“Our beasts turned crazed as well.” Bera picked up the tale somberly. “We were by the streams above the marsh where the Forest narrows, cutting rush and reed, waiting for the moons to bring the mickelfish to spawning. They came down from the heights, called us foul names and killed all they could catch. But Mountain Men never come to the marshes, never once, not in all the years I have traveled that way!” He remembered what he had started to say. “We might have fled through the mosses, but our animals turned against us. They went wild, kicking and biting anyone who dared approach. It was worse than the cursed thirst.” Bera shook his head, bemused. “Some died where they stood, hearts burst with the terror.”
“That’s what happened to our horses,” I told him, “when we were attacked.”
“That is no magic I could work,” Usara spoke earnestly. “My powers are over the elements that make up the world that you see, the air, the earth, fire and water. Had I wished to attack your Folk as they worked in a marsh,” he turned to Bera, all fervent honesty, “I would have raised the water against them, turned the mud to liquid beneath their feet to trap them, woven a fog to baffle—”
“That’s not exactly reassuring them, Usara,” I interrupted. Apak was fingering a dagger at his belt and an unease encircled us like the cold wind presaging a storm.
“Wizardly magic has no power to reach into the mind,” Gilmarten spoke up suddenly, his Soluran lilt turning heads. “This is a new and evil enchantment.”
“Or an ancient one in the hands of evil men,” I corrected him. Guinalle and her scholars might be using their Artifice this side of the ocean someday.
“If you are wizards, can your magic help us?” demanded a voice from somewhere. Ominous expectation hovered like a threat of thunder.
“My vows to Lord Astrad, that is, we are forbidden—and I don’t think I would be able to argue that the Forest is without the King’s laws—” Gilmarten looked stricken.
Usara’s pallor wasn’t only due to his wound. “I could not act without sanction from Planir.”
“Not to attack these Mountain Men,” continued Darni smoothly. “Clearly, any mage may act in defense of himself or the helpless.” He nodded politely to Usara but the smile that curled his lip looked more like the warning snarl of a mastiff to me.
I wouldn’t have thought it possible for Usara to go any paler but he managed it. Harile leaned forward to bruise a pungent leaf under the mage’s nose. The wizard coughed with irritation but it struck a spark of color from his angular cheekbones.
“Scrying can tell us where the Mountain Men are camped,” Darni spoke on with barely a pause. “Their movements will hint at their plans and we can certainly make sure we keep out of their path. But isn’t it time we started taking this fight to them?”
Bera and Apak exchanged uncertain looks but a fair few of the rest looked at Darni with new hope rising above their despondency. He could play this hand if he wanted, I decided. At least it should keep people from measuring Sorgrad and ’Gren for a shallow grave.
“We?” queried Bera.
“These same Mountain Men attacked me and mine.” Darni folded shirtless arms over his broad chest, emphasizing the muscles in limbs thicker than my thigh. He looked nigh on a giant among these Folk, coarse black hair curling in the neck of his jerkin. “I’d say we have a common foe, don’t you?”
“You’re going nowhere until you’ve all had some rest.” Harile blocked Darni’s path, pinching his forearm. The skin held the imprint of the Forest man’s fingers, slow to sink. “You’re too big to go so long without drinking. Get yourselves fed and watered and then your wits will be all the sharper.”
The ring of Folk around us immediately broke up, but now the dead silence of the sheltered basin was lively with low-voiced conversations, even laughter, albeit hurriedly suppressed.
“I hope you know what you’re doing,” I murmured to Darni as I sat on the hard dry lip of the rock ledge.
“Once ’Sar scries them out, we can plan our attack.” He nodded with satisfaction.
“These folk’ll be slaughtered going up against chainmail and broadswords with no more than leather and skinning knives,” I objected with some heat.
Sorgrad leaned forward past me. “Skirmishers?”
“The usual.” Darni’s expression had all the savage glee of a feral cat. “Harry them, draw them out, bleed them dry.”
Sorgrad smiled broadly. “He knows what he’s doing.”
“Care to share the secret?” I asked with a touch of sarcasm.
“We can harry the enemy, cut down stragglers, and maybe make a few night attacks on their camps.” Darni’s voice was matter of fact. “We can’t deny them the ground, so we make it as costly to take as possible and then raise the price of holding it too high for them to bear.” He looked at the assembled Folk in the broad dell, expression thoughtful.
“That’s a long game to play.” I accepted a wooden bowl of thick and savory soup from the fat woman and ate hungrily. Even the flatbread was welcome, soaking up the last of the hot liquid as I scooped up shreds of meat and greenery with a battered spoon that Sorgrad produced from one of his pockets. A lad went past with what looked suspiciously like squirrels strung on a stick but I put the notion firmly from my mind. It was probably deer meat in the soup.
“That’s better.” Darni drained the last drops from his own bowl, wiping his matted beard with the back of one hand. I felt as filthy as he looked, my shirt sticky with sweat.
“We need to find the closest threat,” said Usara, talking more to himself than anyone else. “The ones that attacked Apak.”
“There must be at least three elements working their way in from the north,” ’Gren pointed out, face intense as he turned his thoughts to strategy and tactics.
“I’ll wager any money the assaults are being coordinated using Elietimm enchantment,” scowled Darni.
“That’s what I’d do,” nodded Sorgrad.
“So we need to come up with a plan to stop that,” I noted innocently.
“What kind of force do you reckon we can stitch together out of these people?” ’Gren looked around the basin, a predatory eagerness in his tone.
“Think how close Apak’s people were to Grynth when they were attacked. Bera’s were on the edge of the Lakeland.” Darni’s jaw jutted forward. “We have to do something or the whole of the Ferring Gap will be dragged into this. Come to that, they’ll have set the entire Forest alight before the end of the season. How’s Brakeswell going to react if the Great West Road is closed? What about Pastamar?”
“We mustn’t be hasty,” said Usara desperately. “First things first. I must bespeak the Archmage. Planir will know what to do.”
I sat silently and drank from a flagon of water. I wasn’t particularly concerned whether or not Planir knew what to do. I had plenty of ideas.
The Chamber of Planir the Black,
Archmage of Hadrumal,
6th of Aft-Summer
“So, you see, you must send help and quickly. If we do nothing, there will quite simply be chaos.” The urgency in Usara’s words rang through the shining mirror to strike faint echo from the goblet in Planir’s hand.
The Archmage took a reflective sip of his emerald green cordial. “I think you need to widen your focus here, ’Sar.”
“Is there a problem with the spell?” Usara frowned.
“Think through the consequences of what you are suggesting,” said Planir patiently. “For you and the Soluran to help these Forest Folk is one thing. For the wizards and Archmage of Hadrumal to engage in the fight would be quite another.”
“But these Mountain Men are backed by at least one enchanter from the Ice Islands,” protested Usara hotly. “They seem to have suborned these Sheltya. There’s no telling how powerful they might be!”
“You can counter their enchantments with your own sorcery,” Planir reassured him. “This is a dire threat and you must do everything in your power to halt this enchanter’s ambitions. But I am not prepared to raise the stakes in the greater game by having the mages of Hadrumal take on Elietimm enchanters who have set this landslide in motion.”