wharves, then inspected them closely, even taking the ranger’s sword and sliding it under one worn area. As he moved the blade back and forth he felt the bathers—the portcullis was down.

“We should search south along the cliff face,” Jojonah reasoned, speaking in a whisper and motioning that there might be guards atop the wall—though that wall was several hundred feet above the companions. “That is the most likely place for us to find a more accessible door.”

“Do you suspect that any guards will be posted within this portal?” Pony asked.

“At this time of night, I doubt there are any below the second level of the abbey,” Jojonah replied with confidence. “Except perhaps for guards Markwart has posted near the prisoners.”

“Then let us try these,” Pony replied.

“The portcullis is down,” Jojonah explained, trying hard, but futilely, to keep the edge of hope in his voice.

Pony held up the malachite, but the monk wore a doubtful expression.

“Too large,” he explained. “Perhaps three thousand pounds. That is why this gate is hardly guarded. The front doors swing in, but they cannot open while the portcullis is down. And of course that portcullis is inaccessible to any lever we might construct while the solid doors are closed.”

“Not inaccessible to magic,” Pony argued. Before the master could protest, she fished out the soul stone and was soon out of body, slipping through the crack between the front doors to view the portcullis. She went back to her physical coil quickly, not wanting to expend too much energy. “This is the way,” she announced. “The inner doors are not closed, nor did I see any sign of guards in the hallway beyond.”

Jojonah didn’t doubt her; he had done enough spirit-walking to know its potential, and to understand that even in the darkened tunnels, the woman would have been able to “see” clearly enough.

“The front doors are barred, as well as blocked by the portcullis,” Pony explained. “Prepare a torch and go and listen carefully, for the lifting portcullis and then the bar. When you hear it rise, go quickly, for I know not how long I can offer you.”

“You cannot lift—” Jojonah started to protest, but Pony had already raised her hand with the malachite, had already fallen into the depths of the greenish stone.

Elbryan moved near the master and dropped a hand on his shoulder, bidding him to be quiet and watch.

“I hear the portcullis rising,” Juraviel whispered after a few moments, the elf standing with his ear pressed against the large doors. Elbryan and a stunned Jojonah rushed to join him, and despite the monk’s protests that it was impossible, he did indeed hear the grating sound of the great gate lifting into the ceiling.

Pony felt the tremendous strain. She had lifted giants before, but nothing of this magnitude. She focused on her image of that portcullis and fell deep, deep within the power of the stone, channeling its energy. The portcullis was up high enough, she believed, above the top of the doors, but then she had to reach even deeper, to grab the locking bar as well and somehow try to lift it.

She trembled violently; sweat beaded on her forehead and her eyes blinked rapidly. She pictured the bar, found it in her mental image, and grabbed at it with all her remaining strength.

Juraviel pressed his ear closer, could hear the bar shifting, one end going up. “Now, Nightbird!” he said, and the ranger put his shoulder to the great doors and heaved with all his strength. The bar fell free, the doors swung open, and Elbryan slipped down to one knee in the passageway, quickly moving to light his torch.

“The locking mechanism is in a cubby down to the right,” the monk said to the elf as Juraviel ran past Elbryan.

A moment later the torch came up and the elf announced that the portcullis was secured. Jojonah, back at Pony’s side, shook the woman roughly, drawing her from her trance. She came out of it and stumbled, nearly falling over for lack of strength.

“I have seen but one other with such power,” Jojonah remarked to her as he led her into the passage.

“He is with me,” Pony replied calmly.

The master smiled, not doubting her claim and taking great comfort in the possibility. He quietly closed the inner doors then, explaining that the draft would be felt deep into the abbey if the corridor were left open to the sea.

“Where do we go?” the ranger asked.

Jojonah thought on it for a moment “I can get us to the dungeons,” he said, “but only by going up several levels, then coming back down at another point”

“Lead on,” said Elbryan.

But the monk was shaking his head. “I do not like the possibilities,” he explained. “If we encounter any brothers, the alarm will be sounded.” The notion that they might indeed meet up with some of St.-Mere-Abelle’s flock brought a wave of panic over Jojonah, not for this powerful trio and their mission, but for the unfortunate brothers they might encounter.

“I beg you not to kill any,” he blurted suddenly.

Elbryan and Pony exchanged curious glances.

“Brothers, I mean,” Jojonah explained. “Most are unwitting pawns for Markwart, at worst, and not deserving of—”

“We did not come in here to kill anyone,” Elbryan interrupted. “And so we shall not, on my word.”

Pony nodded her agreement, and so did Juraviel, though the elf wasn’t so sure that the ranger had spoken wisely.

“There may be a better way to the dungeons,” Jojonah said. “There are old tunnels off to the side, just a hundred feet in. Most are blocked, but we can pass those barriers.”

“And you will know your way along them?” the ranger asked.

“No,” Jojonah admitted. “But they all tie together—the oldest parts of the abbey—and I am certain that any course will lead us soon enough to a place I can recognize.”

Elbryan looked to his friends for confirmation, and they both nodded, preferring a trek down unused passageways to a course that would likely put them in contact with other monks. First, on Juraviel’s reasoning, they also closed the portcullis, preferring to leave no sign that the abbey’s security had been breached.

They found the old passageway soon after, and, as Jojonah predicted, had no trouble in getting through the barrier the monks had constructed. Soon they were walking along the most ancient corridors and rooms of St.-Mere-Abelle, sections that had not been used in centuries. The floors and walls were all broken, the uneven angles of stone casting ominous lengthened shadows in the torchlight. Water stood calf-deep in many places, and small lizards ran on padded feet along the walls and ceiling. At one point Elbryan had to draw out Tempest just to cut his way through a myriad of thick webs.

They were intruders here, as any person would be, for these regions had been left for the lizards and the spiders, for the damp and the greatest adversary, time. But the companions plodded on through the often narrow, always twisting corridors, spurred by thoughts of Bradwarden and the Chilichunks.

The tunnel was dark and without detail, just a swirling mass of gray and black. Fog drifted up about the spirit of wandering Markwart, and though his form was noncorporeal, in this place he felt the cold touch of that mist.

For the first time in along, long while, Markwart considered his course and wondered if he was wandering too far from the light. He recalled that time when he was a young man, first entering St.-Mere-Abelle half a century before. He had been so full of idealism and faith, and those qualities had pushed him up through the ranks, attaining immaculate on the tenth anniversary of his entrance to the Order, and master only three short years later. Unlike so many of the previous Father Abbots, Markwart had never left St.-Mere-Abelle to serve as abbot of another abbey, had spent all of his years in the presence of the gemstones, in the most sacred of Abellican houses.

And now, he reasoned, the gemstones had shown him a new and greater path. He was beyond the limits of his predecessors, wandering into regions unexplored and unexploited. And so, after only a moment of doubt, it was with great pride, bolstered by his unwavering confidence in himself, that Markwart continued the descent along the dark and cold tunnel. He understood the perils here, but was certain he would be able to take whatever evils he found and twist them for the sake of good, the end justifying the means.

The tunnel widened to a black plane of swirling gray fog, and among its rolling mounds and stinking mists Markwart saw the huddled forms, blacker shadows among the darkness, hunched and twisted.

Several nearby sensed his spirit and approached hungrily, clawed hands extended.

Markwart held up his hand and ordered them back, and to his satisfaction, they did indeed retreat, forming a semicircle about him, red-glowing eyes staring at him hungrily.

“Would you like to see again the world of the living?” the spirit asked of the two closest.

They leaped forward, cold hands grasping Markwart’s ghostly wrists.

A sense of elation filled the Father Abbot’s spirit. So very easy! He turned and started back up the tunnel, the demon spirits in tow. He opened his eyes then, his physical eyes, blinking in the sudden candlelight, the twin flames flickering wildly. They were still burning black, but not for long, for they flared red and huge suddenly, great fires spouting up from, the meager candles, swaying, dancing, filling all the room with their red-hued light, stinging Markwart’s eyes.

But he did not, could not, look away, mesmerized by the black shapes forming within those fires, humanoid shapes, hunched and twisted.

Out they stepped, side by side, the two hideous forms, their hungry, red-glowing eyes boring into the seated Father Abbot. Beside them the candles flared one last time and returned to normal, and all the room was hushed.

Markwart sensed that these demon creatures could spring upon him and rend him to pieces, but he was not afraid.

“Come,” he bade them, “I will show you to your new hosts.” He fell into the hematite and his spirit walked free of his body once more.

CHAPTER 32

Pony’s Nightmare

The ranger carefully marked the walls at every intersection, and there were many in this maze of ancient and unused corridors. The four wandered for more than an hour, at one point chopping their way through a door and dismantling a bricked barrier before finally happening upon an area that seemed familiar to Jojonah.

“We are near the center of the abbey,” the monk explained. “To the south is the quarry, and the ancient crypts and libraries; to the north, the corridors that used to serve as living quarters for the brothers, but now serve Markwart as dungeon cells.” Without any prompting, the master led the way, moving carefully and quietly.

Soon after, Elbryan doused the torch, for the flickering of firelight could be seen up ahead.

“Some of the cells are there,” Jojonah explained.

“Guarded?” asked the ranger.

“Possibly,” the monk replied. “And it could be that the Father Abbot himself, or one of his powerful lackeys, is nearby, interrogating the prisoners.”

Elbryan motioned for Juraviel to take up the point. The elf moved far ahead, returning a few moments later to report that two young men were indeed standing a calm guard in the area of torchlight.

“They are not wary,” Juraviel explained.

“They would expect no trouble down here,” Master Jojonah said with confidence.

“You stay here,” Elbryan said to the monk. “It would not be wise for you to be seen. Pony and I will clear the way.”

Jojonah dropped an anxious hand on the ranger’s forearm.

“We’ll not kill them,” Elbryan promised.

“They are trained fighters,” Jojonah warned, but the ranger hardly seemed to be listening, already moving ahead, Pony and Juraviel by his side.

As they neared the area, Elbryan moved in front, then went down low to one knee, peering around an earthen bend.

There stood the two young monks, one stretching and yawning, the other leaning heavily against the wall, half asleep.

Suddenly the ranger was between them, elbow lashing out at the leaning monk, slamming him hard into the wall. Up snapped Elbryan’s backhand the other way, dropping the yawning monk even as he opened wide his eyes and started to protest. The ranger turned back to the one now slumping even lower against the wall, wrapping the man, spinning him over and putting him facedown to the floor, while Pony and Juraviel came in on the other, who was too dazed from the heavy hit to offer any resistance. Using fine elven twine, they bound the men, and gagged them and blindfolded them using their own monk robes, and the ranger dragged them down a dark side passage.

By the time he returned, Jojonah was back with the group, and Pony was standing outside a wooden door, staring hard at it. As soon as Jojonah had identified it as Pettibwa’s cell, Pony started toward it as if she meant to burst right in. But now she could not.

The stench told her the truth, the same smell she had known in sacked Dundalis those many years before.

Elbryan was beside her in an instant, steadying her as she finally lifted the latch and pushed open the door.

The torchlight splayed into the filthy room, and there, amidst her own waste, lay Pettibwa, the skin on her thick arms slack and hanging, her face so very pale and hugely bloated. Pony stumbled to her, fell to her knees beside the woman and moved to cradle Pettibwa’s head, but the body would not bend, and so the woman lowered her head to Pettibwa instead, her shoulders bobbing with sobs.

She had known nothing but love for this foster mother, the woman who had seen her into adulthood, who had taught her so much about life and love, and about generosity, for in those years long past, Pettibwa had no practical reason to take in the orphaned Pony. Yet she had accepted Pony into her family fully, shown the girl as much love and support as she gave to her own son, and that was considerable indeed.

And now she was dead, and in no small part because of that loving generosity. Pettibwa was dead because she had been kind to an orphaned child, because she had served as mother to the woman who became an outlaw of the Church.

Elbryan held Pony close and tried to hold together her emotions—so many whirling emotions: guilt and grief, sheer sadness and a great emptiness.

“I need to talk to her,” Pony said repeatedly, her words coming out over sobbing gasps. “I need—”

Elbryan tried to comfort her, tried to hold her steady, and grabbed her arm when she reached for the soul stone.

“She has been gone too long,” the ranger said.

“I can find her spirit and say good-bye,” Pony reasoned.

“Not here, not now,” Elbryan softly replied.

Pony started to protest, but finally, with trembling hand, replaced the gem in her pouch—though she kept her hand close to it.

“I need to talk to her,” she said more firmly, and turned from her lover to the corpse once more, bending low and whispering farewells to her second mother.

Jojonah and Juraviel watched from the doorway, the monk horrified, though surely not surprised that the woman had not survived the wrath of Markwart. He was embarrassed as well that one of his Order, indeed the very leader of his Order, had done this to the innocent woman.

“Where is the other human?” Juraviel asked.

Jojonah nodded to the next cell in line, and they both went quickly—only to find Graevis hanging dead, the chain still wrapped about his neck.

“He escaped the only way he could,” Jojonah said somberly.

Juraviel went right to the corpse, carefully turning it out of the chain choker. Graevis’ stiff form contorted weirdly as it fell to the length of the single shackle, but better for Pony to see him like that, the elf reasoned, than in his death pose.

“She needs to be alone,” Elbryan said to them, joining Jojonah in the doorway.

“A bitter blow,” Juraviel agreed.

“Where is Bradwarden?” the ranger asked Jojonah, his tone stern, forcing the guilt-ridden monk to retreat a step. Elbryan recognized Jojonah’s horror at once, though, and so he put a comforting hand on the monk’s broad shoulder. “It is a difficult time for us all,” he offered.

“The centaur is farther along the corridor,” Jojonah explained.

“If he lives,” Juraviel put in.

“We will go to him,” the ranger said to the elf, motioning for Jojonah to lead on. “You stay close to Pony. Protect her from enemies and from her own turmoil.”

Juraviel nodded and came out of the cell as Elbryan and Jojonah made their quiet way along the corridor. Juraviel went back to Pony then, telling her gently that Graevis, too, was dead, then embracing her as sobs of grief washed over her.

Jojonah followed the ranger farther down the low corridor, guiding Elbryan past intersections with soft whispers. They moved around a final bend into another shadowy, torchlit area, where they saw two doors, one on the left-hand wall and another at the very end of the corridor.

“You think this is ended, but it has only begun!” they heard a man cry, followed closely by the crack of a whip and a low, feral growl.

“Brother Francis,” Jojonah explained. “A lackey of the Father Abbot.”

The ranger started ahead, but stopped fast, and Jojonah faded into the shadows, as the door began to open.

The monk, a man of about the same years as Elbryan, stepped out, whip in hand and a very sour expression on his face. He froze in place, eyes going wide as he took note of Elbryan, this stranger standing impassively, sword still in its scabbard.

“Where are the guards?” the monk asked. “And who are you?”

“A friend of Avelyn Desbris,” Elbryan replied grimly, and loudly. “And a friend of Bradwarden.”

“Oh, by the gods, good show!” came a cry from within the cell, and it surely did Elbryan’s heart good to hear the booming voice of his centaur friend again. “Oh, but ye’re to get yer due, Francis the fool!”

“Silence!” Francis commanded the centaur. He rubbed his hands together and eased the whip out to its length as Elbryan advanced a step—though the ranger still did not bother to draw his sword.

Francis lifted the whip threateningly. “Your friendships alone show you to be an outlaw,” he said, a nervous edge to his voice despite his best efforts to appear calm.

The ranger recognized those efforts, but hardly cared whether this man was confident or not. Bradwarden’s voice and the realization that this man had just used that whip on his centaur friend assaulted the ranger’s sensibilities, sent him spiraling into that warrior mentality. He continued his advance.

Francis pumped his arm but didn’t snap the whip. He shifted uncomfortably and glanced over his shoulder as often as forward.

On came Nightbird, Tempest still sheathed at his hip.

Now the panicking Francis did try to snap the whip, but Nightbird quick-stepped forward, inside its rolling length, and pushed it aside. The monk threw the weapon at him, turned and sprinted for the door at the end of the corridor. He grabbed at the handle and yanked hard, and the door opened about a foot before Nightbird’s hand was against it, stopping its momentum.

With frightening strength the ranger slammed the door closed.

Sensing an opening in the ranger’s defenses, Francis spun about and launched a straight right punch for the man’s exposed ribs.

But even as his right hand pushed the door, Nightbird stiffened his left hand, holding it fingers up and perpendicular to his body, a foot in front of him. A simple, slight shift, perfectly timed, brushed Francis’ hand out wide, and then Francis’ successive left was turned harmlessly under the ranger’s upraised right arm.

Francis tried yet another fast right, and again the ranger picked it off, brushing it out wide with the same blocking hand, only this time he followed it out, keeping the back of his fingers in contact with Francis’ arm. It all seemed too slow to Francis, and too easy, but suddenly the tempo changed, Nightbird rolling his hand fast over Francis’ forearm, grabbing hard and yanking back across his body. He caught Francis’ fist, covering it with his right hand and pulling hard, again with the frightful, undeniable strength.

Francis lurched to the side, his arm drawn right across his body and down, and his breath was blasted away by a short, straight left jab to his side, a punch incredibly jarring, given the mere five inches the ranger’s fist traveled. Francis bounced hard against the door and tried to recover, but Nightbird, holding fast the monk’s fist, drove his arm up and under Francis’, and the sudden movement at so strange an angle brought a loud, bone-jarring pop from Francis’ elbow. Waves of pain washed over him. His broken arm was thrown up high as he fell back squarely against the door, and the large ranger waded in, hitting him with a right to the stomach that doubled him over, followed by a left uppercut to the chest that lifted his feet right off the ground.

A devastating flurry followed, left and right in rapid succession, hammering away, jolting Francis against the door or up into the air.

It ended as abruptly as it had started, with Nightbird moving back a step, leaving Francis bent forward from the door, one hand holding his belly, the other hanging limply. He looked up at the ranger just in time to see the roundhouse left hook. It caught him on the side of the jaw, snapped his head violently to the side, and flipped him right over to land on his back on the hard floor.

All the world was spinning into blackness for Francis as the large form moved over him. “Do not kill him!” he heard from far, far away.

Nightbird hushed Jojonah immediately, not wanting his voice to be recognized. He relaxed when he looked closer at his victim, to see that Francis was unconscious. Moving quickly, the ranger dropped a sack over the monk’s head and bade Jojonah to bind him, then went charging into Bradwarden’s cell.

“Taked ye long enough to find me,” the centaur said cheerily.

Elbryan was overcome by the sight, and thrilled, for Bradwarden was indeed very much alive, and looking healthier than the ranger could ever have hoped.

“The armband,” the centaur explained. “What a good bit o’ magic!”

Elbryan ran over and embraced his friend, then, remembering that time was not their ally, went right for the large shackles and chains.

“I’m hopin’ ye found a key,” the centaur remarked. “Ye’re not for breaking them!”

Elbryan reached into his pouch and produced the packet of red gel, the same substance he had used on the tree against the raiding goblins. He unfolded the packet; then smeared the reddish gel onto the four chains holding the centaur.

“Ah, but ye got more o’ the same stuff ye used in Aida,” the centaur said delightedly.

“We must be quick,” Jojonah remarked, coming into the room. The sight of him put Bradwarden into a fit, but Elbryan was quick to explain that this was no enemy.

“He was with them that took me from Aida,” Bradwarden explained. “With them that put me in chains.”

“And with them that mean to get you out of these chains,” the ranger was quick to add.

Bradwarden’s visage softened. “Ah, true enough,” he surrendered. “And he did give me me pipes on the long road.”

“I am no enemy of yours, noble Bradwarden,” Jojonah said with a bow.

The centaur nodded, then turned his head and blinked curiously as his right arm came down from the wall. There stood Elbryan, Tempest in hand, readying to strike at the chain that held the centaur’s right hind leg.

“Good sword,” Bradwarden remarked, and then, with a single swing, his leg, too, was free.

“Go see to Elbryan,” Pony said. She was still kneeling beside the body of Pettibwa, but she resolutely straightened her back.

“I doubt that he needs any assistance,” the elf replied.

Pony took a deep breath. “Nor do I,” she said, and Juraviel understood that she wanted to be alone. He noted that her hand was again clutched about a stone in the pouch, and that was surely alarming, but in the end he knew that he had to trust in Pony. He kissed her gently on the top of the head, then moved back from her, out the door of the cell but no farther, keeping quiet guard in the torchlit corridor.

Pony tried hard to hold control. She put her hand to Pettibwa’s bloated cheek and stroked it gently, lovingly, and it seemed to her as if the dead woman settled easier, as if the pallid color of death was not so obvious.

Pony felt something then, a sensation, a rush, a tickle. Confused, wondering if, in her longing to reach out to Pettibwa, she had unintentionally slipped under the power of the soul stone she once more held tight in her hand. Following that course, Pony closed her eyes and tried to concentrate. Then she saw them, or thought she did, a trio of spirits, one an old man, rushing through the room.

Three spirits: Pettibwa, Graevis, and Grady?

The notion startled Pony as much as it intrigued her, but still not understanding, she became afraid and wisely broke all connection to the soul stone. She opened her eyes and looked down at Pettibwa—to see the woman looking back at her!

“What magic might this be?” Pony muttered aloud. Had she subconsciously reached out so powerfully with the soul stone that she had grabbed Pettibwa’s disembodied spirit? Was such resurrection even possible?

She got her terrifying answer as Pettibwa’s eyes flared red with demonic flames and the woman’s face contorted, a guttural snarl coming from her opened mouth.

Pony rocked back, too confused, too overwhelmed, to immediately react, and her horror only grew as the corpse’s teeth elongated into pointed fangs. Up came the corpse to a sitting position, too suddenly, plump arms shooting out and clamping hard, with super-human strength, about Pony’s throat. The horrified young woman thrashed violently, turning her hands into every possible angle to gain leverage but making no headway in dislodging the demon’s powerful grip.

But then Juraviel was there, his slender sword slashing hard against Pettibwa’s bloated forearm, opening it wide that the pus and gore could spill out.

Elbryan was just about to sever the last of Bradwarden’s chains when Pony’s cry reached his ears. He slashed hard with Tempest, spinning on his heel and taking several steps before the chain even fell to the floor, Jojonah close behind. He came around the bend in full speed, heard a tumult within the cell that held the body of Graevis, and kicked open the door.

And then he stopped, stunned, for the animated corpse had bitten right through its one chained wrist and now came toward him, its eyes flaring with red fires, its stump arm leading the way with a spray of blood.

Elbryan wanted to go to Pony—above all else, he wanted to get by her side—but he could not rush off, and took some comfort when Jojonah thundered past behind him on his way to Pettibwa’s cell. Out came Tempest and in charged the ranger, meeting the demon creature head-on, ignoring the spray of the bloody stump and slashing away viciously at the reaching arms.

“My mum,” Pony said repeatedly, falling back against the wall as Juraviel battled the creature. The woman knew rationally that she should go to Juraviel’s side, or that she should use the gemstones now, perhaps the soul stone to force this evil spirit from Pettibwa’s body. But she could not act, could not get past the horror at seeing Pettibwa, her adopted mother, in this state!

She forced herself to find a level of calm, told herself repeatedly that if she could get into the soul stone, she might learn the truth of this creature. Before she could begin the move, though, Juraviel thrust ahead powerfully, right between the reaching arms, stabbing his sword deep into the corpse’s heart, a sight that froze Pony in place.

The demon laughed wildly and batted the elf’s hand from the sword hilt, then swatted Juraviel with a backhand that launched him head over heels.

The elf accepted the blow, and was moving with it before it ever connected, diminishing much of the shock. A flutter of his wings, a perfect twist in midair, landed him squarely on his feet, facing the demon creature—which still had the sword sticking from its chest.

Then another form came charging into the small cell, rushing past the elf. Without slowing, Jojonah slammed hard into the demon, burying it under his tremendous weight, taking it heavily into the back wall.

And then Bradwarden entered, and the cell was packed full of bodies!

“What is it about?” the centaur gasped.

With an unearthly roar, the demon launched Jojonah away, but Bradwarden found his answers quickly, and as the creature rushed forward, the centaur spun about and hit it with a double-kick that sent it careening back into the wall. Bradwarden moved right in on the creature, front hooves smashing away, fists pounding hard, a sudden and brutal beating that would not allow the demon to find any time to go on the offensive.

“Get her out of here,” Juraviel instructed Jojonah. As the monk scooped Pony into his arms, the elf leveled his bow and waited for an opening.

All the months of Bradwarden’s frustration came pouring out in the next seconds as the centaur rained blow after blow on the demon creature, battering it, tearing bloated flesh, smashing bone into pulp. Still, if he was truly harming the creature, it didn’t show it, just kept trying to find some way to grab at him.

But then an arrow popped into one of those red-glowing eyes, and how the demon howled!

“Oh, but ye didn’t like that one!” the centaur said, using the opportunity to spin about and drive his rear legs right into the demon face. With the head already pressed against the stone wall, the skull exploded in a shower of gore, but still the body fought on, arms flailing wildly.

Jojonah ushered Pony into the hall and set her down against the wall.

“Damned thing, lie down and die!” came Elbryan’s voice from the next cell.

The monk charged away to the door and then looked back, a disgusted expression on his face, waving for Pony to stay back.

Inside the cell, Elbryan slashed hard with Tempest, abandoning his normal thrusting style, for he had stabbed the creature several times, driving his sword tip deep into flesh and organs, with little effect. So he had gone to a more conventional style, taking up the mighty sword in both hands and swinging it in devastating, slashing motions. One of the demon’s arms was severed at the elbow, and a down stroke of Tempest took the other, right at the shoulder.

Still the creature came on, but a straight-across cut of Tempest stopped its momentum and gave the ranger time to level and line up his backswing.

Jojonah looked away, understanding, as the great sword flashed across, lopping the head off. When the monk looked back, his revulsion was even greater, for that head, lying to the side against the wall, was still biting at the air, fires still burning in the eyes! And the body continued to press the attack.

Elbryan punched out with his fist and knocked the body back, then took up Tempest in both hands, did a complete pivot, coming around with the sword low, taking off one leg. The corpse tumbled to the side, one stump thrashing, one leg kicking, and with the head, just a few inches away, snapping futilely at the air.

The fires in the eyes were diminishing, though, and Elbryan soon realized that the fight was over. He rushed back into the hall, past Jojonah, past Bradwarden and Juraviel as they exited the first cell, to grab up the hysterical Pony in his arms.

“Still kicking,” Bradwarden explained to Jojonah when the monk saw that Pettibwa’s body, the gory remains of its head flapping about its shoulders, was still flailing against the wall, tearing at the stone.

“But not for knowing which way to turn,” the centaur added, closing the door.

Jojonah went to the ranger and the woman. Amazingly, Pony was fast composing herself.

“Demon spirits,” the monk explained, looking Pony right in the eye. “Those were not the souls of Graevis and Pettibwa.”

“I saw them,” Pony stuttered, gasping for breath, her teeth trembling. “I saw them come in, but there were three.”

“Three?”

“Two shadows and an old man,” she explained. “I thought it was Graevis, though I could not see clearly.”

“Markwart,” Jojonah breathed. “He brought them here. And if you saw them—”

“Then he saw you,” Elbryan reasoned.

“We must be gone from this place, and quickly,” Jojonah cried. “Markwart is on his way, do not doubt, and with an army of brothers behind him!”

“Run on,” said Elbryan, pushing Jojonah toward the same ancient corridors that had brought them to this cursed place. He glanced back once at the side passage where they had put the guards, then took up the rear of the line, with Pony beside him. They moved as swiftly as the often tight and twisting corridors would allow, and soon came upon the dock doors of the abbey, closed and with the portcullis down, as they had left them.

Master Jojonah started for the crank, but Pony, steadier now and with a grim determination set upon her face, held him back. She took out the malachite once more and fell into its magic, and though she was weary and emotionally battered, she brought up a wall of rage and channeled it into the stone. With hardly an effort, it seemed, the portcullis slid up into the ceiling holes.

Elbryan went right to the great doors, lifting the locking bar and pulling one open. He moved to put the bar aside, but again Pony, still in the throes of the levitational magic, intervened.

“Hold the bar above the locking latch,” she instructed. “Quickly.”

They could hear the terrific strain in her voice, so Bradwarden ushered Jojonah out the open door, while Juraviel went behind Pony and gently eased her along, as well. As she passed the open door and Elbryan, Pony put her other hand, holding the magnetite, against the outside of the metallic door and fell into that magic as well.

The portcullis shifted dangerously over Elbryan’s head, but Jojonah, understanding what the clever woman meant to do, was at Pony’s side, easing the magnetite from her hand and strengthening the magnetic pull, through the door and onto the metal locking bar. Pony fell fully into the malachite once more, steadying the portcullis as Elbryan, too, came outside.

The ranger pulled the door closed, and Jojonah released his magnetic magic, then gave a satisfied sigh as the locking bar fell into place across the latches of the two doors. Then Pony gradually let go of her magic, easing the portcullis down, making it look as if these doors had not been breached.

She turned about and blinked in the glare, as did the others, the morning sun low in the sky before her, cutting shafts of light through the thick fog lifting from All Saints Bay. The tide was not in, but it was on the way, and so they set off immediately and at a swift pace, back down the beach and along the trail to their horses.

Snarling with rage, and despite the protests of the two dozen brothers rushing about him, the Father Abbot was the first to crash through the doors to the dungeon area on the lower level.

There was the battered Francis, the hood still tight about his head, struggling to stand, being helped by one of the other guards Elbryan had overpowered. Farther along the corridor, just inside the doors of their cells, lay the destroyed bodies of the Chilichunks, Pettibwa’s still thrashing at the floor as the demon spirit struggled to the end.

Markwart was not surprised, of course, since be had seen the intruder, the woman kneeling over Pettibwa, on his escort of the demons, but the other monks could not have expected this grisly scene. Some cried and fell away, others fell to their knees in prayer.

“Our enemies brought demons against us,” Markwart cried, waving a hand at the plump woman’s body. “Well fought, Brother Francis!”

With some help from another young brother, Francis finally escaped the hood and his bonds. He started to explain that he had done little fighting, but stopped in the face of Markwart’s glare. Francis wasn’t certain what was going on here, hadn’t seen the Chilichunks’ animated corpses, and wasn’t sure exactly who had destroyed the demons. He had a fair idea, though, and that notion sent many things careening through his thoughts.

Elbryan grew ill at ease, even frightened, as he watched Pony make her way along the trails. Her grunts were not of weariness, though she surely must have been exhausted after her magical feats, but of anger, a primal rage. The ranger stayed close to her, put his hand on her when ever the trail allowed, but she hardly looked at him, just continually blinked away any hint of tears, her jaw set firmly, her gaze locked ahead.

At the horses, Pony methodically retrieved the rest of her gemstones.

Jojonah offered to use healing hematite on Bradwarden, if the woman would loan him one, but the centaur brushed away that idea before Pony could begin to answer. “I’m just needing a bit o’ food,” he insisted, and truly, he did look healthy enough, though quite a bit skinnier than the last time the others had seen him. He patted his arm, the red elven armband securely in place. “Good gift ye gave to me,” he said to Elbryan with a wink.

“Our road will be long and fast,” the ranger warned, but Bradwarden only patted his less than ample belly and laughed. “I’m running all the faster for me lack o’ belly,” he said cheerily.

“Then let us go,” said the ranger. “At once. Before the monks come out of their abbey to search for us. And let us deliver Master Jojonah to St. Precious on time.”

“Ride Greystone,” Pony bade the monk, handing him the reins.

Jojonah accepted them without protest, for it made sense that the lighter woman, and not he, should climb on the back of the centaur.

But Pony caught them all by surprise, turning not for Bradwarden, but back toward St.-Mere-Abelle, running full out, gemstones in hand.

Elbryan caught up to her twenty yards away and had to tackle her to stop her progress. Now she was indeed crying, shoulders bobbing with sobs, but she fought against him furiously, trying to get free, trying to get back to the abbey to exact some revenge.

“You cannot defeat them,” the ranger said to her, holding her tightly. “They are too many and too strong. Not now.”

Pony continued to fight, even unintentionally clawed Elbryan’s face.

“You cannot dishonor Avelyn like this,” Elbryan said to her, and that gave her pause. Gasping, tears streaming down her face, she looked at him skeptically.

“He gave you the stones to keep them safe,” Elbryan explained. “Yet if you go back to the abbey now, you will be defeated and the gemstones will fall into the hands of our—of Avelyn’s—enemies. They will be taken by the same one who brought such turmoil and pain to the Chilichunks. Would you give him that?”

All strength seemed to fall away from the woman then, and she slumped into her lover’s arms, burying her face in his chest. He led her gently back to the others and put her in place atop Bradwarden, with Juraviel behind her to keep her steady.

“Give me the sunstone,” he bade her, and when she did, he took it to Jojonah, explaining that they should put up some blocking magic to defeat any magical attempts to find them. Jojonah assured him that such a feat would be easy enough, so the ranger went to Symphony and took the lead as the group thundered away at full gallop, putting St.-Mere-Abelle far, far behind them before the sun climbed high in the eastern sky.

“Find them!” the Father Abbot fumed. “Search every passage and every room. All doors barred and guarded! Now! Now!”

The other monks scrambled, some heading back the way they had come to alert the rest of the library.

When the reports filtered back to Markwart that the back dock doors had apparently not been opened, the search within the library intensified, and by mid-morning nearly every corner of the great structure had been scoured. The outraged Markwart setup a central reporting area in the abbey’s huge chapel, surrounded by the masters, each in command of a number of searching monks.

“They had to come in, and depart, through the dock doors,” one of the masters reasoned, a sentiment backed by many. His scouting leader had just returned to him to report that no other door in the abbey showed any sign of entry.

“But the doors were closed and barred, an impossible feat from outside the abbey,” another master reasoned.

“Unless they used magic,” someone offered.

“Or unless someone within the abbey was there to meet them, to open the doors for them, to close the doors behind them,” Markwart reasoned, and that thought drew an uncomfortable shift from every man in the room.

Soon after, when it was obvious that the enemies were indeed long gone from the abbey, Markwart ordered half the monks out in searching parties and another two dozen out magically, using quartz and hematite.

He knew the futility, though, for the Father Abbot was finally getting a true appreciation of the cunning and power of his real enemies. With that hopelessness came a pit of rage deeper than Markwart had ever known, one that he honestly believed would overwhelm him forever.

He found relief later that afternoon, though, when he interviewed Francis and the two monks who had been on guard near the cells, when he learned more about these intruders who had come to St.-Mere-Abelle, including one who was no stranger to the place.

Perhaps he wouldn’t need the centaur and the Chilichunks after all. Perhaps he could shift the blame, even of the original theft of the gemstones by Avelyn, by theorizing about a larger conspiracy within the Order. Now, he understood. Now, he had a scapegoat.

And Je’howith would be bringing a contingent of Allheart soldiers.

Markwart stood in his private quarters that night, staring out the window. “We shall see,” he said, a hint of a grin spreading on his face. “We shall see.”

“You’re not even to ask for the stones?” Pony said, standing on the streets of Palmaris with Elbryan and Master Jojonah. The group had landed earlier that morning north of the city, traveling across the great river on Captain Al’u’met’s Saudi Jacintha, which, fortunately, had still been docked in Amvoy. Al’u’met had agreed to Jojonah’s request for help without question and without payment, and with a promise that not a word of the impromptu ferry would be spoken to anyone.

Juraviel and Bradwarden were still in the north, while Elbryan, Pony, and Jojonah entered Palmaris, the monk to return to St. Precious, the other two to check on old friends.

“The sacred gems were given into fine care,” Jojonah replied with a sincere smile. “My Church owes you much, but I fear that you will get no just rewards from the likes of Father Abbot Markwart.”

“And you?” Elbryan asked.

“I go to deal with one less cunning, but equally wicked,” Jojonah explained. “Pity all the monks of St. Precious, to have lost Abbot Dobrinion to Abbot De’Unnero.”

They parted then as friends, with Jojonah retiring to the abbey and the other two moving along the streets of the city, trying to find some information. Pure luck brought them in the path of Belster O’Comely soon after, the man howling with glee to see them both alive.

“What information about Roger?” the ranger asked.

“He went south with the Baron,” Belster explained. “To the King, so I’ve heard.”

That bit of news pleased them immensely and filled them with hope, for word of the Baron’s demise had not yet reached the common folk of Palmaris.

With Belster in tow, and Pony leading, they went next to Fellowship Way, the tavern that had been Pony’s home for those difficult years after the first sacking of Dundalis. Profound pain assaulted Pony as she looked upon the place, and she could not stay, pleading with Elbryan to get her out of the city, back to the northland where they both belonged.

The ranger agreed, but first turned to Belster. “Go into the Way,” he bade the innkeeper. “You have been looking to remain in Palmaris, so you told me. They will need help in there to keep the business open and running smoothly. I can think of none better suited for the job than you.”

Before the innkeeper denied the request, he paused long enough to study the ranger and to follow Elbryan’s gaze to Pony.

Then he understood.

“The finest tavern in all of Palmaris, so I’ve been told,” he said.

“It was,” Pony added grimly.

“And so it shall be again!” Belster said enthusiastically. He patted Elbryan on the shoulder, gave Pony a great hug, then started for the tavern, a noticeable spring in his step.

Pony watched him, even managed a smile, then looked up to Elbryan. “I love you,” she said quietly.

The ranger returned her smile and kissed her gently on the forehead. “Come,” he said, “we have friends waiting for us on the road to Caer Tinella.”

Epilogue

The morning was brisk, despite the brilliant sunlight streaming in from the east. The breeze was not stiff, but Pony felt it keenly across every inch of her bare skin as she danced bi’nelle dasada among the falling many-colored leaves. She was not with Elbryan this morning, nor had she been for many days, preferring to dance alone now, for a time, as she used these moments of deep meditation as an escape from her grief and her guilt.

She saw Pettibwa and Graevis, even Grady, as she twirled about the piles of leaves. She remembered those days of her youth, faced them squarely and used them to put the events that had come after into a proper context. For, despite the very heavy burden of guilt, Pony rationally understood that she had done nothing wrong, that she had taken no road which, given the option once more, she would not now take.

And so she danced, every morning, and she cried, and when the grief finally began to lift and her common sense began to take the edge from her guilt, she was left with only . . .

Rage.

The leader of the Abellican Church was her enemy, had started a war from which Pony had no intention of running. Avelyn had given her the gemstones, and through that act of faith she felt well-armed.

She pivoted and turned in perfect balance, throwing a pile of leaves high with her fast-stepping feet. The meditation was deep and strong, a similar sensation as when she fell deep within the embrace of the gemstones. She was getting stronger.

She did not mean to maneuver around that wall of rage; she meant to smash right through it.

Winter came early that year, and by mid-Calember the ponds north of Caer Tinella already showed the shine of ice, and mornings were often greeted by a thin white coating of snow.

Farther to the south, the clouds hung heavy over All Saints Bay, the winter gales beginning to threaten. The water loomed darker, with the whitecaps rolling in against the cliffs contrasting starkly. Only two of the thirty abbots convening for the College at St.-Mere-Abelle—Olin of St. Bondabruce of Entel, and Abbess Delenia of St. Gwendolyn—had come by sea, and they both planned to stay as Markwart’s guests throughout the winter, for few ships would brave such perilous waters at that time of year.

Despite the gathering of so many Church dignitaries, and reports that the war was all but over, the mood at the abbey was somber, as gloomy as the season. Many of the abbots had been personal friends of Abbot Dobrinion. Also, there was the general feeling, spurred by many whispers, that this College would prove eventful, even pivotal, to the future of the Church. Father Abbot Markwart’s appointment of Marcalo De’Unnero to head St. Precious, and the recent news that a ninth-year brother had been promoted to Immaculate, were not matters without debate or opposition.

And everyone knew that other “guests” would be hovering about the College, a contingent of soldiers from Ursal, men of the fierce Allheart Brigade, by all accounts, on loan from the King to Abbot Je’howith of St. Honce. Such an accompanying force was certainly not without precedent in the Church, but it almost always signaled that some serious trouble was afoot.

Tradition dictated that the College would convene after vespers on the fifteenth day of the month, with all the participants, abbots and masters, spending the whole of the day quietly in reflection, preparing themselves mentally for the coming trials. Master Jojonah took this duty particularly to heart, closing himself in the small room afforded him, kneeling by his bed in prayer in the hopes that he would find some divine guidance. He had been quiet and impassive in his months under De’Unnero at St. Precious, taking no action to anger the new abbot or to even hint of the subversion that was in his heart. Of course, he had been scolded for leaving De’Unnero on the road, but after one brutal confrontation, nothing more had been said of the matter—to Jojonah, at least.

Now was his chance, he knew, perhaps his last chance, but could he find the courage to speak out openly against Markwart? He had heard little concerning the agenda of the College, but he strongly suspected—especially considering the companions the abbot of St. Honce had brought—that Markwart would use this opportunity to get a formal brand against Avelyn.

Markwart apparently had allies in this matter, powerful allies, but still, Jojonah knew what course his conscience dictated should Markwart’s declaration against Avelyn come to pass.

But what if it did not?

Jojonah’s midday meal was delivered outside his door, with only a single signaling knock, as he had instructed. He went to retrieve the food, and was surprised indeed when he opened the door to see Francis standing in the hall, holding his tray.

“So the rumors are true,” Jojonah said distastefully. “Congratulations, immaculate brother. How unexpected.” Jojonah took the tray, but held the door with his freehand, as if he meant to close it in Francis’ face.

“I heard you,” Francis said quietly.

Jojonah cocked his head, not understanding.

“In the dungeons,” Francis remarked.

“Truly brother, I know not of what you speak,” Jojonah said politely, falling back a step. He started to close the door, but Francis slipped into the room quickly.

“Shut the door,” Francis said quietly.

Jojonah’s first instinct was to lash out verbally at the upstart young man, but he could not ignore Francis’ claim, and so he gently closed the door and moved to his bed, placing the tray on the small table.

“I know that it was you who betrayed us to the raiders,” Francis said bluntly. “I have not yet determined who opened the wharf doors for you—and then closed them behind you—for I have witnesses as to the whereabouts of Brother Braumin Herde.”

“Perhaps it was God who let them in,” Jojonah said dryly.

Francis turned on him and didn’t seem to much appreciate the wit.

“Who let you in, you mean,” he stated firmly. “I heard you before I lost consciousness, and I assure you that I recognize your voice.”

The smile left Jojonah’s face, replaced by a determined stare.

“Perhaps you should have let the man kill me,” Francis stated.

“Then I would be just like you,” Jojonah quietly replied. “And that I fear worse than any punishment, worse than death itself.”

“How could you know?” Francis demanded, trembling with rage and advancing a step, as if he meant to strike out at Jojonah.

“Know?” the master echoed.

“That I killed him!” Francis blurted, falling back and breathing hard. “Grady Chilichunk. How could you know that it was I who killed him on the road?”

“I did not know,” a disgusted, and surprised, Jojonah replied.

“But you just said—” Francis started to argue.

“I was speaking of your demeanor, and no specific actions,” Jojonah interrupted. He paused to study Francis, and saw that the man was torn apart.

“It does not matter,” Francis remarked, waving his hand. “It was an accident. I could not know.”

The immaculate didn’t believe those words for a moment, Jojonah understood, and so he did not press the point as Francis staggered out of the room.

Jojonah didn’t even bother to eat his meal then, too consumed by Francis’ words. He knew what was to come now, and so he went back to his bedside and prayed, as much the confession of a doomed man as any request for guidance.

That night, the College began with long and uneventful introductions of the different abbots and their escorting masters, all pomp and ceremony that was expected to last through the dawn. This was the only event to which all the monks of the host abbey were invited, and so more than seven hundred had gathered in the great hall, along with the soldiers of the Allheart Brigade who had accompanied Abbot Je’howith.

Jojonah watched it from the back rows of seating, near the exit. He tried to keep an eye on Markwart, who, after the initial prayer and greeting, had retired to the shadows at the edge of the room. On and on it went, and Jojonah even considered running away on more than one occasion. How long might he be gone before Markwart and the others even realized that he had left? he wondered.

Truly that would have been the easier course.

He expected that the night would prove uneventful, and anticipated another long day in his private room, praying, but then held his breath when, just before the dawn, Father Abbot Markwart again took center stage.

“There is one matter which should be breached before the break,” the Father Abbot began. “One which all the younger brothers should hear openly addressed before they are dismissed from the College.”

Jojonah was on the move, swinging around the back of the seats and down the outside row, moving toward the central area. He took the course because it would bring him right past Braumin Herde.

“Listen carefully,” he instructed the immaculate, bending low as he passed. “Record every word in your memory.”

“It is no secret to you all that a most important matter, a most important crime, has plagued St. -Mere-Abelle and all of our Order for several years now, a crime that showed the true depth of its wickedness in the rising of the demon dactyl and the terrible war that has brought so much misery and suffering to our lands,” Markwart went on, his tone loud and dramatic.

Jojonah continued his slow walk toward the front of the hall. Many heads turned to regard him, many whispered conversations began in his wake, and he was not surprised, for he understood that his sympathies toward Avelyn were not secret, even beyond the walls of St.-Mere-Abelle.

And he saw Je’howith’s soldiers, Markwart’s stooges, gathered at the side and seeming eager.

“It is the most important declaration possible of this College of Abbots,” the Father Abbot finished powerfully, “that the man, Avelyn Desbris by name, be branded openly and formally as a criminal against the Church and state.”

“A call for heresy, Father Abbot?” asked Abbot Je’howith of St. Honce, sitting in the front row.

“Nothing less,” Markwart confirmed.

Murmurs erupted from every corner of the hall; heads shook and heads nodded, abbots and masters bending low in private conversations.

Jojonah swallowed hard, recognizing that his next step would lead him to a cliff face. “Is this not the same Avelyn Desbris who was once given the highest honor in all the Abellican Church?” he asked loudly, drawing the attention of all, particularly of Brother Braumin Herde. “Was it not Father Abbot Dalebert Markwart himself who named Avelyn Desbris as a Preparer of the sacred stones?”

“Another time,” Markwart replied, keeping his cool and calm tone. “More the pity, then, and farther the fall.”

“Farther the fall indeed,” Jojonah retorted, moving powerfully to the center stage to face his nemesis. “But it was not Avelyn who fell from grace.”

In the back of the room Braumin Herde dared to smile and nod his head; from the whispers and reactions of those nearby, it seemed to him as if Jojonah was doing quite well.

“Not only Avelyn, you mean!” Markwart said suddenly, ferociously.

Simple startlement made Jojonah pause, and that gave Markwart the opening he needed to sweep his proclamations back out to the entire audience. “Be it known here and now that the security of St.-Mere-Abelle was again breached this very summer,” the Father Abbot cried. “The prisoners I had secured to speak to you against Avelyn were stolen from my very grasp.”

More gasps than whispers came from the audience now.

“I introduce now Immaculate Brother Francis,” Markwart explained, a name that was not unfamiliar to the gathering—indeed, one of the points of contention that was expected to be raised later in the College concerned the man’s premature promotion.

Braumin Herde chewed hard on his lip as he recognized the pain on Jojonah’s face. He remembered his promise to his beloved Jojonah, though, pointedly telling himself again and again that this was exactly the scenario Jojonah had predicted. Out of love and respect for Jojonah, he had to remain silent, though if he had gotten one hint that this College might be swayed Jojonah’s way, he would have run down to stand beside the man.

That hint never materialized. Markwart’s questions were quick and to the point as he prodded Francis for information concerning the escape of the prisoners. Francis described Elbryan in great detail, and went on to confirm that demons had apparently inhabited the bodies of the Chilichunk couple.

And then he looked Jojonah right in the eye.

And then he fell silent.

Jojonah could hardly believe that the man had not betrayed him!

But Markwart still clung to his superior edge as he thanked and dismissed the brother, for he had only used Francis to setup his next witness, one of the guards Elbryan had overpowered, one who had crept up a bit along the side passage to get a glimpse of the intruders, and who could, and did indeed, identify Master Jojonah as a conspirator.

Jojonah fell silent; he knew that he would not be heard at that time no matter how loud his protests.

Abbot De’Unnero came next, detailing the events on the road that had allowed Jojonah to sneak away, opening a timetable during which the master could indeed have gone to St.-Mere-Abelle. “And I spoke with the merchant, Nesk Reaches,” De’Unnero insisted, “and confirmed that Master Jojonah had not returned to their encampment.”

A strange sense of calm began to wash over Jojonah, an acceptance that this indeed was a fight he could not win. Markwart had come here well-prepared.

He looked over at the fanatical Allheart soldiers and smiled.

Next Markwart called for one of Jojonah’s companions on the road to Aida, a monk who would no doubt explain to the gathering how Jojonah had manipulated the group away from Avelyn’s body.

Every piece seemed to be falling in place against him.

“Enough!” Jojonah cried, breaking the momentum. “Enough. I was indeed in your dungeons, evil Markwart.”

The gasps came louder, accompanied by more than a few shouts of anger.

“Freeing those imprisoned unlawfully and immorally,” Jojonah asserted. “I have seen too much of your wickedness. I watched it exact a toll upon gentle—yes, gentle and godly!—Avelyn. I saw it most keenly in the fate of the Windrunner.”

Master Jojonah paused with that last statement and even laughed aloud. Every abbot, master, and immaculate in this room understood, and approved of, the fate of the Windrunner, every leader in this room was complicit in the murders.

Jojonah knew he was doomed. He wanted to rail out against Markwart, to show the ancient texts that described the previous method of collecting stones, to scream out that Brother Pellimar, who had been on that journey to collect the stones, had also been murdered by this supposedly holy Church.

But there was no practical point to it, and he did not want to give everything away. He looked to Brother Braumin Herde then, the man who would take up his torch, and he smiled.

Markwart screamed again for a declaration of Avelyn as a heretic, then added that Jojonah, by his own admission, was a traitor to the Church.

And then Abbot Je’howith, the second most powerful man in the Order, rose tall and seconded the motion, and with a confirming nod from Markwart, motioned to his soldiers.

“By your own words you have committed treason against the Church and the King,” Je’howith proclaimed as the soldiers surrounded Jojonah. “Have you any offering of defense?” He turned about to face the congregation. “Will any others speak for this man?”

Jojonah stared up at the gathering, at Braumin Herde, and the man dutifully remained silent.

The Allheart soldiers swarmed over the master, and with Markwart and Je’howith’s blessings, so did many monks, beating him, dragging him away. As he was ushered out the door, he saw Brother Francis standing quietly, taking no part, seeming distressed and helpless.

“I forgive you,” Jojonah said to the man. “As does Avelyn, as does God.” He almost added the forgiveness of Brother Braumin, but could not go that far in trusting Francis.

And then he was gone, dragged from the room as the mob gained momentum.

Many were still in their seats, sitting quiet and stunned, including Brother Braumin. He caught sight of Francis staring up at him, but had only a glare to offer in return.

Later that same cold Calember day, Master Jojonah, stripped naked and placed in an open cage on the back of a wagon, was taken through the streets of St.-Mere-Abelle village, his porters crying out his sins and crimes to the nervous townsfolk.

Insults became spit, became stones hurled Jojonah’s way. One man ran up to the cart with a sharpened stick, stabbing the monk hard in the belly, opening a vicious wound.

Brothers Herde, Viscenti, and Dellman, and all the other monks of St.-Mere-Abelle, and all the visiting abbots and masters, watched it solemnly, some with horror, some with satisfaction.

For more than an hour Jojonah was carted about the streets, and he was a battered and broken man, hardly conscious, when the Allheart soldiers at last dragged him from the cart and lashed him to a stake.

“You are damned by your actions,” Markwart proclaimed above the frenzy of the excited crowd. “May God show you mercy.”

And the pyre was lit beneath Jojonah’s feet.

He felt the flames biting at his skin, felt his blood boiling, his lungs charring with every breath. But only for a moment, for then he closed his eyes and he saw . . .

Brother Avelyn, reaching for him with outstretched arms . . .

Jojonah never screamed, never cried out at all.

It was, to Markwart, the biggest disappointment of the day.

Braumin Herde watched the whole of the execution as the flames climbed higher, engulfing his dearest friend. Beside him, both Viscenti and Dellman turned to leave, but Herde grabbed them and would not let them go.

“Bear witness,” he said, and they were the last three monks to leave the awful scene.

“Come,” Braumin Herde bade them when at last it was over, when the flames had died away. “I have a book you must see.”

In the crowd of villagers, Roger Lockless also watched. He had learned much since his flight from the road south of Palmaris, from the monster that had destroyed Baron Bildeborough. In the last few hours alone, he had learned of Jojonah and the freeing of the half-man, half-horse prisoner, and while the news had given him hope, this sight had brought only despair and disgust.

But he watched, and understood then that the Father Abbot of the Abellican Order was indeed his enemy.

Far from that place, in the lands north of Palmaris, Elbryan held Pony close on an empty hillock, watching the rise of Sheila. The war with the monsters was over, but the war with the greater enemy, they both knew, was only beginning.

R. A. Salvatore was born in Massachusetts in 1959. He is the acclaimed author of the DemonWars trilogy: The Demon Awakens, The Demon Spirit, and The Demon Apostle, as well as Mortalis, Bastion of Darkness, the New York Times bestseller Star Wars® The New Jedi Order: Vector Prime, and the novel based on the screenplay, Star Wars: Attack of the Clones. He lives in Massachusetts with his wife, Diane, and their three children.

Visit the author’s Web site at www.rasalvatore.com

Books by R. A. Salvatore

THE FIRST DEMONWARS SAGA

The Demon Awakens

The Demon Spirit

The Demon Apostle

Mortalis

THE SECOND DEMONWARS SAGA

Ascendance

Transcendence

Echoes of the Fourth Magic

The Witch’s Daughter

Bastion of Darkness

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Copyright © 1998 by R. A. Salvatore

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Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 98-96542

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