Slowly easing herself to a sitting position, Risala looked dubiously around. 'Can they hear us?' she whispered. 'If they can't see us?'
Naldeth spared her a brief glance. 'Not if we keep our voices down.'
Velindre's hazel eyes were fixed on the half-furled sail, her other hand guiding the steering oars several paces behind her.
Fighting a pointless urge to sink below the Zaise's deck rails to hide, Kheda watched the wild men reach the thinner grasses fringing the far bank. Savages naked but for loincloths carried the mage-lit torches and their long vicious spears. The wild wizards followed, striding unhindered through the inhospitable grasses which parted before them, sending ripples running away like water.
'Two wild wizards,' Kheda said softly. 'And they are wild women.'
Both wore wraps of soft leather tied just above their breasts and reaching to mid-thigh. Their long, coarse curls were knotted around dense clusters of vivid red and purple feathers and both carried themselves with an ominous assurance.
'Do you suppose they answer to him?' breathed Risala.
A third savage mage strode forward to stand on the undercut lip of the bank, between the feather-crowned women. Where the wild spearmen wore the usual brief clouts of stained hide, this man wore a belt of plaited cords with a panel of wooden beadwork hanging at his groin. All around the rest of the belt scraps of lizard hide were
tied, interspersed with what looked horribly like hanks of black, tangled hair. He wore a band of pale-grey feathers tied just below one knee and another around one wrist. Shrugging back a heavy cloak of long blue-green feathers that could only have come from the monstrous birds that had attacked the cave dwellers, he turned to the two women, gesturing upstream and down.
'So that's a wild wizard.' Naldeth stole a quick glance before returning all his attention to his spell-casting.
'Can he see us?' Kheda couldn't see any clue on the savage mage's face. He couldn't actually see his face, he realised with a shudder. The man wore a bleached white skull as a mask, stark against his profusion of dark, matted locks. The empty eye sockets of the skull stared after the invisible ship, framed by the downward curve of the ridged horns once flourished by whatever beast had given up its life for the wild mage's adornment.
'Probably not.' Naldeth didn't sound as certain as Velindre had done, as the Zaise slipped silently away downstream.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Wild wizards, like the ones who burned the fleeing people of Chazen alive. Like the ones who twisted harmless animals into monsters to slaughter my swordsmen.
'Where are we going?' Kheda forced the words out.
'Back out to sea,' Velindre said tersely, 'before that mage thinks of whipping up a sandstorm.'
Because coating anything invisible with dust would leave it plain for all to see.
'The rawest apprentice in Hadrumal would have done that by now.' Naldeth drew his hands together, lacing his fingers tight. The whiteness of his knuckles belied his contempt for the savages standing confused on the rapidly receding river bank.
'Won't he sense your magic?' Faintest blue magelight still shimmered around the half-sail, countering the sea breeze coming inshore. Kheda moved closer to Risala.
'Not unless he's quicker witted than he has been so far.' Nevertheless, Velindre raised a hand and the sapphire radiance faded to a bare memory staining Kheda's vision.
'He wasn't so slow-witted.' Kheda couldn't help himself. 'He found us, didn't he?'
'That wizard couldn't see us,' Naldeth said stubbornly. 'I'll take my oath on it.'
'AH he knew was that something was awry,' Velindre agreed. 'He didn't know what.'
'Then how did they just happen to arrive so soon after we sailed inland?' snapped Kheda.
'The smoke could have drawn them,' Risala said reluctantly. 'From the hunters' fires.'
'I suppose it's possible,' Kheda allowed grudgingly.
'Once they were close enough, their wizard could have felt some disturbance in the elements.' Velindre considered the puzzle, ignoring Kheda's irritation. 'Though I'm certain he didn't know what it was.'
Naldeth nodded his agreement. 'If he had any notion, he would have brought down some magic on us.'
'Or some dragon,' interjected Risala.
'At least we know there are still mages here.' Kheda dismissed the cooling remnants of his anger. 'As well as potentially dangerous numbers of wild men. That's what we came to find out—'
'You're proposing we go back to the Archipelago immediately?' Velindre was still gazing back up the river. 'To sit and wait for their attack?'
'We don't know that they will attack again,' protested Naldeth.
'We don't know that they won't,' Kheda said grimly.
And I still don't know what we'd do if they did.
The younger wizard shook his head stubbornly. 'Surely this isle is big enough for their needs. It's not as if a land this size could blow itself apart and sink like that outlying chain.'
'We still don't know for certain why those savages from that drowned island sailed east to Chazen instead of coming here.' Risala grimaced, absently rubbing at a sore welt on one forearm.
'If we took a day or so to get a little closer to those mageborn, we might glean some better understanding of their magic' Velindre caught her bitten thumbnail between her white teeth, brow clouded with thought. 'Finding some weakness in their wizardry could prove vital if they do come to the Archipelago one day. That
masquerader in the feather cloak has an affinity with elemental air but he wasn't drawing on the breezes around him. I'm sure he has some tie to a dragon. I could feel it.'
Instantly Risala looked up. 'Is it anywhere close?'
'Let me read the breezes.' Velindre stared into the sky with disquieting eagerness.
'Just don't bring it down on us.' Kheda turned to Naldeth. 'Were those women with feathers in their hair mages as well?'
'I'd call them mageborn rather than mages,' the young wizard said slowly. 'One of them was keeping the torches alight with a fire affinity but I don't think she could do much more than that.'
'Not without a fire dragon's aura to draw on.' Velindre was still intent on the cloudless sky.
'The wild wizards who came to the Archipelago had lesser mages hanging around them, to begin with at least,' Risala said thoughtfully.
'And we never really understood why.' Kheda looked around dubiously.
'We don't know anything about them.' Velindre was unperturbed. 'Which is hardly surprising after barely a day sailing this coast. We came here to reconnoitre, Kheda. Will you at least spend another day seeing what we might learn?'
'One more day,' he conceded.
Because there are indeed too many questions still unanswered, and I have come too far for all this to be for nothing. And Risala and I are not alone, defenceless against evil wizardry. But is the confidence of these northern mages wholly justified or am I just seeing more ofDev's arrogance?
The Zaise slipped back down the muddy channel towards the maze of rivulets cutting through the sand bars defying the surging sea. Kheda's countless scrapes and
scratches began to throb unbearably. He realised he was still gripping his bloodied sword and clenched his fist around the hilt all the tighter to fight the urge to scratch at his itches. Finally he lost sight of the savage mage in the receding grasslands.
'We had better find somewhere to hide the ship without magic if we're going ashore,' Naldeth said irritably, 'in case some elemental concealment catches a wild wizard's eye.'
'Or a dragon's.' Velindre leaned against the tiller to turn the prow of the Zaise towards the north, beyond the river mouth. 'Let's see how the land lies this way.'