Duele, Evunn and the ClawBound were outside, dealing with the bodies, offering them up to Tual. Auum couldn't bring himself to join them, unsure whether those that had perpetrated this crime against the elven races should be consumed by the forest denizens. So he stayed to clean and he wouldn't be satisfied until the floor ran with the blood from his own raw hands.
It was late in the afternoon when Auum had scoured the temple enough and the stone shone clean. He and his Tai had raised the marble hand and it sat next to the stump to which it had been attached. They had collected every chip of marble from pool and floor. All that remained missing was dust and the thumb fragment. And Duele had reported many writings gone from the temple's chambers of contemplation, compounding the desecration.
Examining the tent the strangers had pitched to the left of the apron before tearing it and its contents to shreds, the Tai had found food and equipment for more than the twenty-one they had killed and the two they would soon hunt. It seemed clear that others had run too, and almost certainly north. It was critical that all these strangers were found, killed and searched. This was too big for one TaiGethen cell and one ClawBound pair. Auum brought his Tai together, and after their prayers had been offered and their fast of the day broken, he told them of his decision.
'We will track the two we saw,' he said. 'They will lead us to others. The ClawBound pair can start now if they will. We will wait for our brother TaiGethen and the Al-Arynaar. Many are close, I can feel it.'
He stopped to chew a mouthful of food.
'Yniss has set us the stiffest of tests and we must not fail. Every elf depends upon us. All that was taken from here must be returned. Let no one and nothing stand in our way. But do not indulge in retribution or revenge while our task is upon us. Those may come later. Rest now, for when we begin again we must not pause until the harmony is restored. Are you both full well?'
They knew what he asked them, whether the spiritual unease they felt had affected them physically or mentally. Both nodded their heads.
'Do not be silent if you should change. I will talk to the ClawBound. '
Auum flowed to his feet and walked across the apron to where the elf and panther sat at the edge of the forest. The heavily muscled sleek black feline had her paw on the bones of a large rodent and was chewing the flesh. Beside her, the elf crunched on raw vegetables.
'You saw the two?' asked Auum.
The ClawBound turned their heads to him as one, their eyes on him, the panther's yellow and hooded, the elf's a deep dark green. The elf nodded.
'You understand what we seek? All must die. All that was taken must be returned. Will you track the two for us?'
Another nod.
'Tual watch over you. We will not be far behind you.'
Auum returned to his Tai. Behind him, the ClawBound slipped silently back into the forest.
Chapter 19
Two more days. Two more days of heat, rain, sweat, flies, snakes, lizards, spiders, rats and bickering men. Erienne hardly slept a wink that first night and the next was no better. She spent the days staring into the waters of the River Ix as the guide took them away from the main flow and up countless turns, branches and tributaries. By the end of the second day, she was so unsure of their overall direction, she had to keep checking their position by the sun.
This was surely some form of elaborate torture designed for a purpose she couldn't guess. The land was hell above ground, the skies disgorged rain that stung her head through the hood of her cloak, and everywhere there were animals large and small obsessed solely with killing her should she make one false move. Even the brightly coloured frogs, Ren had told her cheerfully, could unintentionally end her life.
And so, when they did land, for a break or for that dreaded second night, Erienne was scared every time she put her foot down, stretched out an arm to steady herself or sat on a log to eat around the fire. Even had she wanted to, she couldn't have sustained a conversation. Her concentration was broken by every rustle and crack in the undergrowth and every call of every animal. It made her temporarily useless as a mage, and already Denser and Ilkar had become a little irritable that the cleansing and gentle healing spells they had to cast were not being shared equally.
She tried telling herself that the threat couldn't be everywhere, that she was simply overreacting to an alien situation. She stared long at Ren and Ilkar, who seemed so completely at ease. And at Kayloor, respectful of the forest but comfortable. At Hirad and The Unknown, who accepted their situation with trademark phlegmatism, and at Thraun, who absolutely loved it and whose hunting instincts were sharper than ever, back beneath trees where he felt he belonged.
But she could turn to Denser and Darrick because she knew, without having to ask, that the strangeness affected them too. Her only other option was to retreat into her mind alone, which was even more distressing filled as it was with Lyanna. Being apart from her daughter's grave had broken the direct association but nothing would ever dim the memories. Her desperation was as keen as ever, and those scant moments when her memories brought her joy were scarce jewels in the desert. But she couldn't cry. Not here. This place didn't understand her pain, and her tears and rage would be wasted.
To distract herself as they sailed, she tried to imagine what lay beneath them. Ilkar and Ren had been fulsome in their descriptions and she had bought it all, fuel for her fears. The shoals of flesh-eating fish that scented blood from ten miles' distance. The thirty-foot crocodiles with jaws strong enough to pierce plate mail. The invisible creatures that burrowed into flesh and laid their young to grow fat on host blood.
She imagined war beneath the impenetrable surface. The flashing of scales in the dance of life. And seeing one of the armoured beasts surge from the river to take a tapir as it drank fed her fantasies until she expected a fanged head to spear through the floor of the boat and take them all to the terrible drowning death that dominated her nightmares.
But instead they landed for good in the late afternoon of the third day at a shallow beach fringed with palms and waving grasses, home to three dozen and more fishing boats and open canoes.
'Home,' said Ilkar, leaping onto the land and staring up the beach.
'About bloody time,' said Hirad, following him to stand with hands on hips.
Erienne felt a rush of relief. She needed to lie under a roof, in something more substantial than a hammock. The light was beginning to fade, she was tired, hungry and could no longer ignore the growing pulse in her head as a passing ache. It had been coming on for days. At least now she could hope for a little privacy and security to sort it out.
'It's beautiful,' said Ren, slipping an arm around Ilkar's waist.
A flight of red-backed parrots passed over them, heading for the cloud-shrouded green heights and the falls they could just make out in the distance.
'Naturally,' said Ilkar.
'He's going to tell us it's a five-mile swamp hike through snake-infested forest to his front door,' grumbled Denser, though he was smiling. He looked down at Erienne, his expression sobering. 'Are you all right, love?'
'Damn fool question,' said Erienne, feeling the comfort of his closeness and empathy.
'You know what I mean.'
'Later,' she said.
'The village is literally just over the rise here,' said Ilkar, pointing up the bank through which a path had been well trodden, its shingle all but covered in mud.
Erienne followed his arm and could see the odd plume of smoke rising into the heavy sky. It was getting very hot again. She felt the sweat prickling on her and had a sudden longing for winter and the cold. Even the rain here was hot enough to bathe in.
The Unknown and Aeb had hauled all of their kit from the boat under the scowling gaze of Kayloor.