Unhitching the single reins from where they were tied around the bridle, he fought briefly for control and leaned close to his mount’s neck, putting quick distance between himself and the carriage. When he heard the shouts behind him, he reined in and turned.
The enemy were at the carriage. Its doors were opened and riders circled it, their voices angry, filled with recrimination. He knew they could see him but he didn’t care. They wouldn’t catch him now; but more than that, he had taken them away from their quarry. Half a day’s ride following an empty carriage. And now they, at least, would never find what they were looking for.
No time for self-congratulation though. These were just six incompetents he had fooled. There were far cleverer enemies still in the hunt and they would not make their intentions so obvious.
Erienne looked down at her daughter, dozing fitfully in her lap, and wondered for the first time whether she had not undertaken a monumental folly. The first day in Thornewood had been easy enough. Lyanna had been high-spirited and they’d sung walking songs as they’d travelled south, and the sun-dappled forest had smelled clean, fresh and friendly. That first night had been a real adventure for Lyanna, sleeping in the open, covered by her mother’s cloak and guarded by her alarm wards. And as Lyanna had slept, Erienne had gone further, tuning to the mana spectrum and tasting its chaos, looking for signs that all was not well.
Not that Erienne had considered them in any danger that night. She trusted that the Guild knew what they were doing and would look after them. And though wolves ran in Thornewood, they were not known to take human flesh. And she, as a mage of Dordover, had more defences than many.
But on this second day, the atmosphere had changed. Deeper into the woods, the canopy thickened and they walked in shadow much of the time, their moods lifting only when the sun broke through to lighten the ground at their feet. Their songs and chatter had become sporadic and then ceased altogether. And though Erienne fought to find things to say or point out to her increasingly anxious daughter, she found her efforts fell on deaf ears or died on her lips as she looked into Lyanna’s fearful eyes.
And the truth was, she felt it too. She understood, or thought she understood, why they were having to walk alone. But her faith in the Guild was quickly diminishing. She had expected some contact but had had none; and now every twig that cracked and every creak of a tree in the wind made her jump. She strained for the sounds of the birds and used their song to boost Lyanna’s spirits. After all, she had lied, if the birds sing, there can be no danger.
Erienne had kept a smile on her face though she knew Lyanna was only half-convinced to carry on. Even so, the little girl tired quickly and so they had stopped in the late afternoon, Erienne resting her back against a moss-covered tree trunk while Lyanna dozed. Poor child. Only five years old and running for her life, if she but knew it.
Erienne stroked Lyanna’s long black hair and edged her doll out from where it was making an uncomfortable dent in her cheek. She looked out into the forest. The sound of the breeze through the trees and the shadowy branches waving above them felt somehow malevolent. She imagined the wolf pack closing in and shook her head to disperse the vision. But they were being followed. She could feel it. And she couldn’t free herself from the thought that it wasn’t the Guild.
Her heart was suddenly pounding in her chest and panic gripped her. Shadows flickered in front of her, taking on human form and flitting around the periphery of her vision, always just out of reach. Her mouth was dry. What in all the God’s names were they doing here? One woman and a little girl. Pursued by a power too great for them to combat. And they’d put their lives in the hands of total strangers who had surely abandoned them.
Erienne shivered though the afternoon was warm, the motion disturbing Lyanna who woke and looked up at her, eyes searching for comfort but finding none.
‘Mummy, why do they just watch? Why don’t they help us?’
Erienne was silent until Lyanna repeated the question, adding, ‘Don’t they like us?’ She chuckled then and ruffled Lyanna’s hair.
‘How could anyone not like you? Of course, they like us, my sweet. I think maybe they have to be apart from us to make sure no one bad finds us.’
‘When will we get there, Mummy?’
‘Not long, my darling. Not long. Then you can rest easy. We must be getting closer.’ But her words sounded hollow to her and the wind through the trees whispered death.
Lyanna looked sternly at her, her chin carrying a slight wobble.
‘I don’t like it here, Mummy,’ she said.
Erienne shivered again. ‘Neither do I, darling. Do you want to find somewhere better?’
Lyanna nodded. ‘You won’t let the bad people get me, will you?’
‘Of course not, my sweet.’
She helped Lyanna to her feet, shouldered her pack and they moved off, direction south as they had been told. And as they walked, their pace hurried by the phantoms that they felt closing in, Erienne tried to remember how The Unknown Warrior or Thraun would have shaken off pursuers. How they would have covered their tracks, moved carefully over the ground and laid false trails. She even wondered whether she could carry Lyanna within a Cloaked Walk, rendering them both invisible. A tiring and draining exercise that would be.
She smiled grimly. It was a new game for Lyanna and it might just keep her happy but it was a game they were playing for the highest of stakes.
They moved through the forest with no little skill but beneath the canopy elves missed nothing. Ren’erei confessed surprise at their ability, the silence with which they moved and their efforts to leave no trace of their passing. She even respected the route they chose, often moving away from the trail they left, to throw off any who might follow.
And for most pursuers it would have worked. But Ren’erei and Tryuun were born to the forest and detected every nuance of change brought upon it by the passage of humans. A splayed leaf crushed into the mulch; loose bark brushed from the bole of a tree at a telltale height; the pattern of twig splinters lying on the ground. And for these particular people, a shadow at odds with the sun through the canopy, eddies in the air and the altered calls of woodland creatures.
Ren’erei went ahead, Tryuun covering his sister from a flank at a distance of twenty yards. The two elves had followed the signs for a full day, closing steadily but never allowing a hint to their quarry that they were being followed.
She moved in a low crouch, eyes scanning her route, every footfall of her light leather boots sure and silent, her mottled brown and green cloak, jerkin and trousers blending with the sun-dappled forest environs. They were close now. The woodchucks nesting in the roots of the tall pines ahead had sounded a warning call, bark dust floated in the still air close to the forest floor, and in the dried mud underfoot, tufts of grass moved gently, individual stalks recovering from the force of a human foot.
Ren’erei stopped beside the wide trunk of a great old oak, placing one hand on it to feel its energy and holding the other out, flat-palmed, to signal to Tryuun. Without looking, she knew her brother was hidden.
Ten yards ahead of her, local turbulence in the air, signified by the eddying of bracken and low leaves, told of a mage under a Cloaked Walk. The mage was moving minutely to avoid becoming visible even momentarily, and again Ren’erei paused to enjoy the skill.
Her fingers all but brushing the ground, Ren’erei crossed the space, identifying the patches of shadow and building a picture of the mage. Tall, slender and athletic but unaware of his or her mortal position. The elf was silent, her movement disturbing nothing, the woodland creatures comfortable with her presence among them.