“This one,” Zystyl said, indicating the male. “Butcher him now, so that the horde may eat. You.” He turned to the female, who had sucked in a dry gasp of air at his words. “You may live, so long as you provide us with information.”
The male elf tried to squirm away, but a dagger sliced his neck and he fell without further sound. Matty shrieked so loudly that Zystyl bashed her across the face; the blow was powerful enough to knock her out. As a consequence, the captain was forced to wait, sulking, until she groaned and recovered consciousness.
And then she sobbed so hysterically that Zystyl was on the verge of slicing her throat, too, just for some peace and quiet. He restrained himself only because he so desperately needed knowledge about this world.
Instead, he contented himself by partaking of the feast that was already rejuvenating his army. The male elf was not plump, and the pickings were slim, but the very thought that the Delvers were in a region where there was fresh meat for the taking improved morale many times over.
Finally, they were able to get some pieces of information from the elfwoman. They would have to wait only a few hours before the Hour of Darken, as she called it. Zystyl judged that the Blind Ones would be able to tolerate the world then, at least until the Lighten Hour.
“We need to go to a place where there is a great cave,” he said, clacking his metal jaws in anticipation. “You will lead us to that place-or we will eat you.”
“I-I will show you the way,” the woman agreed. “There is a tunnel through the Ringhills, just such a great cave where you can hide from the sun.”
She described the tunnel, a long corridor of darkness that carried a road toward the city. Zystyl determined that the Delvers could reach that tunnel in one night of marching, so he settled his army to rest. When it was dark, they would commence the advance on the Metal Highway and its long, dark tunnel.
13
Battle of the Blue Swan
From hill they came, and miner’s deep to slay with axe and sword
And bold stood he the line to keep before the murd’rous horde
From The Ballad of the First Warrior
“We will stay here, on the lakeshore-but you must take word to the city,” declared Tamarwind.
Belynda nodded. For nearly twenty days she had accompanied Natac’s band on a grueling march through the hills. Now they had come to the edge of the lake, at the Blue Swan Inn, with the Silver Loom rising from its island across the causeway. The Lighten Hour was just past, and the spire gleamed with argent brilliance. The city structures, the manors and museums of so many hues of marble, stood impassive. In their eternal majesty Belynda could almost make herself believe that nothing had changed.
But in truth, everything had changed.
She was more tired than she had ever been in her life. After the first few days, during which she had ridden on the back of the centaur Gallupper, she had forced herself to walk on her own. Her shoes had tattered, been replaced by deerskin moccasins of Tamarwind’s making, as the company had fled from the Greens. They had skirted the edge of the Snakesea, knowing that the Crusaders had marched in pursuit. Then, though the tunnel of the Metal Highway had beckoned as an easy route back to the city, Natac had led his little force on a grueling trek through the Ringhills. The elves had not questioned his orders, and the objections of the two men-Owen and Fionn-had been overcome with a sharp rebuke from Miradel’s warrior.
Along the way Belynda had learned that Natac had a company of about a hundred elves, and that they had been joined by some twenty-five giants. During the long march back to Circle at Center the fighters had been in high spirits, encouraged by their success in bringing the sage-ambassador out of the enemy camp. Still, they were badly outnumbered by that foe, and their only battle experience was the brief skirmish that had freed Belynda. Led by their captain, the warrior from Earth, they had marched swiftly through the hills.
But they knew that Sir Christopher’s army had been on the move as well. Gallupper, Owen, and Fionn had held back from the main body and provided them with detailed reports of the knight’s progress. The human warriors had harassed the enemy column, bringing supplies and stealing horses at every opportunity. The young centaur, meanwhile, had served as messenger, carrying regular reports of the Crusader movements back to Natac and the elves. The Knight Templar had been following the same trail as the elves, and at last word he was no more than ten or twelve miles away from the lakeshore.
Now Natac had drawn up his little band beside that shore, at the start of the causeway. They occupied a small rise of dry ground. Before them was a stretch of marsh to the left, then a shallow stream linking to the lake. A small stone bridge crossed that stream. In order to attack, an enemy would have to come across the bridge, wade the stream, or slog through the marsh. Or, as Owen had pointed out, the attack could come from the lake, but the Viking had admitted that it was unlikely the Crusaders were bringing boats along the highway. The Blue Swan Inn, with its lofty verandas and sheltered harbor, was outside of Natac’s position. So was the great tunnel leading to the Metal Highway.
“Do you expect that he will try to attack you here?” the sage-ambassador asked Tam.
“Yes… and we will fight him,” Tamarwind said, trying bravely to sound casual about the whole notion of a battle. “Natac says that we must stop him here, for if we give him the causeway, we give him entrance to the city.”
“I think I can see that,” Belynda said. She had been paying attention as Natac continuously instructed his elves and giants, and she had begun to understand some aspects of strategy and tactics. “As soon as the Crusaders come down the hill, they will take the Blue Swan. But if you tried to fight at the inn, the enemy could come through the tunnel and attack you from behind.”
“Not to mention that we don’t have enough fighters to hold the inn,” said Tamarwind. “I hope they leave it alone.”
“They won’t,” Natac said grimly, joining the pair. He came up to Belynda and took her hand in his powerful fingers. “Now, Lady Elf, you must do as Tamarwind suggests-hasten to the city and raise the alarm. We will hold here for a time, but you must send reinforcements, as quickly as possible.”
“I will try,” she promised.
With only a few backward glances, she and Nistel made their way across the causeway. Thoughts of her enemy, of the hatred that blazed within her and of the violence that the Crusaders could wreak upon her beloved city, lent speed to her flight and urgency to her mission.
“It is a good tunnel, my lord,” reported one of the Crusader elves. “I myself have traveled it to Circle at Center. If we take it, we will be at the lakeshore in a day.”
“We will follow the tunnel,” Sir Christopher decided, looking at the wide roadway as it disappeared into the darkness. His black horse pranced nervously sideways in the face of the shadowy entrance, while the knight considered his tactical situation. “I want my centaurs and giants to follow them across the high trails. I want that witch, one way or the other!”
Indeed, when the knight remembered the way the elfwoman had seduced him, then escaped from his righteous vengeance, he could think of nothing except taking her again-with a culmination in the devil’s fire she so richly deserved. His hatred was a strange mixture of longing and revulsion, a memory of harsh pleasure and urgent desire that kept him awake for long hours in the night.
The Crusaders split into two parties, the goblins and elves forming a column for the march into the tunnel while the centaurs and giants took up the hilltop trail, following the tracks of the raiders who had so boldly attacked their camp. The knight rode behind the first company of a hundred goblins, urging speed as they entered the tunnel to find that it was very well lighted by floating globes of magical fire.