The prospect did not alarm the great troll. Instead, the thought of such a battle gave him a sense of pleasant anticipation, together with a self-congratulatory nod for his shrewd analysis of the enemy's situation. This way, Baatlrap's army would be ready to face the pursuing humans in a fair fight, at a place of the troll lord's choosing.
"Stop the march!" he shouted to the humanoid monsters of his command. "We meet the humans here!"
Finellen tried to conceal her worry from the rest of her troops and from her human and elven companions. She wasn't entirely successful in either case.
"It's going to be tough to catch them, isn't it?" Hanrald asked softly, leading his war-horse along the trail beside the dwarven captain.
"Aye," she grunted sourly. "They move so damned fast. Even a whole night's forced march puts us two leagues behind them!"
The column of dwarves had unquestioningly followed their leader's command, tromping grimly through the night. Hanrald had ridden or walked along with them in silent amazement, for the doughty warriors stumped along at an exhausting rate hour after hour, and yet not one of them raised a voice in complaint or showed any sign of faltering. Brigit's scouting report had indicated that the monsters camped at dusk, and this news propelled all of them into a steady, draining pace.
Before sunrise, the dwarves paused for an hour's rest. Some tried to nap for a few minutes, while others simply stretched muscles battered and bruised from long days on the trail. Brigit rode forth on her fleet mare, ready as always to scout the enemy force. Shortly after her departure, however, the druid Danrak entered the camp with news that alarmed them all.
The monsters, he told them, broke camp even before the coming of daylight. Once again they marched away from the dwarves, increasing the distance between the two forces faster than Finellen and her warriors could close it.
"Still, are you sure it's as bad as all that?" questioned the earl as he and Finellen made their way along the trail. "After all, Brigit hasn't gotten back yet. She might have some good news."
Finellen shook her head in frustration and disappointment. "You heard what Danrak said. They were already on the march an hour before dawn!"
The courageous druid, Hanrald knew, had been observing the camp of the trollish army from nearby vantage points in the brush and trees, no doubt concealed in the body of some fleet forest creature, perhaps a rabbit or squirrel, or maybe even a sparrow or jay. Such disguises had enabled him to give them excellent reports on each of the monsters' camps and their subsequent lines of march.
"Same direction as yesterday, I assume?" the Earl of Fairheight queried.
"Yup. They're heading for the Gray Headlands!" Finellen said disgustedly. "It looks like they'd take the axe all the way to the Sword Coast if they could swim!"
The day after the ravage of the town, the raiders had marched northeast, staying near the shore of Gwynneth. Though the beasts had looted a few small fishing villages-isolated huts and cottages, for the most part-there were no sizable villages in their immediate path. Still, the eastern shore of the island was populated far more heavily than was the north, so it wouldn't take long before the giant humanoids would begin to encounter victims aplenty.
Hanrald knew, too, that even the hardy dwarves couldn't handle another night of marching. It seemed that, by acting upon his advice, Finellen might have missed her chance for the fight that she so desperately wanted. The long-legged troops of the enemy were just too fast for the dwarves.
Something moved in the trees before them, and then, as she always did, Brigit and her mare materialized. Hanrald's heart jumped with relief as she shrugged away his helping hand to dismount on her own.
"How far ahead are they?" Finellen inquired grumpily. Then something on the sister's knight's face gave the dwarf-woman pause. "What is it? Do you have news?"
"I do, at that," the Llewyrr woman reported. She shook her head in amazement, as if she didn't believe what she was going to say.
"I saw them on the march. They kept on for several hours, into the midmorning. Then, for some reason that I can't figure out, they just stopped. They're waiting near the coast, barely a league and a half away."
"I don't like blundering along in this bottomland. It's too easy for it to drop into a bog," Alicia announced with concern.
Following behind her, Keane cursed as a thorny branch slashed back across his face. "And getting more tangled with every step!" he added sourly.
The two of them pressed forward, ahead of the main body of troops. They had been forced to leave their horses some distance behind but continued to explore in the hope that the ground would open up.
Abruptly Alicia stumbled, a loud sucking noise following her foot from the ground. She grasped a tree trunk for balance as Keane saw that she stood ankle deep in brown muck. Flies buzzed around them, and the air pressed close and humid.
"Help!" cried the princess, suddenly in real distress as her feet continued to sink.
Keane reached for her hand and pulled, but it took all of his strength to break the princess free of the clutching mire. Finally he jerked backward and Alicia came free, falling into his arms as he collapsed against the rough bark of a tree trunk.
Exhausted, he held her, and she was content to lie in his arms as they gradually caught their breath. Finally, in a regretful moment for Keane, she sat up and brushed the hair back from her face before she looked at her mud-stained boots.
"Thanks," she said, squeezing his hand. "That stuff surprised me." His heart swelled, and he wanted the moment to last forever.
"Let's rest a bit," Keane urged gently. I want to be here alone with you! his mind whispered. It was a selfish reason, but the mage told himself that the princess really did look exhausted.
"Yes. It's nice to sit still for a moment," she agreed softly.
She looked at him, and her deep, bright eyes filled his vision and his heart. Again he felt the urge to take her into his arms, to cover her mouth with kisses, but his innate reserve would not weaken enough for him to act.
And then, in the next instant, her thoughts had turned back to the men under her command. "It doesn't seem that we can go any farther this way," she said. "We'll have to chance the course to the east."
Keane nodded, reluctantly turning to practical matters. "I think you're right, though it surprises me to find this much of a swamp here. Are you sure eastward is the course you want to follow?"
"Father must have encountered this morass too," Alicia continued. "If we halt the men here and explore to either side, we'll probably lose a whole day!"
Keane nodded. Even if he used magic-a spell of flying, for example, to carry him birdlike over the tangled fen-he would need the remaining hours of daylight to complete a moderately thorough reconnaissance. Those would be precious hours when the men of Corwell would not be marching. He well understood Alicia's desire to keep moving. The welfare of King Kendrick had become a growing concern to the magic-user as well. Privately he grew increasingly concerned that they hadn't come upon any sign of the king's passage. It was a fact that did not bode well for their chances of eventually finding Tristan, the mage suspected.
"So all I can do is try to guess at his track," Alicia concluded. "Codscove must lie to the east of here, and that seems like the most logical place for him to go!"
They followed the tangled trail back to the main body of the troops. There, the Exalted Inquisitor, still clad in his immaculate white robe, greeted them with expressions of concern.