"It might be the Elvenlords doing the retreating," Shana finished for him. "One of Dora's lair is helping them to find grazing and ore—and lately there have been small groups of 'wild' humans turning up who speak some dialect that the Iron People understand."
"Do you suppose they could be what is left of the Corn People?" Lorryn asked, his curiosity now piqued.
Shana shrugged. "They could just be Traders—we knew already that the Iron People have had some contact with Traders. Keman says they are slowly bringing in their families and dependents to join the encampment, and some of them have been saying it's safer than hiding in the wilderness. They do know farming, though—"
"Grazing—and farmers to help with crops." Lorryn pulled a grass stem to chew on it. "That would suit the Iron People down to the bone. They'd prefer to make a settlement, if they can. It's hard to run proper forges unless you're settled. Did you tell Mero about this new Elven commander?"
She nodded. "I told him to pass the information on, as he sees fit. There's been a complication; we really need to find a reliable source of iron. Mero and Rena can't do anything about finding some, and if we're going to keep the Iron People as allies, we have to get a dragon to find us a mine."
"That reminds me—we've got an iron-related problem of our own." Lorryn wished profoundly that Caellach Gwain wasn't at the heart of so many of his problems. "There is another problem among the wizards so far as Caellach Gwain and his cronies are concerned."
"The magic-twisting." Shana made a face. "Well, we've known about that for as long as we've had any amount of iron around us; you just increase your focus to get around the way the magic warps. Or you use the warp—I've seen Orien actually lob a levin-bolt around a corner! What's the problem?"
"Younger wizards can learn how to deal with it, because they're used to using semi-precious stones as focuses. Caellach just doesn't want the iron around, at all. So far as he's concerned, it's one more Change in the Way Things Were, and that's what he wants to go back to." Lorryn sighed, and felt his headache coming back. Why was it that so many of the problems seemed to begin and end in Caellach Gwain?
"He's just lazy," Shana snorted.
"Well—I agree, he is, but not all of the older wizards are, and they're having the same problems adjusting. And they aren't complaining, they're just suffering quietly."
"Suffering?" Shana raised a skeptical eyebrow.
"Well, not suffering then, but it's hard for the old ones. They aren't as fit, they aren't as healthy, and it's harder for them to learn new things. None of it's out of stubbornness." He felt very sorry for them—he'd seen some of them struggling to use a focus-stone to do things that pre-adolescents were accomplishing without a thought. He'd watched them suffer with aching joints and coughs and colds from living in caverns rather than the comfortable rooms of the old Citadel. Most importantly, he'd seen them disheartened and frustrated, thinking that after all of their years in hiding, they were now considered to be little better than useless.
"I know." It was her turn to sigh. "It's not fair, is it? If it wasn't for them, I wouldn't be here. But I don't know what to do about it. We can't stop things from changing—"
"No, but—let me think about this one." He offered her a shy smile. "You've said it yourself; you're the one that's good with plans and strategy, I'm the one that's good with people. Maybe we can find a way to turn all this to our advantage."
"How?" That skeptical look again—but this time he had just the glimmering of an idea, and he met her gaze firmly.
"I don't know—but there's always possibilities, as long as you keep your eyes open for them." And on that positive note, he got to his feet and offered her his hand. "Let's go take a walk and blow the cobwebs out of our brains before we go back to work."
"Cobwebs do get in the way of clear sight," she agreed, to his great pleasure. "And I could use a walk—with you."
And those last two words increased his pleasure tenfold.
15
Rena had been working hard most of yesterday, changing grasses and leaves with her elven magic into sweet treats with which the Iron People could lure in the young bulls for their first lessons in being accustomed to saddles and being ridden. Horses could be broken to saddle—it was not the best way to teach them, but it was successful—but bulls, never. Their stubborn natures and the great courage bred into their line made it impossible to break their spirit, so the only way to train them for their duties as war-bulls was to begin by tempting them, gently, into captivity, and rewarding them for every sign of cooperation with the one thing they always responded to food. More specifically, a treat, a taste they couldn't find on their own. Like people, cattle had a sweet tooth, and now that Rena was acting as an envoy to these people, she was determined to do everything that she could to bring the weight of debt over to the wizards' side of the scales. If that meant that she spent half a day changing grass into the goodies with which the bull-trainers could reward their animals, so be it.
The magic that elven ladies were traditionally trained in was a gentle art of transformation, which they usually used to tailor garments seamlessly to fit like silken skins, to sculpt flowers into gossamer and fantastic shapes, or to make other cosmetic changes. Rena had learned to use it to turn the relatively inedible into edible and tasty—and, at need, to stop a beating heart. It had lately occurred to her that she could also use it to start a heart that had stopped, or perhaps to cure disease or mend a wound, but she had not yet had the opportunity (or the courage) to try.
The normal noise of the camp woke her just after dawn; the sounds of voices and cooking, the far-off lowing of the cattle herds. She lived with the Iron Priest, Diric, and his wife Kala. The great friend of the Elvenbane Lashana, halfblooded Mero, who was openly courting Rena, also lived with them, but Kala watched over both of them with as stern an eye to propriety as if Rena was their own child. Diric and Kala had given them separate sleeping-chambers on opposite sides of the family tent. Rena found that reassuring; raised as a sheltered elven maiden, isolated, for the most part, from all males but her brother and father, she enjoyed Mero's attentions but she was also uncomfortably shy about being courted. Not that she wanted him to stop! By no means. But she was not yet prepared to go any further than a hesitant kiss or two.
Still, waking up in the cool of the dawn, with the bustle of the camp around her and a breath of breeze carrying the scents of grass and the smoke from dung-fires wafting under the skirts of the tent, she felt just a little lonely in her solitary bed.
Lorryn isn 't so shy—but then, Lorryn isn 't a girl. She sighed. I wish I was like Shana. Shana is always so strong, so brave, and she never worries about what people will think. She wondered if Shana and Lorryn shared a bed; she wondered, in the freedom of thought that being only half-awake lent to her, just what went on when one did share a bed. Mero's careful kisses and caresses sent strange sensations through her; pleasant, oh my yes, but strange. Surely it wasn't—well—like the cattle, or the birds of her garden....