'And the temple doors?'
'It'll be carnage. Sheth spent a lot of energy on that ward. It's big. If we should die in the fight, don't touch it until you get a replacement mage.'
'Didn't you tune elves out of the triggers?' Rebraal frowned.
'In the apron wards yes, but we can't risk a smart stranger circumventing the ward by forcing an elf to open the temple doors, so anything bigger than a panther will trigger it.'
Rebraal nodded, stopped and turned a slow circle on the slippery stone apron. He could see the archer positions, he knew the ward trigger points. They'd done all they could. Yniss would see them safe or let them die for a greater purpose. He had to believe that, though it sat harsh in his mind.
The Al-Arynaar shouldn't rely on any God. They were placed here by Yniss to succeed.
'Come on. You need to get your head down,' he said, ushering Erin away to the hammocks they'd slung under the archer positions. 'I need to relieve Rourke on the path.'
But the strangers didn't delay long enough. Rebraal ran into Rourke, who was chasing back up the path, slightly out of breath and very scared. They were coming slowly, travelling by lantern light in the relative cool of night-time. Their pace would bring them to the temple apron an hour before dawn and well before the elves could expect Mercuun. The nine would take on, according to Rourke's count as he had watched them pass below him from the sanctuary of a palm tree, one hundred and thirty-two. Mainly warriors but with ten who were obviously mages.
Tension replaced quiet calm as the reality of the attack overtook the hope that somehow the strangers would be deflected, or that perhaps they were not here to find the temple at all. All the Al-Arynaar had had these thoughts but they seemed foolish now. There was nothing else of interest here for hundreds of square miles and Rebraal doubted they had come to map the mangrove swamps, the volcanic region to the south or the course of the three huge, sluggish rivers that wound their way through the vast rainforest from the northern coastal ports to the southern deltas where desert gave way to lush vegetation again after a thousand miles.
But why had the TaiGethen not found them and dealt with them? And why had the ClawBound not warned him days before?
The leader of the Al-Arynaar visited the platforms for the last time, reminding the archers to pick their targets and not to begin until the wards had caused maximum confusion. And when their stocks of arrows were exhausted, they were to wait for the signal, the threat call of the grey monkey, before moving to attack from the rear with swords, hoping to force whoever remained into the doors of the temple. To the mages, he had given the task of occupying their enemy counterparts, using spells that demanded magical shielding.
Everything else was in the lap of Yniss.
And so they waited and listened, pairs of elves in three of the four platforms that overlooked the apron, and Rebraal himself with the fourth pair, Sheth'erei and Skiriin. They took it in turn to rest in the hammocks below, while all around the forest hummed with anticipation. The denizens of the rainforest and their God, Tual, knew that evil stalked the ground and the calls were of warning and of danger.
As the very first vestiges of light were edging across the top of the canopy and filtering dimly through to the forest floor, the humidity increased dramatically, the darkness of night was abruptly restored to the sky and the rain came. It was harder than Rebraal had ever remembered; it fell in drops that tore weaker leaves apart, exploded on the ground and crashed among the broad boughs of the trees above to trigger miniature waterfalls as leaves sagged and dropped their loads of water.
On the archer platforms, with skins pulled across to deflect the worst of the deluge which was unrelenting for approaching an hour, the Al-Arynaar peered out at the wall of water falling all around them.
'Gyal is angry,' said Skiriin.
Rebraal nodded. The capricious God of the rain who could withhold her life-growing nectar at a whim was venting her fury on the strangers now. Rebraal gave a silent prayer of thanks but knew they would need much more than that.
'Rebraal, look,' hissed Sheth.
She pointed through the murk of the rain, which was now beginning to ease. Soon it would stop altogether and the sky would clear. Such was the way of the forest. There was lantern light out there. Blurred and dim but unmistakable. No torch would have stood up to the rain and Rebraal was surprised that lanterns had. Presumably, they'd been sheltered.
The call of the brown tree frog filtered across the apron. Rourke had seen them too.
'Sheth, be ready,' said Rebraal.
'I will.'
The mage sat cross-legged on the platform and closed her eyes. Through her mind she would now be seeing the mana shapes that made up the wards. So would Erin'heth. On the front of the apron, the wards would be activated only when enough of the strangers had crossed them. Every other spell was already active and waiting for the ignorant step of men who shouldn't be there and would learn that fact only in death.
Rebraal watched almost hypnotised as the bobbing lights approached. The sky was clearing quickly as the clouds dispersed, their cargo discharged. The strangers appeared as shadows within shadows, a hulking darkness in the forest growing larger with every pace. But soon he could pick out features, a growth of beard, a low forehead, the glint of weapons and mail, chains on a pair of boots.
Quickly he checked at his feet, saw his bow wrapped in leathers and his quiver of arrows, similarly protected. He stooped to remove the coverings, testing the tension in the string as he did and upending the arrows to stand their tips in a dish of blood poison. All they had to do was hit their targets. Nature would do the rest before the Al-Arynaar had to draw their swords and attack one to one.
'Now it starts,' he said.
Next to him, Skiriin, first arrow nocked and ready, nodded nervously. The first strangers broke cover and stepped tentatively onto the flags of the apron. They spread into a loose line twenty men wide, all with weapons drawn, all moving with the cautious assurance of experienced soldiers, eyes everywhere as they advanced towards the temple.
Around them the forest was hushed, but the quiet was broken by a sharp warning from one of the strangers. One of the mages. A quick exchange followed and the attackers began to scatter.
'They've divined the wards,' said Rebraal. 'Now, Flynd. It's got to be now.'
Upwards of fifty men were on the apron when the southern perimeter wards were activated and tripped in the same heartbeat. Simultaneously, the scattering force ran into areas covered by wards already set and the apron became a furnace.
Explosions ripped along the length of the stone, hurling bodies into the air, showering others with lethal flame and rippling the stone itself. A wall of flame grasped at the sky, climbing fifty feet into the air, cutting off those on the apron from any help and forcing them towards the temple. Rebraal could see figures wreathed in flame staggering blind, dying and confused, and their wails and desperate shouts echoed against the blank unsympathetic walls of the surrounding forest.
The trapped tried to flee but more explosions held them in. Bodies were littering the apron now as steam hissed in great clouds into the sky. Around the edges of the apron, the rest of the strangers were running, looking for ways to save their comrades, shouts and cries lost in the roar of another FlameWall carving at the dawn. But for those on the apron, there would be no salvation and Shorth would see them to torment in death.
'Wait, Skiriin, wait,' whispered Rebraal, hearing the elf's bow tense.