“Excuse me if I am so unmannerly as to dine in front of you,” said Sir Lathan.
“I’ve had nothing to eat or drink the last cycle.”
“We haven’t had much to eat ourselves,” said Paithan.
“Or drink,” Roland added, eyeing the knight’s full mug.
“There are other taverns in this town,” said Sir Lathan. “Taverns that serve your kind.” He looked up from his plate long enough to fix his eyes on the elf and the dwarf, then returned his attention to his food. He forked meat into his mouth, and washed it down with a drink, “More ale,” he shouted, looking around for the innkeeper. He banged his mug on the table and the innkeeper appeared, a sullen look on his face.
“This time,” said Sir Lathan, flinging the mug at the man’s head, “draw it from the good barrel. I won’t drink slop.”
The innkeeper scowled.
“Don’t worry. It will be paid for out of the royal treasury,” said the knight. The innkeeper’s scowl deepened. Sir Lathan stared coldly at the man. Retrieving the mug, which had clattered to the floor, the innkeeper vanished.
“So, you’ve come from the norinth, have you, elf. What were you doing there, with that.” The knight gestured with his fork in the direction of the dwarf.
“I’m an explorer,” said Paithan. “This man, Roland Redleaf, is my guide. This is Blackbeard. We met—”
“Drugar,” growled the dwarf. “My name is Drugar.”
“Uh, huh.” Sir Lathan took a bit, chewed, then spit the meat back into his plate. “Pah! Gristle. So what’s an elf doing with the dwarves? Forging alliances, perhaps?”
“If I was, it’s my business.”
“The lords of Thillia could make it their business. We’ve let you elves live in peace a long time. Some are thinking it’s been too long. My Lord among them.”
Paithan said nothing, merely cast a significant glance at the elven weapons standing among the knights’ own. Sir Lathan saw the glance, understood, and grinned. “Think we can’t get along without you? Well, we’ve come up with some devices that’ll make you elves sit up and take notice.” He pointed. “See that?
It’s called a crossbow. Drive an arrow through any type of armor you name. Even send it through a wall.”
“It will do you no good against the giants,” said Drugar. “It will be like throwing sticks at them.”
“How would you know? You met up with them?”
“They wiped out my people. Slaughtered them.”
Sir Lathan paused in the act of lifting a piece of bread to his mouth. He looked at the dwarf intently, then tore off a lit of bread with his teeth.
“Dwarves,” he muttered disparagingly, his mouth full. Paithan glanced swiftly at Drugar, interested in the dwarf’s reaction. Drugar was eyeing the knight with a strange expression; the elf could have sworn it was glee. Startled, Paithan began to wonder if the dwarf was insane. Considering this, he lost the thread of the conversation and only picked it up again when he heard the word SeaKings.
“What about the SeaKings?” he asked.
Sir Lathan grunted. “Keep awake, elf. I said that the tytans have attacked them. They’ve been routed, seemingly. The bastards actually had the nerve to beg us for help.”
The innkeeper returned with the ale, set the mug down in front of the knight.
“Back off,” Lathan commanded, waving a greasy hand.
“And did you send aid?” Paithan inquired.
“They’re the enemy. It could have been a trick.”
“But it wasn’t, was it?”
“No,” the knight admitted. “I guess not. They were soundly trounced, according to some of the refugees we talked to before we turned them away from the walls—”
“Turned them away!”
Sir Lathan lifted the mug, drank long and deep, wiped the back of his hand across his mouth, “What would happen if we sent sorinth for aid, elf. What would happen if we asked your people for help?”
Paithan felt a hot flush spread from his neck to his cheeks. “But you and the SeaKings are both human.” It was lame, but all he could think of to say.
“Meaning you’d help us if we were your kind? Well, you can make good on that one, elf, because we’ve heard rumors that your people in the Fartherness Reaches have been attacked, as well.”
“That means,” said Roland, quickly calculating, “that the tytans are spreading out, moving est and vars, surrounding us, surrounding Equilan,” he said with emphasis.
“I’ve got to go! Got to warn them,” murmured Paithan. “When do you expect them to reach Griffith?”
“Any day now,” said Lathan. Wiping his hands on the table-doth, he rose to his feet, the tyro armor making a clattering sound. “The flood of refugees has stopped, which means they’re all probably dead. And we’ve heard nothing from our scouts, which means they’re probably dead, too.”
“You’re being awfully cool about this.”
“We’ll stop them,” said Sir Lathan, buckling on his sword belt. Roland stared at the sword, with its honed, wooden blade and suddenly began to laugh, a high-pitched, shrill cackle that made Paithan shudder. By Orn, maybe the dwarf wasn’t the only one going crazy.
“I’ve seen them!” cried Roland, in a low, hollow voice. “I saw them beat a man…. He was tied up. They hit him and hit him”—his voice rose, fists clenched—“and hit him and—”
“Roland!”
The human was curling up, body hunching over, fingers twitching spasmodically. He seemed to be falling apart.
“Roland!” Paithan flung his arms around the man, gripped the shoulders hard, fingers digging into the flesh.
“Get him out of here,” said Sir Lathan, in disgust. “I’ve no use for cowards.” He paused a moment, considering his words, Tolling them in his mouth as if they tasted bad. “Could you get weapons to us, elf?” He asked the question grudgingly.
No, Paithan was on the verge of saying. But he stopped the words, nearly biting off his tongue to keep them from blurting out. I need to reach Equilan. Fast. And I can’t if I’m going to be stopped and questioned at every border between here and Varsport.
“Yes, I’ll get you weapons. But I’m a long way from home—” Roland lifted a ravaged face. “You’re going to die! We’re all going to die!” Other knights, hearing the commotion, peered in the window. The innkeeper’s face had gone livid. He began to babble, his wife started to wail. Sir Lathan put his hand on his sword, loosened the blade in its scabbard. “Shut him up before I run him through!”
Roland shoved the elf aside, bolted for the door. Chairs toppled, he overturned a table, and nearly knocked down two knights trying to stop him. At Lathan’s gesture, they let him pass. Glancing through a window, Paithan saw Roland ^tagger-ing down the street, weaving on unsteady feet like a drunken man.
“I’ll give you a permit,” said Lathan.
“Cargans,[26] as well.” The elf pictured the puny barricades, imagined the tytans smashing through them, walking over them as if they were nothing but piles of leaves thrown in their path. This town was dead.
Paithan made up his mind. I’ll take Rega to Equilan-with me. She won’t go without Roland, so I’ll take him back, too. He’s not a bad fellow. Not really.
“Cargans enough to carry me and my friends.”
Sir Lathan was scowling, obviously not pleased.
“That’s the deal,” Paithan said.
“What about the dwarf? He one of your friends, too?” Paithan had forgotten about Drugar, standing silently beside him the entire time. He looked down, to see the dwarf looking up, the black eyes flickering with that queer, gleeful gleam.
“You’re welcome to come with us, Drugar,” said Paithan, trying to sound as if he meant it. “But you don’t have to—”
“I’ll come,” said the dwarf.
Paithan lowered his voice. “You could go back to the tunnels. You’d be safe there.”
“And what would I go back to, elf?”
Drugar spoke quietly, one hand toyed with his long, flowing beard. The other hand was hidden, thrust into his belt.
26
An extremely large, squirrellike animal that can bound swiftly over flat plains on all fours or can glide from treetop to treetop, utilizing a winglike flap of skin, connecting its front and hind legs.