Keris gave greeting to the two as he would to any clansman. The mare made a noise which sounded remarkably like a hearty sniff, nodded her head toward the Lady Eleeri, and cantered off, followed by her son.
“They have great pride, these,” the Lady said to him. “Prove yourself friend and you will have no better battlemate. But for untold scores of years they were hunted by men and by servants of the Dark and they learn new ways slowly.”
“Even perhaps as we,” Keris returned boldly. He could not help but admire the beauty of the two seeming horses as they cantered off.
She nodded. “Even as we.”
Keris spent more and more time now on his own preparations, for Liara was now fully attendant on the Lady Mereth. There was more strength in her slender body than one might believe, and she had no difficulty with the handling of the chair. Part of his days were spent in the improvised weapons court, where what skills he had already were fiercely polished closer to a master’s art. The rest of the time he schooled himself as best he could by studying the reports from those who ventured into Karsten, making the trip each morning to see if anything new had been added to the map—but very little appeared there still.
At last the day did come that it was their turn to ride out. The Sulcars had gone first, since they must travel by wind and wave and not all the year was free of the Great Storms. So had gone Koris’s son Simond, his Lady Trusla, and the witch Frost—all jewel-chosen. They headed north, with only the thinnest trace of an old sea log account as a guide.
Hilarion had contacted Arvon once again to learn that two parties were equipped and ready for search—one for the Dales and one to head across the barren Waste itself.
Keris could not will himself to sleep and moved eagerly when the day of their own journey dawned. They were not a large group, hardly more than a scouting parry who could make the best use of the hiding places if detected.
The Lady Eleeri and Lord Romar were borne by the Keplians. Keris himself had Jasta, a young Renthan who was truly excited at being part of this adventure. Liara was mounted on a large hill pony—she had had to learn to ride during their time of waiting, since the females of the Alizon keeps never journeyed so. But now she felt at ease in the saddle and had taken on the leading of their pack train of mountain ponies well burdened with supplies.
Mouse rode a Torgian mare well to the fore of their party but not beyond the guards. Those numbered two Falconers, Krispin and Vorick, whose fighting skills were doubled by the aid of the great birds who rode at intervals on the special saddle horns of their mounts but scaled up into the sky at will. Denever, armed with those deadly arrows, a double number now in his quiver, had a place of prominence.
For Denever was of Karsten, a wanderer who had survived the mountain upheaval which wiped out the army of which he was a part and who had cast in his fortunes with those of Lormt. He was flanked by two of the old Borderer guards who had once been his deadly enemies—Farkon and his shield-mate, Vutch the Left-Handed.
So they rode out of Lormt in the early morning, pointed south, where the unknown might wait darkly.
4
Karsten
The ravaged mountains to the south no longer offered any easy traveling, though there were trails coming into being again. Some were made by those roving Border scouts ever suspicious of some hostile movement from the south, others emerging as game tracks as time passed since the Turning. But the party from Lormt used none of these.
Lord Romar, astride the Keplian Janner, had long been a wanderer, thus now and then he sighted some landmark. On the fifth day after they left the Border behind, Keris was riding point, meshing his mind with that of Jasta, the Renthan he bestrode. It was Jasta who stopped so abruptly that only years of riding experience kept Keris on his back.
The Renthan held his horned head high, drawing in deep breaths of the chill air of the heights, as if he had been on the run. Not for the first time, nor even the hundredth, Keris silently cursed his inability to produce any talent-born ward of warning for himself.
There came a flash in the air over their heads. Farwing, Krispin’s falcon, swooped as if to land on a neighboring crag and then soared again. That the bird was on scout Keris knew. And a moment later he heard stones rattle under hooves as Denever’s Torgian pushed up beside him.
The stretch before them looked more inviting than that way over which they had just forced a passage. However, that in itself could be a warning. The falcon swooped again, but from among a cluster of rocky spines arose other flyers on the wing. The wind blowing toward the party carried a trace of filthy stench.
“Rus,” Denever commented, yet he made no move to use his bow.
The evil birds, their naked, blood-red heads agleam in the sun, were spreading out, speeding toward them. Old lore flashed into Keris’s mind—a thrice-circling to immobilize prey for the coming of their masters? He had never heard of birds being used in such bespelling. Again the falcon soared, seemingly unwilling to let near him any of that ghastly flock. For flock it was fast becoming—Keris counted at least a dozen of the creatures now on wing.
“Ssssaaaaa!”
When he heard that sound from behind, Keris drew steel and Jasta half wheeled so that they could now look in both directions. Trotting as if her hooves were on the smoothest of roadways came the Torgian mare which was Mouse’s mount, seemingly so attached to her mistress that she even sheltered next to Mouse’s camp mat at night.
The young witch held her head at a sharp angle, making no move to watch the trail or control the passage of her mount. Instead her lips were moving, though Keris caught no sound of words.
Above, the seemingly purposeful flight of the rus faltered all at once. Their wings flapped vigorously as if they fought against some storm wind which would carry them away. Yet they continued to struggle.
There was a curdling in the air space between the flyers fighting that battle and the party on the trail. It seemed to Keris that the stones about him appeared to yield up shadows which arose purposefully, thickening into a net—no, a sack—a giant sack as he had seen used as a fishing net.
“Sssaaa!” Again Mouse’s voice arose and this time with the snap of a command.
Still the rus fought, but it was clear that they now fought to escape, not to come at any prey. At them, with the power of a full storm gust, came the bag, gathering them in. They were screeching now, their voices echoing and reechoing from the heights about. Keris heard in answer the squeals of the pack ponies downtrail, and trumpet challenges from the Torgians.
Even as the bag closed about the birds, so did it continue to grow thicker, hiding what it held. Then it whirled about in a mad circle, and vanished as might a cloud. The air above was free.
He saw Denever, no longer watching the battle above, move toward Mouse, but already a Keplian strode arrogantly uptrail and the Lady Eleeri was beside the girl, reaching out a hand to steady her. Mouse’s eyes were half closed and she drooped.
The Keplian mare tossed her head, glanced from eye corner at the Renthan—for the two breeds seemed in a rivalry of sorts.
*Trap,* Jasta’s mind spoke.
“Set by whom?” Keris countered. “What has been loosed here?”
*Well may you ask that,* Jasta replied. *The rus are said to serve the Sarn, but Sarn have never been known to ride this far south.*
Lord Romar had joined them and now slid from the back of the Keplian who was his battle companion. He nodded to Denever.
“There is no other way past this height,” he pointed out. “If they have bottled us in…”
Keris and the archer joined him afoot. Behind them the Falconer Krispin settled his returned bird on his saddle horn before he, too, dismounted.