The Aelen Kofer did not mind the wolves, either. Foursomes crouched in a little shielded square and hacked at anything in reach. When one square broke under a torrent of wolves the dwarves just rolled up in balls and let their armor protect them while crossbows elsewhere worked on their attackers.
Februaren asked, “Why would the Bastard think wolves would be effective against people in armor?”
Heris snapped, “He doesn’t get many visitors wearing armor?”
Iron Eyes told her, “He doesn’t get any wearing Aelen Kofer armor. These beasts would shred regular mail like rotted cloth. You two get into the center, here. You aren’t wearing Aelen Kofer armor.”
Iron Eyes’s party formed concentric circles round Heris and Februaren.
The wolves came. All of them. Once. They tried leaping the outer ring. Many suffered from upward thrusts of spear, sword, or ax. But they were amazing jumpers. Several smashed into dwarves of the inner circle, on the fly, and bowled the Aelen Kofer over.
Februaren took Heris’s hand. They turned sideways. They then stood inside the tree line of the woods beyond the fence and observed.
The dwarves of the outer circle did not break discipline. They did not turn to help those behind them. They let Iron Eyes and his companions dispatch the wounded wolves.
The two parties paralleling the road stopped to lend supporting fires.
The wolves recognized failure quickly. The biggest and darkest howled. The survivors raced away, too fast to be targeted. Their tails were down but not so far as to concede defeat.
Heris and Februaren rejoined Iron Eyes. Who said, “That’s a damned useful trick, old-timer. You sure you can’t teach me?”
“Not if you insist on remaining Aelen Kofer.” He did not mention having noted that Aelen Kofer had more pathways to their own world than they admitted. How else to explain their company being more numerous now than when it had left the Realm of the Gods? It expanded only when there were no humans around to see it happen.
Februaren had a feeling the journey would have gone faster and more comfortably had the Aelen Kofer understood middle-world geography. They could have done the overland part in their own world, in a more gracious climate.
Februaren did not raise the subject. Iron Eyes would admit nothing.
Allies need not share every secret.
Iron Eyes said, “It’s too late for me to pick something else to be. This is your world. Have you ever seen so many wolves in one place?”
“No. I can’t imagine a pack numbering sixty or seventy.”
“Definitely not natural.”
There were seventeen dead wolves. Injured animals disappeared into the wood. The rest remained out of range but watchful. Respectfully opportunistic.
Heris said, “That’s not natural, either. And they aren’t interested in us because they’re hungry.”
The wolves all radiated health. They were well fed and well groomed.
Februaren asked, “What next?”
Iron Eyes said, “We go kick the door in and yell, ‘Surprise!’”
“That does sound like fun. Heris and I will be right behind you.”
Iron Eyes awarded the old man a narrow-eyed, sour, almost suspicious scowl. But he got his people moving. The crows raged in protest but kept their distance. Death came suddenly when a bird ranged too near the Aelen Kofer.
Likewise, the wolves. Awaiting their chance.
The bolt from an Aelen Kofer crossbow moved so fast you might only note a flicker before it hit you.
A grim, gray little castle lay at the heart of the wood. It looked deserted. Its drawbridge was down and had been for so long that weeds had crept in over its edges. The moat was turgid but the water did move. Barely. It was not frozen, nor was it more than two feet deep, but it was thick. The bottom was foul, loose mud that went down at least that much farther.
The surface of the drawbridge boasted dried leaves, a few dried weeds that had grown between the timbers, and several dangerous patches of ice. Around it, for thirty feet, lay a scatter of human bones.
Iron Eyes grumbled. “Those bones. I remember. Did you plan to remind me before… What?” The crows had gotten excited.
Two elderly men had appeared on the drawbridge. One carried a rusty old bill, the other a lance that had seen its best days centuries ago. They lacked no confidence. They prepared to hold the bridge.
Iron Eyes muttered something about mercy for the mad. But he did not get carried away. “Shift them without hurting them. If they won’t be shifted, make them a feast for wolves and crows.”
The latter were in the air, excited.
Iron Eyes had used the dwarf language. The old men heard. They seemed amazed. Then decided they were overmatched after all. They went back inside, pursued by the derision of crows.
The entrance loomed dark as a fathomless cave.
Iron Eyes again asked, “You were going to keep me from marching straight in, weren’t you?”
“I don’t know. Maybe. On the other hand, it might be instructive to see how Aelen Kofer mail stands up to a falcon’s bite.”
The old man was guessing, based on Piper’s speculations. Layers of hearsay and imagination could be hiding something but it seemed most reasonable to suspect the presence of firepowder weapons. Which he had explained to Iron Eyes when the expedition was forming. “You see any unusual bones around here?”
“I see a lot that are busted up strange. You mean the striped creature? Like the ones that tried to invade the Realm of the Gods?”
“Yes.”
“They don’t look so different with the meat off.”
“Extra fingers and toes.”
“There’s that. But the small bones are scattered, probably for miles. But sometimes theirs are black. Don’t ask why. We found out getting rid of the ones we dealt with before. How should we do this? Can you just pop inside?”
“No. I don’t know what I’d be jumping into. There might be spells to make me unhappy. But I could get up on the wall… Girl!”
Heris turned, perched amongst panicky crows, looked down, turned again to rejoin Februaren and Jarneyn. “Not one falcon, Double Great. Two. One the kind Piper calls a hound. The big kind he got rid of because they worked so bad at Clearenza. The old men are beside them with torches. I didn’t see anybody else. If it wasn’t for them I’d say the place was deserted.”
Februaren told Iron Eyes, “Move your people out of the way, now.” He indicated an arc, narrow end at the gate, that he thought should be dwarf-free. “And tell them there’s going to be a lot of noise. These machines talk loud.”
Heris asked, “What’s the plan?”
“We get those people to think the whole mob is charging in. They fire. Then the whole mob charges in.”
Februaren and Iron Eyes made the arrangements. Crows and wolves observed, remaining at a safe distance. The crows kibitzed. An occasional wolf crawled forward, got hold of a fallen pack mate, dragged it away until one of the Aelen Kofer decided to object. Iron Eyes told Februaren, “That’s clever. The perfect trick.”
It tricked no one.
Iron Eyes, not counting chickens, already had another plan running. Some of his people brought rails from the fence. Wolves paced them but took no risks.
Heris wanted a look at the countryside roundabout. She went up top, came back down. “The wolves are waiting for something.” The beasts were gathering out where they could not be seen, with numerous comings and goings. At least two dozen more had come from somewhere.
“Probably expecting the Bastard.”
Aelen Kofer work parties used fencing to bridge the moat off to the right of the gate. They started building a ladder. Heris told them, “Wait.” She took a coil of rope from a dwarf, turned sideways, then dropped one end from the top of the wall. A half-dozen dwarves swarmed up. They climbed like monkeys despite the clutter they carried.
Those six readied their crossbows, stepped forward, sighted on the two old men. Then dove back so violently that one knocked Heris right off the wall. She did miss the makeshift bridge. Which meant an intimate encounter with icy, nasty, shallow water. She came up cursing, turned sideways, got back up top in time to watch a fog of burned firepowder clear from the little courtyard. Dripping, starting to shudder in the breeze, she demanded, “Anybody hurt?”