His strong hands and penetrating voice parted the crowd. Pushing aside Qualinesti, Silvanesti, and Kagonesti alike, Planchet made his way to Morillon and asked where the Speaker could be found.
“Still abed, for aught I know. Rousing him is your job, I believe.” The haughty noble eyed Planchet’s scruffy human attire with distaste. “Where have you been anyway?”
The valet folded his arms and surveyed the assembly. Some of the elves were former senators of the Thalas-Enthia. Others were commoners, elevated by circumstance or the vote of their neighbors to become their representatives to the Speaker. Every face bore an expression of grave concern.
“I passed the night in the city, my lord, running and hiding from humans intent on cutting my throat,” he said.
Gasps circled the chamber. “Is the Khan turning against us?” asked a frightened senator.
The valet held up placating hands. “Don’t panic. The riot appears to have been started by followers of the Khurish god Torghan. When the Khan’s troops arrived to put down the fighting, they were told elves started it. Calm has been restored in the city, but I must report these events to the Speaker. He and the Khan need to meet to clarify what happened.”
“I must go to Sahim-Khan.”
All heads turned. Gilthas stood in the passage leading to his private rooms. Lord Morillon swept up to him.
“Great Speaker, you should not wait upon a barbarian lord like Sahim! Let him come to you. You have precedence as ruler of the most ancient race—”
“It’s his country, Morillon. I will go to Sahim-Khan as soon as he will receive me.”
Everyone spoke at once, some supporting Morillon’s attitude, others the Speaker’s. Woven through the discussion was frightened speculation about the possibility of war with the Khan’s army.
Hytanthas found his mind drifting. The debate raging around him sounded like the hum of bees disturbed in their hive. He was wrung out. He felt disconnected, distant. Then, unexpectedly, his gaze fell on a stranger.
Across the chamber, a stooped figure stood motionless amidst the milling elves. Covered in heavy layers of ragged brown robes, he was comically out of place, yet no one seemed to notice him. Senators moved around Hytanthas, bumping him occasionally, but they gave no sign of seeing the robed stranger. Hytanthas stared hard but could get no impression of a face, only a cowled darkness.
He called a warning. But the noise of the discussion had risen to such a level, he couldn’t even hear his own shouted words. Nor did any of the others seem to hear him. He began shouldering his way through the crowd, intent on reaching the cowled intruder. Was he a spy in the pay of Sahim-Khan, or another tool of Neraka? Whatever he was, he should not be here listening to the elves’ intimate councils.
As he reached the stranger, Hytanthas grabbed the dagger worn by a rugged-looking Kagonesti, the chosen representative of his tribe. Normally keenly aware, the Wilder elf didn’t react at all to Hytanthas’s theft of his weapon.
Closer now, he noted the stranger’s face was hidden in the depths of his hood, his hands tucked into his sleeves. Hytanthas seized him by the wrist. Or he tried. His hand passed through the intruder’s arm as though he was a ghost.
At last, the stranger took notice of him. The cowl turned toward Hytanthas and from it came a faint, startled query:
“You see me? How is that possible?”
Hytanthas tried shouting again, “Great Speaker, a spy!”
He found his own wrist gripped. The stranger’s hand was solid enough now, with long fingers and prominent joints. His hold was like the snap of a bear trap, swift and hard. Hytanthas protested and jerked his arm repeatedly, but couldn’t free himself.
“You had better come with me,” hissed the stranger.
Hytanthas finally caught a glimpse of the intruder’s face. It was dark, like polished wood, with a beak of a nose, thin lips, and eyes like none the elf had ever seen before. His eyes were dark brown—nearly black—from corner to corner. Hytanthas cried out in horror, and the cry rose in pitch as he noticed something even worse. Hanging down behind the hooded figure was a tail, bushy brown and fully three feet long.
At that moment, Gilthas glanced away from his wrangling advisors and his eye fell upon Captain Ambrodel. Hytanthas’s head was tilted back, his mouth slack. He held his left arm rigidly across his chest. Concerned, Gilthas called attention to the captain’s distorted posture.
The Kagonesti senator standing in front of Hytanthas turned and spoke to the young elf as Gilthas made his way across the room. But Hytanthas did not respond; his eyes remained closed.
The Speaker arrived, laying a hand on Hytanthas’s rigid arm. Instantly, the bizarre trance was broken. Hytanthas opened his eyes, staggered back, and fell unconscious to the floor.
Planchet knelt by him. “Fainted,” he said, attributing the incident to a lack of food and the rigors of the past few days.
At the Speaker’s direction, Planchet carried the unconscious elf to a spare room off of Gilthas’s own bedchamber. Excusing himself, telling his subjects to continue their discussion during his brief absence, Gilthas followed.
Planchet had placed the captain on a cot and was removing his boots. He looked up as the Speaker entered.
“I don’t think this was caused by simple weakness,” Gilthas said quietly, his expression grave.
He gently lifted Hytanthas’s left arm, the one the young elf had held so rigidly. The wrist bore red marks, as though strong fingers had held it in a crushing grip.
By strenuous riding through the night, the Weya-Lu band circled wide of the elves and got between them and the pass leading into the Valley of the Blue Sands. The normally empty foothills were alive with skulking scouts and reconnaissance parties from both sides, all feeling their way through unfamiliar territory with every nerve strained to detect the enemy. Adala had hoped to pick up reinforcements before meeting the Lioness again, but her messages to other tribes had gone unanswered. When the elven army was seen to be heading north from Khuri-Khan, the Tondoon and Mikku scouts had assured Adala’s scout of their tribes’ support. Unfortunately, those assurances had not yet generated anything of substance. No Tondoon or Mikku riders had arrived to bolster the Weyadan’s force.
Adala disregarded advice from both Etosh and Bilath that they wait a while longer, to give other tribesmen time to join them. The laddad must be punished for their foul deeds. They must be stopped and prevented from entering the hidden valley. The prophecy of the Oracle clearly warned of grave upheavals if the elves claimed the spot. The leader of the Weya-Lu carried several titles, one of the lesser-known being “Protector of the Blue Sands.” Until flow, this had seemed only an ancient, ceremonial distinction. With the incursion of the laddad, the title was gaining new significance. And overlaying everything else was the Weyadan’s unswerving, white-hot need for vengeance. The murderous foreigners had to be brought to account for their massacre of the nomad camp.
Most of the Weya-Lu accepted their leader’s judgment that the elves were responsible for the atrocity. A few, like Wapah and Bilath, were troubled by the lack of evidence linking the slaughter to the laddad, but even they had to admit there seemed no other explanation. Sahim-Khan certainly was ruthless enough, but he stood to gain nothing from the killing. Besides, his army was bottled up in the capital, watching the elven host and guarding against any sudden coup. Knights of Neraka or wayward bands of ogres or minotaurs might be responsible, but none were known to be in the area. The only foreigners in Khur were the elves, and elven cavalry had certainly been close by.