The Kinslayer Wars

1

The forest vanished into the distance on all sides, comfortingly huge, eternal, and unchanging. That expanse was the true heart, the most enduring symbol, of the elven nation of Silvanesti. The towering pines, with lush green needles so dark they were almost black, dominated, but glades of oak and maple, aspen, and birch flourished in many isolated pockets, giving the forest a diverse and ever-changing character.

Only from a truly exalted vantage—such as from the Tower of the Stars, the central feature of Silvanost—could the view be fully appreciated. This was where Sithas, Speaker of the Stars and ruler of Silvanesti, came to meditate and contemplate.

The sky loomed vast and distant overhead, a dome of black filled with glittering pinpoints of light. Krynn’s moons had not yet risen, and this made the pristine beauty of the stars more brilliant, more commanding. For a long time, Sithas stood at the lip of the tower’s parapet. He found comfort in the stars and in the deep and eternal woods beyond this island, beyond this city. Sithas sensed that the forest was the true symbol of his people’s supremacy. Like the great trunks of forest giants, the ancient, centuries-living elves stood above the scurrying, scampering lesser creatures of the world.

Finally the Speaker of the Stars lowered his eyes to look upon that city, and immediately the sense of peace and splendor he had known dissipated. Instead, his mind focused on Silvanost, the ancient elven capital, the city that held his palace and his throne.

Faint traces of a drunken chant rose through the night air to disturb his ears. The song thrummed in the guttural basso of dwarves, as if to mock his concern and consternation.

Dwarves! They are everywhere in Silvanost! Everywhere, in the city of elves, he thought grimly.

Yet the dwarves were a necessary evil, Sithas admitted with a sigh. The war with the humans called for extremely careful negotiations with powerful Thorbardin, the dwarven stronghold south of the disputed lands. The power of that vast and warlike nation, thrown behind either human Ergoth or elven Silvanesti, could well prove decisive.

Once, a year earlier, the Speaker of the Stars had assumed the dwarves were firmly in the elven camp. His negotiations with the esteemed Hylar dwarf Dunbarth Ironthumb had presented a unified front against human encroachment. Sithas had assumed that dwarven troops would soon stand beside the elves in the disputed plainslands.

Yet, to date, King Hal-Waith of Thorbardin had not yet sent a single regiment of dwarven fighters, nor had he released to Kith-Kanan’s growing army any of the great stocks of dwarven weapons. The patient dwarves were not about to be hurried into any rash wars.

So a dwarven diplomatic mission was a necessity in Silvanost. And now that war had begun, such missions required sizable escorts—in the case of the recently arrived dwarven general Than-Kar, some one thousand loyal axemen. Surprising himself, Sithas thought with fondness of the previous dwarven ambassador. Dunbarth Ironthumb had fully possessed all the usual uncouthness of a dwarf, but he also had a sense of humor and was self-effacing, traits that had relaxed and amused Sithas. Than-Kar had none of these traits. A swarthy complected Theiwar, the general was rude to the point of belligerence. Impatient and uncooperative, the ambassador actually seemed to act as an impediment to communication. Take, for example, the messenger who had arrived from Thorbardin more than a week ago. This dwarf, after his months’-long march, must certainly have brought important news from the dwarven king. Yet, Than-Kar had said nothing, had not even requested an audience with the Speaker of the Stars. This was the reason for the conference Sithas had scheduled for the morrow, peremptorily summoning Than-Kar to the meeting in order to find out what the Theiwar knew.

His mood as thick as the night, Sithas let his gaze follow the dark outlines of the river Thon-Thalas, the wide waterway surrounding Silvanost and its island. The water was smooth, and he could see starlight reflected in its crystal surface. Then the breeze rose again, clouding the surface with ripples and washing the chant of the dwarven axemen away.

Seeing the river, the Speaker’s mind filled with a new and most unwelcome memory, a scene as clear in its every detail as it was painful in its recollection. Two weeks ago or more it was now, yet it might as well have been that very morning. That was when the newly recruited regiments had departed westward, to join Kith-Kanan’s forces.

The long columns of warriors had lined the riverbank, waiting their turns to board the ferry and cross. From the far bank of the Thon-Thalas, they were about to begin their long march to the disputed lands, five hundred miles to the west. Their five thousand spears, swords, and longbows would prove an important addition to the Wildrunners.

Yet, for the first time in the history of Silvanesti, the elves had needed to be bribed into taking up arms for their Speaker, their nation. A hundred steel bounty, paid upon recruitment, had been offered as incentive. Even this had not brought volunteers flocking to the colors, though after several weeks of recruitment regiments of sufficient size had finally been raised. And then there had been the scene at the riverbank.

The cleric Miritelisina had just recently emerged from the cell where Sithas’s father, Sithel, had thrown her for treason a year earlier. The matriarch of the faith of Quenesti Pah, benign goddess of healing and health, Miritelisina had voiced loud objections to the war with the humans. She had had the audacity to lead a group of elven females in a shrill, hysterical protest against the conflict with Ergoth. It had been a sickening display, worthy more of humans than of elves. Yet the cleric had enjoyed a surprisingly large amount of support from the onlooking citizens of Silvanesti.

Sithas had promptly ordered Miritelisina back to prison, and his guard had disrupted the gathering with crisp efficiency. Several females had been wounded, one fatally. At the same time, one of the heavily laden river craft had overturned, drowning several newly recruited elves. All in all, these were bad omens.

At least, the Speaker realized, the outbreak of war had driven the last humans from the city. The pathetic refugees of the troubles on the plains—many with elven spouses—had marched back to their homelands. Those who could fight had joined the Wildrunners, the army of Silvanost, centered around the members of the House Protectorate. The others had taken shelter in the great fortress of Sithelbec. Ironic, thought Sithas, that humans married to elves should be sheltered in an elven fortress, safe against the onslaught of human armies!

Still, in every other way, the city that Sithas loved seemed to be slipping further and further from his control.

His gaze lingered to the west, rising to the horizon, and he wished he could see beyond. Kith-Kanan was there somewhere under this same star-studded sky. His twin brother might even be looking eastward at this moment; at least, Sithas wanted to believe that he felt some contact.

For a moment, Sithas found himself wishing that his father still lived. How he missed Sithel’s wisdom, his steady counsel and firm guidance! Had his father ever known these doubts, these insecurities? The idea seemed impossible to the son. Sithel had been a pillar of strength and conviction. He would not have wavered in his pursuit of this war in the protection of the elven nation against outside corruption.

The purity of the elven race was a gift of the gods, with its longevity and its serene majesty. Now that purity was threatened—by human blood, to be sure, but also by ideas of intermingling, trade, artisanship, and social tolerance. The nation faced a very crucial time indeed. In the west, he knew, elves and humans had begun to intermarry with disturbing frequency, giving birth to a whole bastard race of half-elves.

By all the gods, it was an abomination, an affront to the heavens themselves!

Sithas felt his face flush, and his hands clenched. If he had worn a sword, he would have seized it then, so powerfully did the urge to fight come over him. The elves must prevail—they would prevail!

Again he felt his distance from the conflict, and it loomed as a yawning chasm of frustration before him. As yet they had received no word of battle, although he knew that nearly a month earlier, the great invasion had begun. His brother had reported three great human columns, all moving purposefully into the plainslands. Sithas wanted to go and fight himself, to lend his strength to winning the war, and it was all he could do to hold himself back. Inevitably his sense of reason prevailed.

At times, the war seemed so far away, so unreachable. Yet, other times, he found it beside him, here in Silvanost, in his palace, in his thoughts ... in his very bedroom.

His bedroom. Sithas gave a rueful smile and shook his head in wonder. He thought of Hermathya, how months earlier his feelings for her had approached loathing.

Yet with the coming of war, a change had come over his wife as well. Now she supported him as never before, standing beside him every day against the complaints and pettiness of his people ... and lying beside him every night as well.

He heard, or perhaps he felt, the soft rustle of silk, and then she was beside him. He breathed a deep sigh—a sound of contentment and satisfaction. The two of them stood alone, six hundred feet above the city, atop the Tower of the Stars, beneath the brilliant light shower of its namesake.

Her mouth, with its round lips so unusually full for an elf, was creased by the trace of a smile—a sly, secret smile that he found strangely beguiling. She stood beside him, touching a hand to his chest and leaning her head on his shoulder. He smelled her hair, rich with the scent of lilacs, yet in color as bright as copper. Her smooth skin glowed with a milky luminescence, and he felt her warm lips upon his neck. A warm rush of desire swept through him, fading only slightly as she relaxed and stood beside him in silence.

Sithas thought of his volatile wife—how pleasant it was to have her come to him thus, and how rare such instances had been in the past. Hermathya was a proud and beautiful elf woman, used to getting her own way. Sometimes he wondered if she regretted their marriage, arranged by their parents. Once, he knew, she had been the lover of his brother—indeed, Kith-Kanan had rebelled against his father’s authority and fled Silvanost when her engagement to Sithas had been announced. Did she ever regret her choice? How well had she calculated her future as wife of the Speaker of the Stars? He did not know—perhaps, in fact, he was afraid to ask her.

“Have you seen my cousin yet?” she asked after a few minutes.

“Lord Quimant? Yes, he came to the Hall of Balif earlier today. I must say, he seems to have an excellent grip on the problems of weapon production. He knows mining, smelting, and smithing. His aid is much needed ... and would be much appreciated. We are not a nation of weaponsmiths like the dwarves.”

“Clan Oakleaf has long made the finest of elven blades,” Hermathya replied proudly. “That is known throughout Silvanesti.”

“It is not the quality that worries me, my dear. It is in the quantity of weapons that we lag sadly behind the humans, and the dwarves. We cleaned out the royal armories in order to outfit the last regiments we sent to the west.”

“Quimant will solve your problems, I’m certain. Will he be coming to Silvanost?”

The estate of Clan Oakleaf lay to the north of the elven capital, near the mines where they excavated the iron for their small foundries. The clan, the central power behind House Metalline, was the primary producer of weapons-quality steel in the kingdom of Silvanesti. Lately its influence had grown, due to the necessity of increased weapons production brought on by the war. The mines were worked by slaves, mostly human and Kagonesti elves, but this was a fact Sithas had to accept because of his nation’s emergency. Lord Quimant, the son of Hermathya’s eldest uncle, was being groomed as the spokesman and leader of Clan Oakleaf, and his services for the estate were important.

“I believe he will. I’ve offered him chambers in the palace, as well as incentives for the Oakleaf clan—mineral rights, steady supplies of coal ... and labor.”

“It would be wonderful to have some of my family around again.” Hermathya’s voice rose, joyful as a young girl’s. “This can be such a lonely place, with all of your attention directed to the war.” He lowered his hand, sliding it along the smooth silk of her gown, down her back, his strong fingers caressing her. She sighed and held him tighter. “Well, maybe not all of your attention,” she added, with a soft laugh. Sithas wanted to tell her what a comfort she had been to him, how much she had eased the burdens of his role as leader of the elven nation. He wondered at the change that had come over her, but he said nothing. That was his nature, and perhaps his weakness.

It was Hermathya who next spoke.

“There is another thing I must tell you . . .”

“Good news or bad?” he asked, idly curious.

“You will need to judge that for yourself, though I suspect you will be pleased.”

He turned to look at her, holding both of his hands on her shoulders. That secret smile still played about her lips.

“Well?” he demanded, feigning impatience. “Don’t tease me all night! Tell me.”

“You and I, great Speaker of the Stars, are going to have a baby. An heir.” Sithas gaped at her, unaware that his jaw had dropped in a most unelven lack of dignity. His mind reeled, and a profound explosion of joy rose within his heart. He wanted to shout his delight from the tower top, to let the word ring through the city like a prideful cry.

For a moment, he truly forgot about everything—the war, the dwarves, the logistics and weapons that had occupied him. He pulled his wife to him and kissed her. He held her for a long time under the starlight, above the city that had so troubled him earlier.

But for now, all was right with the world.

The next day, Than-Kar came to see Sithas, though the Theiwar dwarf arrived nearly fifteen minutes after the time indicated in the Speaker’s summons.

Sithas awaited him, impatiently seated upon the great emerald throne of his ancestors, located in the center of the great Hall of Audience. This vast chamber occupied the base of the Tower of the Stars, with its sheer walls soaring upward into the dizzying heights. Above, six hundred feet over their heads, the top of the tower stood open to the sky.

Than-Kar clumped into the hall at the head of a column of twelve bodyguards, almost as if he expected ambush. Twoscore elves of the House Protectorate—the royal guard of Silvanesti—snapped to attention around the periphery of the hall.

The Theiwar sniffed his nose loudly, the rude gesture echoing through the hall, as he approached the Speaker. Sithas studied the dwarf, carefully masking his distaste.

Like all Theiwar dwarves, Than-Kar’s eyes seemed to stare wildly, with the whites showing all around the pinpoint pupils. His lips curled in a perpetual sneer, and despite his ambassadorial station, his beard and hair remained unkempt, his leather clothes filthy. How unlike Dunbarth Ironthumb!

The Theiwar bowed perfunctorily and then looked up at Sithas, his beady eyes glittering with antagonism.

“We’ll make this brief,” said the elf coldly. “I desire to know what word has come from your king. He has had time to reply, and the questions we have sent have not been formally answered.”

“As a matter of fact, I was preparing my written reply when your courier interrupted me with this summons yesterday. I had to delay my progress in order to hasten to this meeting.”

Yes, Than-Kar must have made haste, for he obviously hadn’t taken time to run a comb through his hair or change his grease-spattered tunic, thought Sithas. The Speaker held his tongue, albeit with difficulty.

“However, insofar as I am here and taking up the speaker’s valuable time, I can summarize the message that I have received from Thorbardin.”

“Please, do,” Sithas requested dryly.

“The Royal Council of Thorbardin finds that, to date, there is insufficient cause to support elven warmaking in the plains,” announced the dwarf bluntly.

“What?” Sithas stiffened, no longer able to retain his impassive demeanor.

“That is a contradiction of everything our meetings with Dunbarth established!

Surely you—your people—recognize that the human threat extends beyond mere grazing rights on the plains!”

“There is no evidence of a threat to our interests.”

“No threat?” The elf cut him off rudely. “You know humans, they will stretch and grab whatever they can. They will seize our plains, your mountains, the forest—everything!”

Than-Kar regarded him coolly, those wide, staring eyes seeming to gleam with delight. Abruptly Sithas realized that he was wasting his time with this arrogant Theiwar. Angrily he stood, half fearing that he would strike out at the dwarf and very much desiring to do just that. Still, enough of his dignity and self-control remained to stay his hand. After all, a war with the dwarves was the last thing they needed right now.

“This conference is concluded,” he said stiffly.

Than-Kar nodded—smugly, Sithas thought—and turned to lead his escort from the hall.

Sithas stared after the dwarven ambassador, his anger still seething. He would not—he could not—allow this to be the final impasse!

But what else could he do? No ideas arrived to lighten the oppressive burden of his mood.

2

The horse pranced nervously along the ridgetop, staying within the protective foliage of the tree line. Thick, bluegreen pines enclosed the mount and its elven rider on three sides. Finally the great stallion Kijo stood still, allowing Kith-Kanan to peer through the moist, aromatic branches to the vast expanse of open country beyond.

Nearby, two of the Wildrunners—Kith’s personal bodyguards—sat alertly in their saddles, swords drawn and eyes alert. Those elves, too, were nervous at the sight of their leader possibly exposing himself to the threat in the valley below. And what a threat it was! The long column of the human army snaked into the distance as far as the keen-eyed elves could see from their vantage on the ridgetop. The vanguard of the army, a company of heavily armored lancers riding huge, lumbering war-horses, had already passed them by. Now ranks of spearmen, thousands upon thousands, marched past, perhaps a mile away down the gradually sloping ridge. This was the central wing of the massive Army of Ergoth, which followed the most direct route toward Sithelbec and presented the most immediate threat to the Wildrunners. Kith-Kanan turned with a grim smile, and Kijo pranced into the deeper shelter of the forest.

The commander of the Wildrunners knew his force was ready for this, the opening battle of his nation’s first war in over four centuries. Not since the Second Dragon War had the elves of the House Protectorate taken to the field to defend their nation against an external threat.

The ring on his finger—the Ring of Balifor—had been given to his father as a reminder of the alliance between kender and elves during the Second Dragon War. Now he wore it and prepared to do battle in a new cause. For a moment, he wondered what this war would be named when Astinus took up his pen to scribe the tale in his great annals.

Though Kith-Kanan was young for an elf—he had been born a mere ninety-three years ago—he felt the weight of long tradition riding in the saddle with him. He knew no compelling hatred toward these humans, yet he recognized the threat they presented. If they weren’t stopped here, half of Silvanesti would be gobbled up by the rapacious human settlers, and the elves would be driven into a small corner of their once vast holdings.

The humans had to be defeated. It was Kith-Kanan’s job, as commander of the Wildrunners, to see that the elven nation was victorious. Another figure moved through the trees, bringing the bodyguards’ swords swooshing forth, until they recognized the rider.

“Sergeant-Major Parnigar.” Kith-Kanan nodded to the veteran Wildrunner, his chief aide and most reliable scout. The sergeant was dressed in leather armor of green and brown, and he rode a stocky, nimble pony.

“The companies are in place, sir—the riders behind the ridge, with a thousand elves of Silvanost bearing pike behind them.” Parnigar, a veteran warrior who had fought in the Second Dragon War, had helped recruit the first wild elves into Kith-Kanan’s force. Now he reported on their readiness to die for that cause. “The Kagonesti archers are well hidden and well supplied. We can only hope the humans react as we desire.”

Parnigar looked skeptical as he spoke, but Kith suspected this was just the elf’s cautious nature. The sergeant’s face was as gray and leathery as an old map. His strapping arms rested on the pommel of his saddle with deceptive ease. His green eyes missed nothing. Even as he talked to his general, the sergeant-major was scanning the horizon.

Parnigar slouched casually in his saddle, his posture more like a human’s than an elf’s. Indeed, the veteran had taken a human wife some years before, and in many ways he seemed to enjoy the company of the short-lived race. He spoke quickly and moved with a certain restless agitation—both characteristics that tended to mark humans far more typically than elves.

Yet Parnigar knew his roots. He was an heir of the House Protectorate and had served in the Wildrunners since he had first learned to handle a sword. He was the most capable warrior that Kith-Kanan knew, and the elven general was glad to have him at his side.

“The human scouts have been slain by ambush,” Kith-Kanan told him. “Their army has lost its eyes. It is almost time. Come, ride with me.” The commander of the Wildrunners nudged Kijo’s flanks with his knees, and the stallion exploded into a dash through the forest. So nimble was the horse’s step that he dashed around tree trunks with Kith-Kanan virtually a blur. Parnigar raced behind, with the two hapless guards spurring their steeds in a losing struggle to keep pace.

For several minutes, the pair dashed through the forest, the riders’ faces lashed by pine needles, but the horses’ hooves landing true. Abruptly the trees stopped, exposing the wide, gently rolling ridgetop. Below, to the right, marched the endless army of humankind.

Kith-Kanan nudged Kijo again, and the stallion burst into view of the humans below. The elven general’s blond hair trailed in the sun behind him, for his helmet remained lashed to the back of his saddle. As he rode, he raised a steel-mailed fist.

He made a grand figure, racing along the crest of the hill above the teeming mass of his enemy. Like his twin brother Sithas, his face was handsome and proud, with prominent cheekbones and a sharp, strong chin. Though he was slender-like every one of his race—his tall physique lifted him above the deep pommels of the saddle.

Instantly the trumpeters of Silvanost sprang to their feet. They had lain in the grass along this portion of the crest. Raising their golden horns in unison, they brayed a challenge across the rolling prairie below. Behind the trumpeters, concealed from the humans by the crest of the ridge, the elven riders mounted their horses while the bowmen knelt in the tall grass, waiting for the command to action.

The great column of humans staggered like a confused centipede. Men turned to gape at the spectacle, observing pennants and banners that burst from the woods in a riotous display of color. All order vanished from the march as each soldier instinctively yielded to astonishment and the beginnings of fear. Then the human army gasped, for the elven riders abruptly swarmed over the ridgetop in a long, precise line. Horses pranced, raising their forefeet in a high trot, while banners unfurled overhead and steel lance tips gleamed before them. They numbered but five hundred, yet every human who saw them swore later that they were attacked by thousands of elven riders. Onward the elven horsemen came, their line remaining parade-ground sharp. On the valley floor, some of the humans broke and ran, while others raised spears or swords, ready and even eager for battle.

From the front of the vast human column, the huge brigade of heavy lancers turned its mighty war-horses toward the flank. Yet they were two miles away, and their companies quickly lost coherence as they struggled around other regiments—the footmen—that were caught behind them.

The elven riders raced closer to the center of the column, the thunder of their hooves crashing and shaking the earth. Then, two hundred feet from their target, they stopped.

Each of the five hundred horses pivoted, and from the dust of the sudden maneuver, five hundred arrows arced forth, over the great blocks of humans and then down, like deadly hawks seeking out their terrified victims. Another volley ripped into the human ranks, and suddenly the elven riders retreated, dashing across the same ridge they had charged down mere moments before.

In that same instant, the humans realized they were going to be robbed of the satisfaction of fighting, and a roar of outrage erupted from ten thousand throats. Swords raised, shields brandished, men broke from the column without command of their captains, chasing and cursing the elven riders. The enraged mob swept up the slope in chaotic disarray, united only in its fury. Abruptly a trumpet cry rang from the low summit, and ranks of green-clad elves appeared in the grass before the charging humans, as if they had suddenly sprouted from the ground.

In the next instant, the sky darkened beneath a shower of keen elven arrows, their steel tips gleaming in the sunlight as they arced high above the humans, then tipped in their inevitable descent. Even before the first volley fell, another rippled outward, as steady and irresistible as hail.

The arrows tore into the human ranks with no regard for armor, rank, or quickness. Instead, the deadly rain showered the mob with complete randomness, puncturing steel helmets and breastplates and slicing through leather shoulder pads. Shrieks and cries from the wounded rose in hysterical chorus, while other humans fell silently, writhing in mute agony or lying still upon the now-reddening grass.

Again and again the arrows soared outward, and the mob wavered in its onrush. Bodies littered the field. Some of these crawled or squirmed pathetically toward safety, ignored by the mindless rush of the others. As more of them died, fear rose like a palpable cloud over the heads of the humans. Then, by twos and fives and tens, they turned and raced back toward the rest of the column. Finally they retreated in hundreds, harried back down the newly mud-covered slope by pursuing missile fire. As they vanished, so did the elven archers, withdrawing at a trot over the crest of the ridge. At last the human heavy lancers approached, and a cheer rose from the rest of the great army. A thousand bold knights, clad in armor from head to toe, urged their massive horses onward. The great beasts lumbered like monsters, buried beneath clanking plates of barding. A cloud of bright pennants fluttered over the thundering mass.

Kith-Kanan, still mounted upon his proud stallion, studied these new warriors from the ridgetop. Caution, not fear, tempered his hopes as the great weight of horses, men, and metal churned closer. The heavy knights, he knew, were the army’s most lethal attack force.

He had planned for this, but only the reality of things would show whether the Wildrunners stood equal to the task. For a moment, Kith-Kanan’s courage wavered, and he considered ordering a fast retreat from the field—a disastrous idea, he quickly told himself, for his hope now lay in steadfast courage, not flight. The knights drew nearer, and Kith-Kanan wheeled and galloped after the archers.

The great steeds runbled inexorably up the slope, toward the gentle crest where the elven riders and archers had disappeared. They couldn’t see the foe, but they hoped that the elves would be found just beyond the ridgetop. The knights kicked their mounts and shouted their challenges as they crested the rise, springing with renewed speed toward the enemy. In their haste, they broke their tight ranks, eager to crush the deadly archers and light elven lancers.

Instead, they met a phalanx of elven pikemen, the gleaming steel tips of the Wildrunners’ weapons arrayed as a bristling wall of death. The elves stood shoulder to shoulder in great blocks, facing outward from all sides. The riders and archers had taken shelter in the middle of these blocks, while three ranks of pikemen—one kneeling, one crouching, and one standing—kept their weapons fixed, promising certain death to any horse reckless enough to close. The great war-horses, sensing the danger, turned, bucked, and spun, desperate to avoid the rows of pikes. Unfortunately for the riders, each horse, as it turned, met another performing a similar contortion. Many of the beasts crashed to the ground, and still more riders were thrown by their panicked steeds. They lay in their heavy armor, too weighted down even to climb to their feet.

Arrows whistled outward from the Wildrunners. Though the shortbows of the elven riders were ineffective against the armored knights, the longbows of the foot archers drove their barbed missiles through the heaviest plate at this close range. Howls of pain and dismay now drowned out the battle cries among the knights, and in moments the cavalry, in mass, turned and lumbered back across the ridgetop, leaving several dozen of their number moaning on the ground almost at the feet of the elven pikemen.

“Run, you bastards!” Parnigar’s shout was a gleeful bark beside Kith-Kanan. The general, too, felt his lieutenant!s elation. They had held the knights! They had broken the charge!

Kith-Kanan and Parnigar watched the retreat of the knights from the center of the largest contingent. The sergeant-major looked at his commander, gesturing to the fallen knights. Some of these unfortunate men lay still, knocked unconscious by the fall from horseback, while others struggled to their knees or twitched in obvious pain. More humans lay at the top of the slope, their bodies punctured by elven arrows.

“Shall I give the order to finish them?” Parnigar asked, ready to send a rank of swordsmen forward. The grim warrior’s eyes flashed.

“No,” Kith-Kanan said. He looked grimly at his sergeant’s raised eyebrows. “This is the first skirmish of a great war. Let it not be said we began it with butchery.”

“But-but they’re knights! These are the most powerful humans in that entire army! What if they are healed and restored to arms? Surely you don’t want them to ride against us again?” Parnigar kept his voice low but made his arguments precisely.

“You’re right—the power of the heavy knights is lethal. If we hadn’t been fully prepared for their assault, I’m not certain we could have held them. Still . . .” Kith-Kanan’s mind balked at the situation before him, until a solution suddenly brightened his expression. “Send the swordsmen forward—but not to kill. Have them take the weapons of the fallen knights and any banners, pennants, and the like that they can find. Return with these, but let the humans live.”

Parnigar nodded, satisfied with his general’s decision. He raised a hand and the line of pikemen parted, allowing the sergeant-major’s charger to trot forward. Selecting a hundred veterans, he started the task of stripping the humans of their badges and pennants.

Kith turned, sensing movement behind him. He saw the pikemen parting there, too, this time to admit someone—a grimy elven rider straddling a foaming, dust-covered horse. Through the dust, Kith recognized a shock of hair the color of snow.

“White-lock! It’s good to see you.” Kith swung easily from his saddle as the Kagonesti elf did the same. The general clasped the rider’s hand warmly, searching the wild elf’s eyes for a hint of his news.

White-lock rubbed a hand across his dust-covered face, revealing the black and white stripes painted across his forehead. Typical of the wild elves, he was fully painted for war—and covered by the grit of his long ride. A scout and courier for the Wildrunners, he had ridden hundreds of miles to report on the movements of the human army.

Now White-lock nodded, deferentially but coolly, toward Kith-Kanan. “The humans fare poorly in the south,” he began. “They have not yet crossed the border into elven lands, so slowly do they march.”

White-lock’s tone dripped with scorn—a scorn equal to that Kith had heard him use when describing the “civilized” elves of crystalline Silvanost. Indeed, the wild elves of Kagonesti in many cases bore little love for their cousins in the cities—antipathy, to be sure, that mirrored the hatred and prejudice held by the Silvanesti elves for any race other than their own.

“Any word out of Thorbardin?”

“Nothing reliable.” The Kagonesti continued his report, his tone revealing that dwarves ranked near the bottom on his list of worthwhile peoples. “They promise to assist us when the humans have committed sufficient provocation, but I won’t believe them till I see them stand and fight.”

“Why does the southern wing of the Ergothian army march so slowly?” Kith-Kanan, through his Wildrunner scouts, had been tracking the three great wings of the vast Caergoth army, each of which was far greater in size than his entire force of Wildrunners.

“They have difficulties with the gnomes,” White-lock continued. “They drag some kind of monstrous machine with them, pulled by a hundred oxen, and it steams and belches smoke. A whole train of coal wagons follows, carrying fuel for this machine.”

“It must surely be some type of weapon—but what? Do you know?” White-lock shook his head. “It is now mired in the bottomlands a few miles from the border. Perhaps they will leave it behind. If not . . .” The Kagonesti elf shrugged. It was simply another idiocy of the enemy that he could not predict or fathom.

“You bring good news,” Kith noted with satisfaction. He planted his hands on his hips and looked at the ridgeline above, where Parnigar and his footmen were returning. Many waved captured human banners or held aloft helmets with long, trailing plumes. Every so often he saw a dejected and disarmed human scuttling upward and disappearing over the ridge as if he still feared for his life.

Today Kith and the Wildrunners had directed a sharp blow against the central wing of the human army. He hoped the confusion and frustration of the elven attack would delay their march for several days. The news from the south was encouraging. It would take months for a threat to develop there. But what of the north?

His worries lingered as the Wildrunners quickly reformed from battle into march formation. They would pass through partially forested terrain, so the elven army moved in five broad, irregular columns. They followed parallel routes, with about a quarter of a mile between columns. If necessary, they could easily outdistance any human army, whether mounted or on foot. Kith-Kanan, with Parnigar and a company of riders, remained behind until sunset. He was pleased to see the human army encamp at the scene of the attack. In the morning, he suspected, they would send forth huge and cumbersome reconnaissances, none of which would find any trace of the elves. Finally the last of the Wildrunners, with Kith in the lead, turned their stocky, fast horses to the west. They would leave the field in possession of the foe, but a foe a little more bewildered, a little more frightened, than the day before. The elven riders passed easily along forest trails at a fast walk, and at a canter through moonlit meadows. It was as they crossed one of these that movement in the fringe of the treeline pulled Kijo up sharply. A trio of riders approached. Kith recognized the first two as members of his guard.

“A messenger, sir—from the north.” The guards puffed aside as Kith stared in shock at the third rider.

The elf slumped in his saddle like a corpse that had been placed astride a horse. As he looked toward Kith-Kanan, his eyes flickered with a momentary hope.

“We tried to hold them back, sir—to harass them, as you commanded,” the elf reported in a rush. “The human wing to the north moved onto the plain, and we struck them!”

The scout’s voice belied his looks. It was taut and firm, the voice of a man who spoke the truth and who desperately wanted to be believed. Now he shook his head. “But no matter how quickly we moved, they moved more quickly. They struck at us, sir! They wiped out a hundred elves in one camp and routed the Kagonesti back to the woods! They move with unbelievable stealth and speed.”

“They advance southward, then?” Kith-Kanan asked, instinctively knowing the answer, for he immediately understood that the human commander of the northern wing must be an unusually keen and aggressive foe.

“Yes! Faster than I would have believed, had I not seen it myself. They ride like the wind, these humans. They have surrounded most of the northern pickets. I alone escaped.”

The messenger’s eyes met Kith’s, and the elf spoke with all the intensity of his soul. “But that is not the worst of it, my general! Now they sweep to the east of my own path. Already you may be cut off from Sithelbec.”

“Impossible!” Kith barked the denial. The fortress, or city, of Sithelbec was his headquarters and his base of operations. It was far to the rear of the battle zone. “There can’t be any humans within a hundred miles of there.” But again he looked into the eyes of the messenger, and he had to believe the terrible news. “All right,” he said grimly. “They’ve stolen a march on us. It’s time for the Wildrunners to seize it back.”

3

The sprawling tent stood in the center of the vast encampment. Three peaks stood high, marking the poles that divided the shelter into a trio of chambers. Though the stains of the season’s campaign marked its sides, and seams showed where the top had been mended, the colorless canvas structure had a certain air about it, as if it was a little more important, a little more proud than the tents flowing to the horizon around it.

The huge camp was not a permanent gathering, and so the rows of straightbacked tents ran haphazardly, wherever the rolling ground, crisscrossed by numerous ravines, allowed. Green pastures, feeding grounds for twenty thousand horses, marked the hinges of the encampment. As dusk settled, the army’s shelters lined up in gray anonymity, except for this high, three-peaked tent.

The inside of that structure, as well, would never be mistaken for the abode of some soldier. Here cascades of silken draperies—deep browns, rich golds, and the iridescent black that was so popular among Ergothian nobles—covered the sides, blocking any view of the harsh realities beyond the canvas walls. Suzine des Quivalin sat in the tent, studying a crystal glass before her. Her coppery hair no longer coiled about the tiara of diamond-studded platinum. Instead, it gathered in a bun at the back of her head, though its length still cascaded more than a foot down her back. She wore a practical leather skirt, but her blouse was of fine silk. Her skin was clean, making her unique among all these thousands of humans.

Indeed, captains and sergeants and troopers alike grumbled about the favors shown to the general’s woman—hot water for bathing! A luxurious tent—ten valuable horses were required just to haul her baggage.

Still, though grumbling occurred, none of it happened within earshot of the commander. General Giarna led his force with skill and determination, but he was a terrifying man who would brook no argument, whether it be about his tactics or his woman’s comforts. Thus the men kept the remarks very quiet and very private.

Now Suzine sat upon a large chair, cushioned with silk-covered pillows of down, but she didn’t take advantage of that softness. Instead, she sat at the edge of the seat, tension visible in her posture and in the rapt concentration of her face as she studied the crystal surface before her.

The glass looked like a normal mirror, but it didn’t show a reflection of the lady’s very lovely face. Instead, as she studied the image, she saw a long line of foot soldiers. They were clean-shaven, blond of hair, and carried long pikes or thin, silver swords.

She watched the army of Kith-Kanan.

For a time, she touched the mirror, and her vision ran back and forth along the winding column. Her lips moved silently as she counted longbows and pikes and horses.

She watched the elves form and march. She noted the precision with which the long, fluid columns moved across the plains, retaining their precise intervals as they did so.

But then her perusal reached the head of the column, and here she lingered. She studied the one who rode at the head of that force, the one she knew was Kith-Kanan, twin brother to the elven ruler.

She admired his tall stance in the saddle, the easy, graceful way that he raised his hand, gesturing to his outriders or summoning a messenger. Narrow wings rose to a pair of peaks atop his dark helmet. His dark plate mail looked worn, and a heavy layer of dust covered it, yet she could discern its quality and the easy way he wore it, as comfortably as many a human would wear his soft cotton tunic.

Her lips parted slightly, and she didn’t sense the pace of her breathing slowly increase. The lady did not hear the tent flap move behind her, so engrossed was she in her study of the handsome elven warrior.

Then a shadow fell across her, and she looked up with a sharp cry. The mirror faded until it showed only the lady, her face twisted in an expression of guilt mixed with indignation.

“You could announce your presence,” she snapped, standing to face the tall man who had entered.

“I am commander of the camp. General Giarna of Ergoth need announce his presence to no one, save the emperor himself,” the armor-plated figure said quietly. His black eyes fixed upon the woman’s, then shifted to the mirror. These eyes of the Boy General frightened her—they were hardly boyish, and not entirely human, either. Dark and brooding, they sometimes blazed with an internal fire that was fueled, she sensed, by something that was beyond her understanding. At other times, however, they gaped black and empty. She found this dispassionate void even more frightening than his rage. Suddenly he snarled and Suzine gasped in fright. She would have backed away, save for the fact that her dressing table blocked any retreat. For a moment, she felt certain he would strike her. It would not be the first time. But then she looked into his eyes and knew that, for the moment, anyway, she was safe.

Instead of violent rage, she saw there a hunger that, while frightening, did not presage a blow. Instead, it signaled a desperate yearning for a need that could never be satisfied. It was one of the things that had first drawn her to him, this strange hunger. Once she had felt certain that she could slake it. Now she knew better. The attraction that had once drawn her to Giarna had waned, replaced for the most part by fear, and now when she saw that look in his eyes, she mostly pitied him.

The general grunted, shaking his head wearily. His short, black hair lay sweaty and tousled on his head. She knew he would have had his helmet on until he entered the tent, and then taken it off in deference to her.

“Lady Suzine, I seek information and have been worried by your long silence. Tell me, what have you seen in your magic mirror?”

“I’m sorry, my lord,” replied Suzine. Her eyes fell, and she hoped that the flush across her cheeks couldn’t be noticed. She took a deep breath, regaining her composure.

“The elven army countermarches quickly—faster than you expected,” she explained, her voice crisp and efficient. “They will confront you before you can march to Sithelbec.”

General Giarna’s eyes narrowed, but his face showed no other emotion. “This captain ... what’s his name?”

“Kith-Kanan,” Suzine supplied.

“Yes. He seems alert—more so than any human commander I’ve faced. I would have wagered a year’s pay that he couldn’t have moved so fast.”

“They march with urgency. They make good tune, even through the woods.”

“They’ll have to stick to the forests,” growled the general, “because as soon as I meet them, I shall rule the plains.”

Abruptly General Giarna looked at Suzine inquiringly. “What is the word on the other two wings?”

“Xalthan is still paralyzed. The lava cannon is mired in the lowlands, and he seems unwilling to advance until the gnomes free it.”

The general snorted in amused derision. “Just what I expected from that fool. And Barnet?”

“The central wing has gone into a defensive formation, as if they expect attack. They haven’t moved since yesterday afternoon.”

“Excellent. The enemy comes to me, and my erstwhile allies twiddle their thumbs!” General Giarna’s black beard split apart as he grinned. “When I win this battle, the emperor cannot help but realize who his greatest warrior is.” He turned and paced, speaking more to himself than to her. “We will drive against him, break him before Sithelbec! We have assurances that the dwarves will stay out of the war, and the elves alone cannot hope to match our numbers. The victory will be mine!”

He turned back to her, those dark eyes flaming again, and Suzine felt another kind of fear—the fear of the doe as it trembles before the slavering jaws of the wolf. Again the general whirled in agitation, pounding his fist into the palm of his other hand.

Suzine cast a sidelong glance at the mirror, as if she feared someone might be listening. The surface was natural, reflecting only the pair in the tent. In the mirror, she saw General Giarna step toward her. She turned to face him as he placed his hands on her shoulders.

She knew what he wanted, what she would—she must—give him. Their contact was brief and violent. Giarna’s passion contorted him, as if she was the vent for all of his anxieties. The experience bruised her, gave her a sense of uncleanliness that nearly brought her to despair. Afterward, she wanted to reach out and cover the mirror, to smash it or at least turn it away. Instead, she hid her feelings, as she had learned to do so well, and then lay quietly as Giarna rose and dressed, saying nothing. Once he looked at her, and she thought he was going to speak.

Suzine’s heart pounded. Did he know what she was thinking? She thought of the face in the mirror again—that elven face. But General Giarna only scowled as he stood before her. After several moments, he spun on his heel and stalked from the tent. She heard the pacing of his charger without, and then the clatter of hooves as the general galloped away.

Hesitantly, inevitably, she turned back to the mirror.

4

The two armies wheeled and skirmished across the flatlands, using the forests for cover and obstruction, making sharp cavalry sweeps and sudden ambushes. Lives expired, men and elves suffered agony and maiming, and yet the great bodies of the two armies did not contact each other. General Giarna’s human force drove toward Sithelbec, while Kith-Kanan’s Wildrunners countermarched to interpose themselves between the Ergothian army and its destination. The humans moved quickly, and it was only the effort of an all-night forced march that finally brought the exhausted elves into position.

Twenty thousand Silvanesti and Kagonesti warriors finally gathered into a single mass and prepared a defense, tensely awaiting the steadily advancing human horde. The elven warriors averaged three to four hundred years of age, and many of their captains had seen six or more centuries. If they survived the battle and the war, they could look forward to more centuries, five or six hundred years, perhaps, of peaceful aging.

The Silvanesti bore steel weapons of fine craftsmanship, arrowheads that could punch through plate mail and swords that would not shatter under the most crushing of blows. Many of the elves had some limited proficiency in magic, and these were grouped in small platoons attached to each company. Though these elves, too, would rely upon sword and shield to survive the battle, their spells could provide a timely and demoralizing counterpunch. The Wildrunners also had some five hundred exceptionally fleet horses, and upon these were mounted the elite lancers and archers who would harass and confuse the enemy. They wore the grandest armor, shined to perfection, and each bore his personal emblem embroidered in silk upon his breast. This force stood against a human army of more than fifty thousand men. The humans averaged about twenty-five years of age, the oldest veterans having seen a mere four or five decades of life. Their weapons were crudely crafted by elven standards, yet they possessed a deep strength. The blade might grow dull, but only rarely would it break.

The human elite included riders, numbering twenty thousand. They bore no insignia, nor did they wear armor of metal. Instead, they were a ragged, evil-looking lot, with many a missing tooth, eye, or ear. Unlike their elven counterparts, almost all were bearded, primarily because of a disdain of shaving, or indeed grooming of any kind.

But they carried within them an inner thirst for a thing uniquely human in character. Whether it be called glory or excitement or adventure, or simply cruelty or savagery, it was a quality that made the short-lived humans feared and distrusted by all the longer-lived races of Krynn.

Now this burning ambition, propelled by the steel-bladed drive of General Giarna, pushed the humans toward Sithelbec. For two days, the elven army appeared to stand before them, only to melt away at the first sign of attack. By the third day, however, they stood within march of that city itself. Kith-Kanan had reached the edge of the tree cover. Beyond lay nothing but open field to the gates of Sithelbec, some ten miles away. Here the Wildrunners would have to stand.

The reason for falling back this far became obvious to elf and human alike as the Wildrunners reached their final position. Silver trumpets blared to the eastward, and a column of marchers hove into view.

“Hail the elves of Silvanost!”

Cries of delight and welcome erupted from the elven army as, with propitious timing, the five thousand recruits sent by Sithas two months earlier marched into the Wildrunners’ camp. At their head rode Kencathedrus, the stalwart veteran who had given Kith-Kanan his earliest weapons training.

“Hah! I see that my former student still plays his war games!” The old veteran, his narrow face showing the strain of the long march, greeted Kith before the commander’s tent. Wearily Kencathedrus lifted a leg over his saddle. Kith helped him to stand on the ground.

“I’m glad you made it,” Kith-Kanan greeted his old teacher, clasping his arms warmly. “It’s a long march from the city.”

Kencathedrus nodded curtly. Kith-Kanan would have thought the gesture rude, except that he knew the old warrior and his mannerisms. Kencathedrus represented the purest tradition of the House Royal—the descendants, like Kith-Kanan and Sithas, of Silvanos himself. Indeed, they were distant cousins in some obscure way Kith had never understood.

But more than blood relative, Kencathedrus was in many ways the mentor of Kith-Kanan the warrior. Strict to the point of obsession, the teacher had drilled the pupil in the instinctive use of the longsword and in the swift and repetitive shooting of the bow until such tasks had become second nature. Now Kencathedrus looked Kith-Kanan up and down. The general was clad in unadorned plate mail, with a simple steel helmet, unmarked by any sign of rank.

“What about your crest?” he asked. “Don’t you fight in the name of Silvanos, of the House Royal?”

Kith nodded. “As always. However, my guards have persuaded me that there’s no sense in making myself a target. I dress like a simple cavalryman now.” He took Kencathedrus’s arm, noting that the old elf moved with considerable stiffness.

“My back isn’t what it used to be,” admitted the venerable captain, stretching.

“It’s likely to get some more exercise soon,” Kith warned him. “Thank the gods you arrived when you did!”

“The human army?” Kencathedrus looked past the elves, lined up for battle. Kith told the captain what he knew.

“A mile away, no more. We have to face them here. The alternative is to fall back into the fortress, and I’m not ready to concede the plains.”

“You’ve chosen a good field, it seems.” Kencathedrus nodded at the stands of trees around them. The area consisted of many of these thick groves, separated by wide, grassy fields. “How many stand against us?”

“Just a third of the entire Ergoth army—that’s the good news. The other two wings have bogged down, more than a hundred miles away right now. But this one is the most dangerous. The commander is bold and adventurous. I had to march all night to get in front of him, and now my troops are exhausted as he prepares his attack.”

“You forget,” Kencathedrus chided Kith, almost harshly. “You stand with elves against a force of mere humans.”

Kith-Kanan looked at the old warrior fondly, but he shook his head at the same time. “These ‘mere’ humans wiped out a hundred of my Wildrunners in one ambush. They’ve covered four hundred miles in three weeks.” Now the leader’s voice took on a tone of authority. “Do not underestimate them.” Kencathedrus studied Kith-Kanan before nodding his agreement. “Why don’t you show me the lines,” he suggested. “I presume you want us ready at first light.”

As it happened, General Giarna gave Kith’s force one more day to rest and prepare. The human army shifted and marched and expanded, all behind the screen of several groves of trees. Kith sent a dozen Kagonesti Wildrunners to spy, counting on the natural vegetation that they used so well to cover them. Only one returned, and he to report that the human sentries were too thick for even the skilled elves to pass without detection.

The elven force took advantage of the extra day, however. They constructed trenches along much of their front, and in other places, they laid long, sharp stakes in the earth to form a wall thrusting outward. These stakes would protect much of the front from the enemy horsemen Kith knew to number in the thousands.

Parnigar supervised the excavation, racing from site to site, shouting and cursing. He insulted the depth of one trench, the width of another. He cast aspersions on the lineage of the elves who had done the work. The Wildrunners leaped to obey out of respect, not fear. All along the line they dug in, proving that they used the pick and the spade as well as the longsword and pike. Midafternoon slowly crept toward dusk. Kith restlessly worked his way back and forth along the line. Eventually he came to the reserve, where the men of Silvanost recovered from their long march under the shrewd tutelage of Kencathedrus. That captain stepped up to Kith-Kanan as the general dismounted from Kijo.

“Odd how they work for him,” noted the older elf, indicating Parnigar. “My elves wouldn’t even look at an officer who talked to them like that.” Kith-Kanan looked at him curiously, realizing that he spoke the truth. “The Wildrunners here on the plains are a different kind of force than you know from the city,” he pointed out.

He looked at the reserve force, consisting of the five thousand elves who had marched with Kencathedrus. Even at ease, they lounged in the sun in neat ranks across the grassy meadows. A formation of Wildrunners, Kith reflected, would have collected in the areas of shade.

The teacher nodded, still skeptical. He looked across the front, toward the trees that screened the enemy army. “Do you know their deployments?” asked Kencathedrus.

“No.” Kith admitted. “We’ve been shut off all day. I’d fall back if I could. They’ve had too much time to prepare an attack, and I’d love to set those preparations to waste. Your old lesson comes to mind: “Don’t let the enemy have the luxury of following his plan’.”

Kencathedrus nodded, and Kith nearly growled in frustration as he continued.

“But I can’t move back. These trees are the last cover between here and Sithelbec. There’s not so much as a ditch to hide behind if I abandon this position.”

All he could do was to deploy a company of skirmishers well to each flank of his position and hope they could provide him with warning of any sudden flanking thrust.

It was a night of restlessness throughout the camp, despite the exhaustion of the weary troops. Few of them slept for more than a few hours, and many campfires remained lit well past midnight as elves gathered around them and talked of past centuries, of their families—of anything but the terrible destiny that seemed to await them on the morrow.

Dew crept across the land in the darkest hours of night, becoming a heavy mist that flowed thickly through the meadows and twisted around the trunks in the groves. With it came a chill that woke every elf, and thus they spent the last hours of darkness.

They heard the drums before dawn, a far-off rattle that began with shocking precision from a thousand places at once. Darkness shrouded the woods, and the mists of the humid night drifted like spirits among the nervous elves, further obscuring visibility.

Gradually the dark mist turned to pale blue. As the sky lightened overhead, the cadence of a great army’s advance swelled around the elves. The Wildrunners held to their pikes, or steadied their prancing horses. They checked their bowstrings and their quivers, and made certain that the bucklings on their armor held secure. Inevitably the blue light gave way to a dawn of vague, indistinct shapes, still clouded by the haze of fog. The beat of the drums grew louder. The mist drifted across the fields, leaving even nearby clumps of trees nothing more than gray shadows. Louder still grew the precise tapping, yet nothing could be seen of the approaching force.

“There—coming through the pines!”

“I see them—over that way.”

“Here they come—from the ravine!”

Elves shouted, pointing to spots all along their front where shapes began to take form in the mist. Now they could see great, rippling lines of movement, as if waves rolled through the earth itself. The large, prancing figures of horsemen became apparent, several waves of them flexing among the ranks of infantry. Abruptly, as suddenly as it had started, the drumming ceased. The formations of the human army appeared as darker shapes against the yellow grass and the gray sky. For a moment, time on the field, and perhaps across all the plains, across all of Ansalon, stood still. The warriors of the two armies regarded each other across a quarter-mile of ground. Even the wind died, and the mist settled low to the earth.

Then a shout arose from one of the humans and was echoed by fifty thousand voices. Swords bashed against shields, while trumpets blared and horses whinnied in excitement and terror.

In the next instant, the human wave surged forward, the roaring sound wave of the attack preceding it with terrifying force.

Now brassy notes rang from elven trumpets. Pikes rattled as their wielders set their weapons. The five hundred horses of the Wildrunner cavalry nickered and kicked nervously.

Kith-Kanan steadied Kijo. From his position in the center of the line, he had a good view of the advancing human tide. His bodyguards, increased to twelve riders today, stood in a semicircle behind him. He had insisted that they not obstruct his view of the field.

For a moment, he had a terrifying vision of the elven line’s collapse, the human horde sweeping across the plains and forests beyond like a swarm of insects. He shuddered in the grip of the fear, but then the swirl of events grabbed and held his attention.

The first shock of the charge came in the form of two thousand swordsmen, brandishing shields and howling madly. Dressed in thick leather jerkins, they raced ahead of their metal-armored comrades, toward the block of elven pikes standing firm in the center of Kith’s line.

The clash of swordsmen with the tips of those pikes was a horrible scene. The steel-edged blades of the pikes pierced the leather with ease as scores of humans impaled themselves from the force of the charge. A cheer went up from the Wildrunners as the surviving swordsmen turned to flee, leaving perhaps a quarter of their number writhing and groaning on the ground, at the very feet of the elves who had wounded them.

Now the focus shifted to the left, where human longbowmen advanced against an exposed portion of the Wildrunner line. Kith’s own archers fired back, sending a deadly shower against the press of men. But the human arrows, too, found marks among the tightly packed ranks, and elven blood soon flowed thick in the trampled grass.

Kith nudged Kijo toward the archers, watching volleys of arrows arc and cross through the air. The humans rushed forward and the elves stood firm. The elven commander urged his steed faster, sensing the imminent clash. Then the human advance wavered and slowed. Kith saw Parnigar, standing beside the archers.

“Now!” cried the sergeant-major, gesturing toward a platoon of elves standing beside him. A few dozen in number, these elves wore swords at their sides but had no weapons in their hands. It was their bare hands that they raised, fingers extended toward the rushing humans.

A bright flash of light made Kith blink. Magic missiles, crackling blasts of sorcerous power, exploded from Parnigar’s platoon. A whole line of men dropped, slain so suddenly that members of the rear ranks tripped and tumbled over the bodies. Again the light flashed, and another volley of magic ripped into the humans.

Some of those struck screamed aloud, crying for their gods or for their mothers. Others stumbled back, panicked by the sorcerous attack. A whole company, following the decimated formation, stopped in its tracks and then turned to flee. In another moment, the mass of human bowmen streamed away, pursued by another volley of the keen elven arrows.

Yet even as this attack failed, Kith sensed a crisis on his left. A line of human cavalry, three thousand snorting horses bearing armored lancers, thundered through the rapidly thinning mist. The charge swept forward with a momentum that made the previous attacks look like parade-ground drills. Before the horsemen waited a line of elves with swords and shields, soft prey for the thundering riders. To the right and left of them, the sharp stakes jutted forward, proof against the cavalry attack. But the gaps in the line had to be held by troops, and now these elves faced approaching doom.

“Archers—give cover,” Kith shouted as Kijo raced across the lines. Companies of elven longbow wheeled and released their missiles, scoring hits among the horsemen. But still the charge pounded forward.

“Fall back! Take cover in the trees!” he shouted to the captains of the longsword companies, for there was no other choice.

Kith cursed himself in frustration, realizing that the human commander had forced him to commit his pikes against the initial charge. Now came the horses, and his companies of pikes, the only true defense against a wave of cavalry, were terribly out of position.

Then he stared in astonishment. As more arrows fell among the riders, suddenly the horsemen wheeled about, racing away from the elven position before the defenders could follow Kith’s orders to withdraw. The astonished elven swordsmen watched the horses and the riders flee, pursued by a desultory shower of arrows. The elven defenders could only wonder at the fortuitous turn of events.

In the back of Kith’s mind, something whispered a warning. This had to be a trick, he told himself. Certainly the arrows hadn’t been thick and deadly enough to halt that awe-inspiring charge. Less than fifty riders, and no more than two dozen horses, lay in the field before them. His scouts had given him a good count of the human cavalry. Though he had not been able to study these, he suspected he had seen only about half the force.

“Our men fall back as you ordered,” reported Suzine, her eyes locked upon the violent images in her mirror. The glass rested on a table, and she sat before it—table, woman, and mirror, all encased in a narrow shroud of canvas, to keep the daylight from the crucial seeing device. She never lost view of the elven commander who sat straight and proud in his saddle, every inch the warrior of House Royal.

Behind her, pacing in taut excitement, General Giarna looked over her shoulder.

“Excellent! And the elves—what do you see of them?”

“They stand firm, my lord.”

“What?” General Giarna’s voice barked violently against her, filling the small canvas shelter where they observed the battle. “You’re wrong! They must attack!”

Suzine flinched. The image in the mirror—a picture of long ranks of elven warriors, holding their positions, failing to pursue the bait of the human retreat—wavered slightly,

She felt the general’s rage explode, and then the image faded. Suzine saw only her own reflection and the hideous face of the man behind her.

“My lord! Let us hit them now, while they fall back in confusion!” Kith turned to see Kencathedrus beside him. His old teacher rode a prancing mare, and the weariness of the march from Silvanost was totally gone from his face. Instead, the warrior’s eyes burned, and his gauntleted fist clung tightly to the hilt of his sword.

“It has to be a trick,” Kith countered. “We didn’t drive them away that easily.”

“For the gods’ sakes, Kith-Kanan—these are humans! The cowardly scum will run from a loud noise! Let’s follow up and destroy them!”

“No!” Kith’s voice was harsh, full of command, and Kencathedrus’s face whitened with frustration.

“We do not face an ordinary general,” Kith-Kanan continued, feeling that he owed further explanation to the one who had girded his first sword upon him.

“He hasn’t failed to surprise me yet, and I know we have seen but a fraction of his force.”

“But if they fly they will escape! We must pursue!” Kencathedrus couldn’t help himself.

“The answer is no. If they are escaping, so be it. If they attempt to pull us out of our position to trap us, they shall not.”

Another roar thundered across the fields before them, and more humans came into view, running toward the elves with all manner of weaponry. Great companies of longbowmen readied their missiles, while bearded axemen raised their heavy blades over their heads. Spearmen charged with gleaming points extended toward the enemy, while swordsmen banged their swords against their shields, advancing at a steady march.

Kencathedrus, shocked by the fresh display of human might and vigor, looked at the general with respect. “You knew,” he said wonderingly. Kith-Kanan shrugged and shook his head. “No—I simply suspected. Perhaps because I had a good teacher.”

The older elf growled, appreciating the remark but annoyed with himself. Indeed, they both realized that, had the elves advanced when Kencathedrus had desired, they would have been swiftly overrun, vulnerable in the open field.

Kencathedrus rejoined his reserve company, and Kith-Kanan immersed himself in the fight. Thousands of humans and elves clashed along the line, and hundreds died. Weapons shattered against shields, and bones shattered beneath blades. The long morning gave way to afternoon, but the passing of time meant nothing to the desperate combatants, for whom each moment could be their last.

The tide of battle surged back and forth. Companies of humans turned and fled, many of them before their charging ranks even reached the determined elves. Others hacked and slew their way into the defenders, and occasionally a company of elves gave way. Then the humans poured through the gap like the surging surf, but always Kith-Kanan was there, slashing with his bloody sword, urging his elven lancers into the breach.

Wave after wave of humans surged madly across the trampled field, hurling themselves into the elves as if to shatter them with the sheer momentum of their charges. As soon as one company broke, one regiment fell back depleted and demoralized, another block of steel-tipped humanity lunged forward to take its place.

The Wildrunners fought until total exhaustion gripped each and every warrior, and then they fought some more. Their small, mobile companies banded together to form solid lines, shifted to deflect each new charge, and flowed sideways to fill gaps caused by their fallen or routed comrades. Always those plunging horses backed them up, and each time, as the line faltered, the elven cavalry thundered against the breakthrough, driving it back in disorder. Those five hundred riders managed to seal every breach. By the time the afternoon shadows began to lengthen, Kith noticed a slackening in the human attacks. One company of swordsmen stumbled away, and for once there was no fresh formation to take their place in the attack. The din of combat seemed to fade somewhat, and then he saw another formation—a group of axemen—turn and lumber away from the fight. More and more of the humans broke off their attacks, and soon the great regiments of Ergoth streamed across the field, back toward their own lines.

Kith slumped wearily in his saddle, staring in suspicion at the fleeing backs of the soldiers. Could it be over? Had the Wildrunners won? He looked at the sun—about four good hours of daylight remained. The humans wouldn’t risk an encounter at night, he knew. Elven nightvision was one of the great proofs of the elder race’s superiority over its shorter-lived counterparts. Yet certainly the hour was not the reason for the humans’ retreat, not when they had been pressing so forcefully all along the line.

A weary Parnigar approached on foot. Kith had seen the scout’s horse cut down beneath him during the height of the battle. The general recognized his captain’s lanky walk, though Parnigar’s face and clothes were caked in mud and the blood of his slain enemies.

“We’ve held them, sir,” he reported, his face creasing into a disbelieving smile. Immediately, however, he frowned and shook his head. “Some three or four hundred dead, though. The day was not without its cost.” Kith looked at the exhausted yet steady ranks of his Wildrunners. The pikemen held their weapons high, the archers carried bows at the ready, while those with swords honed their blades in the moments of silence and respite. The formations still arrayed in full ranks, as if fresh and unblooded, but their ranks were shorter now. Organized in neat rows behind each company, covered with blankets, lay a quiet grouping of motionless forms. At least the dead can rest, he thought, feeling his own weariness. He looked again to the humans, seeing that they still fled in disorder. Many of them had reached the tree line and were disappearing into the sheltering forest.

“My lord! My lord! Now is the time. You must see that.” Kith turned to see Kencathedrus galloping up to him. The elven veteran reined in beside the general and gestured at the fleeing humans.

“You may be right.” Kith-Kanan had to agree. He saw the five thousand elves of Silvanost gathered in trim ranks, ready to advance the moment he gave the word. This was the chance to deliver a coup de grace that could send the enemy reeling all the way back to Caergoth.

“Quickly, my lord—they’re getting away.” Impatiently, his gray brows bristling, Kencathedrus indicated the ragged humans running in small clumps, like sheep, toward the sheltering woods in the distance.

“Very well—advance and pursue! But have a care for your flanks!”

“They must come after us now.” General Giarna’s horse twisted and pitched among the ranks of retreating humans, many of whom were bleeding or limping, supported by the shoulders of their sturdier comrades. Indeed, the Army of Ergoth had paid a hideous price for the daylong attacks, all of which were mere preliminaries to his real plan of battle.

The general paid no attention to the human suffering around him. Instead, his dark eyes fixed with a malevolent stare on the elven positions across the mud-spattered landscape. No movement yet—but they must advance. He felt this with a certainty that filled his dark heart with a bloodthirsty anticipation. For a moment, he cast a sharp glance to the rear, toward the tiny tent that sheltered Suzine and her mirror. The gods should damn that bitch! How, in the heat of the fight, could her powers fail her? Why now—today?

His brow narrowed in suspicion, but he had no time now to wonder about the unreliability of his mistress. She had been a valuable tool, and it would be regrettable if that tool were no longer at his disposal.

Perhaps, as she had claimed, the tension of the great conflict had proven too distracting, too overpowering for her to concentrate. Or maybe the general’s looming presence had frightened her. In fact, General Giarna wanted to frighten her, just as he wanted to frighten everyone under his command. However, if that fear was enough to disrupt her powers of concentration, than Suzine’s usefulness might be seriously limited.

No matter—at least for now. The battle could still be won by force of arms. The key was to make the elves believe that the humans were beaten. General Giarna’s pulse quickened then as he saw a line of movement across the field.

“Elves of Silvanost, advance!” The captain had already turned away from his commander. The reserve companies started forward at a brisk march, through the gaps in the spiked fence of the elven line. The companies of the Wildrunners, battered and weary, cleared the way for the attackers, whose gleaming spear points and shining armor stood out in stark contrast to the muddy, bloody mess around them. Nevertheless, the Wildrunners raised a hearty cheer as Kencathedrus led his troops into the attack.

“On the double—charge!” His horse prancing eagerly beneath him, Kencathedrus brandished his sword and urged his complement forward. The troops needed no prodding. All day they had seen their fellow countrymen die at the hands of these rapacious savages, and now they had the chance to take vengeance.

The panicked humans cast down weapons, shields, helmets—anything loose and cumbersome—in their desperate flight. They scattered away from the charging elves, racing for the shelter of any clump of trees or thick brush they could find.

The warriors of Silvanost, disciplined even at their steady advance, remained in close-meshed lines. They parted at the obstacles, while several who were armed with shortswords pressed into the grove, quickly dispatching the hapless humans who sought refuge there.

But even so, it was clear that the great bulk of the routed troops would escape, so rapid was their flight. The close ranks of the elves could not keep pace. Finally Kencathedrus slowed his company to a brisk walk, allowing the elves to catch their breath as they approached the first large expanse of forest.

“Archers, stand forward to the flanks!” Kith-Kanan didn’t know why he gave the order, but suddenly he saw how vulnerable were the five thousand elves, in the event that he had been tricked. Kencathedrus and his regiment had already advanced nearly half a mile ahead of the main army, while the fleeing humans seemed to melt away before them.

Two blocks of elves—his keenest longbows, some thousand strong each—trotted ahead.

“Pikes—in the middle, quickly.” One more unit Kith-Kanan sent forward, this one consisting of his fiercest veterans, armed with their deadly, fifteen-foot weapons with razor-sharp steel tips. They advanced at a trot, filling some of the gap between the two blocks of longbows.

“Horsemen! To me!” A third command brought the proud elven cavalry thundering to their commander. It seemed to Kith-Kanan that Kencathedrus and his company were now in terrible danger. He had to catch up and give them support.

Flanked by his mounted bodyguards, the commander led his horsemen through the lines, in a wide sweep toward the right of Kencathedrus’s company. The elven archers carried their weapons ready. Pikes rattled behind them. Had he done everything that he could to protect the advance?

Kith sensed something in the air as the late afternoon seemed to grow sinister around him. He listened carefully; his eyes studied the opposite tree line, scanned to the right and left to the limits of his vision. Nothing.

Yet now some of his elves sensed the same thing, the indefinable inkling of something terrible and awesome and mighty. Warriors nervously fingered their weapons. The Wildrunners’ horses moved restlessly, shaking off the weariness of many hours’ battle.

Then a rumble of deep thunder permeated the air. It began as a faint drumming, but in Kith-Kanan’s mind, it grew to a deafening explosion within a few seconds.

“Sound the withdrawal!” He shouted at the trumpeters as he looked left, then right—where, by all the gods?

He saw them appear, like a wave of brown grass on the horizon, to both sides—countless thousands of humans mounted on thundering horses, sweeping around the patches of woods, across the open prairie, pounding closer, with all the speed of the wind.

The horns blared, and Kith saw that Kencathedrus had already sensed the trap. Now the elves of Silvanost retired toward the Wildrunners’ lines at a quick pace. But all who looked on could see that they would be too late. The archers and pikemen advanced, desperate to aid their countrymen. They showered the human cavalry with arrows, while the long pikes bristled before the archers, protecting them from the charge.

But the elves of Silvanost had no such protection. The human cavalry slammed into them, and rank after rank of the elven infantry fell beneath the cruel hooves and keen, unfeeling steel.

The pikemen and archers fell back slowly, carefully, still shredding the cavalry with deadly arrows, felling the horsemen by the hundred with each volley. Yet thousands upon thousands of the humans trampled across the plain, slaughtering the stranded regiment.

Kith-Kanan led his riders into the flank of the human charge, little caring that there were ten or twenty humans for every one of his elves. With his own sword, he cut a leering, bearded human from the saddle. Horses screamed and bucked around them, and in moments, the two companies of cavalry mingled, each man or elf fighting the foe he found close at hand.

More blood flowed into the already soaked ground. Kith saw a human lancer drive a bloodstained lance toward his heart. One of his loyal bodyguards flung himself from his saddle and took the weapon through his own throat, deflecting the blow that would have surely been fatal. With a surge of hatred, Kith spurred Kijo forward, chopping savagely through the neck and striking the lancer’s head from his shoulders. Spouting blood like an obscene geyser, the corpse toppled from the saddle, lost in the chaos of the melee before it struck the ground.

Kith saw another of his faithful guards fall, this time to a human swordsman whose horse skipped nimbly away. The fight swirled madly, flashing images of blood, screaming horses, dying men and elves. If he had paused to think, he would have regretted the charge that brought his riders out here to aid Kencathedrus. Now, it seemed, both units faced annihilation. Desperately Kith-Kanan looked for a sign of the elves of Silvanost. He saw them through the melee. Led by a grim-faced Kencathedrus, the elven reserve force struggled to break free of the deadly trap. Finally they tore from their neat ranks in a headlong dash through the sea of human horsemen toward the safety of the Wildrunner lines.

Miraculously, many of them made it. They scrambled between the thick wall of stakes, into the welcoming arms of their comrades, while the stampeding cavalry surged and bucked just beyond. By the dozens and scores and hundreds, they limped and dodged and tumbled to safety, until more than two thousand of them, including Kencathedrus, had emerged. The captain tried to turn and limp back into the fray in a foredoomed effort to bring forth more of his men, but he was restrained in the grasp of two sergeants-major. The archers, too, fell back, and then it was only the riders caught on the field. Isolated pockets of elven cavalry twisted away from the sea of human horsemen, breaking for the shelter of their lines. Kith-Kanan himself, however, after having led the charge, was now caught in the middle of the enemy forces. His arm grew leaden with fatigue. Blood from a cut on his forehead streamed into his eyes. His helmet was gone, knocked from his head by a human’s bashing shield. His loyal guards—the few who still lived—fought around him, but now the outlook was grim.

The humans fell back, just far enough to avoid the slashing elven blades. Kith-Kanan and a group of perhaps two dozen elven riders gasped for breath, surrounded by a ring of death—more than a thousand human lancers, swordsmen, and archers.

With a groan of despair, he cast his sword to the ground. The rest of the survivors immediately followed his example.

As darkness finally closed about them, the humans turned back from the elven line. Kencathedrus and Parnigar knew that it was only nightfall that had prevented the complete collapse of their position. They knew, too, that the exhausted army would have to retreat now, even before the darkness was complete.

They would have to take shelter in Sithelbec early the following day, before the deadly human cavalry could catch them in the open. The entire force of the Wildrunners could suffer the fate of the unblooded elves of Silvanost. It seemed to the elven leaders that the day couldn’t have been any more disastrous. Despair settled around them like a bleak cloud as they considered the worst news of all: Kith-Kanan, their commander and the driving force behind the Wildrunners, was lost—possibly captured, but more likely killed. The army marched, heads down and shambling, toward the security—and the confinement—of Sithelbec.

Sometime after midnight, it started to rain, and it continued to pour throughout the night and even past the gray, featureless dawn. The miserable army finally reached Sithelbec, closing the gates behind the last of the Wildrunners, sometime around noon of the following gray, drizzling day.

5

Suzine awakened to a summons from the general, delivered by a bronze-helmed lieutenant of crossbows. The woman felt vague relief that General Giarna hadn’t come to her in person. Indeed, she hadn’t seen him since before the battle’s climax, when his trap had snared so much of the elven army. Her relief had grown from the previous night, when she had feared that he would desire her. General Giarna frightened her often, but there was something deeper and more abiding about the terror he inspired after he had led his troops in battle.

The darkness that seemed always to linger in his eyes became, in those moments, like a bottomless well of despair and hopelessness, as if his hunger for killing could never be sated. The more the blood flowed around him, the greater his appetite became.

He would take her then, using her like he was some kind of parasite, unaware and uncaring of her feelings. He would hurt her and, when he was finished, cast her roughly aside, his own fundamental needs still raging. But after this battle, his greatest victory to date, he had stayed away from her. She had retired early the night before, dying to look into her mirror, to ascertain Kith-Kanan’s whereabouts. She felt a terrible fear for his safety, but she hadn’t dared to use her glass for fear of the general. He mustn’t suspect her growing fascination with Kith-Kanan.

Now she dressed quickly and fetched her mirror, safe in a felt-lined wooden case, and then allowed the officer to lead her along the column of tents to General Giarna’s shelter of black silk. The lieutenant held the door while she entered, blinking for a moment as she adjusted to the dim light. And then it seemed that her world exploded.

The file of muddy elven prisoners, many of them bruised, stood at resentful attention. There were perhaps a score of them, each with a watchful swordsman right behind him, but Suzine’s eyes flashed immediately to him. She recognized Kith-Kanan in the instant that she saw him, and she had to forcibly resist an urge to run to him. She wanted to look at him, to touch him in all the ways she could not through her mirror. She fought an urge to knock the sword-wielding guard aside.

Then she remembered General Giarna. Her face flushed, she felt perspiration gather on her brow. He was watching her closely. Forcing an expression of cool detachment, she turned to him.

“You summoned me, General?”

The commander seemed to look through her, with a gaze that threatened to wither her soul. His eyes yawned before her like black chasms, menacing pits that made her want to hurriedly step back from the edge.

“The interrogation continues. I want you to witness their testimony and gauge the truth of their replies.” His voice was like a cold gust of air. For the first time, Suzine noticed an additional elven form. This one stretched facedown on the carpeted floor of the tent, a tiny hole at the base of his neck showing where he had been stabbed.

Numbly she looked back. Kith-Kanan stood second from the end of the line, near where the killing had occurred. He paid no attention to her. The elf between him and the dead one looked in grimly concealed fear at the human general.

“Your strength!” demanded General Giarna. “How many troops garrison your fortress? Catapults? Ballistae? You will tell us about them all.” The final sentence was a demand, not a question.

“The fortress is garrisoned by twenty thousand warriors, with more on the way!” blurted the prisoner beside the corpse. “Wizards and clerics, too—” Suzine didn’t need the mirror to see that he lied; neither, apparently, did General Giarna. He chopped his hand once, and the swordsman behind the terrified speaker stabbed at the doomed elf. His blade severed the elf’s spinal cord and then plunged through his neck, emerging under the unfortunate warrior’s chin in a gurgling fountain of blood.

The next swordsman—the one behind Kith-Kanan—prodded his charge in the back, forcing him to stand a little straighter, as the general’s eyes came to rest upon him. But only for a moment, for the human leader allowed his scornful gaze to roam across the entire row of his captives.

“Which of you holds rank over the others?” inquired the general, casting his eyes along the line of remaining elves.

For the first time, Suzine realized that Kith-Kanan wore none of the trappings of his station. He was an anonymous rider among the elven warriors. Giarna didn’t recognize him! That revelation encouraged her to take a risk.

“My general,” she said quickly, hearing her voice as if another person was speaking, “could I have a word with you—away from the ears of the prisoners?” He looked at her, his dark eyes boring into her. Was that annoyance she saw, or something darker?

“Very well,” he replied curtly. He took her arm in his hand and led her from the tent.

She felt the mirror’s case in her hand, seeking words as she spoke. “They are obviously willing to die for their cause. But perhaps, with a little patience, I can make them useful to us ... alive.”

“You can tell me whether they speak the truth or not—but what good is that when they are willing to die with lies in their mouths?”

“But there is more to the glass,” she said insistently. “Given a quiet place and some time—and some close personal attention to one of these subjects—I can probe deeper than mere questions and answers. I can see into their minds, to the secret truths they would never admit to such as you.” General Giarna’s black brows came together in a scowl. “Very well. I will allow you to try.” He led her back into the tent. “Which one will you start with?”

Trying to still the trembling in her heart, Suzine raised an imperious hand and indicated Kith-Kanan. She spoke to the guard behind him. “Bring this one to my tent,” she said matter-of-factly.

She avoided looking at the general, afraid those black eyes would paralyze her with suspicion or accusation. But he said nothing. He merely nodded to the guard behind Kith and the swordsman beside him, the one who had just slain the fallen elf. The pair of guards prodded Kith-Kanan forward, and Suzine preceded him through the silken flap of General Giarna’s tent. They passed between two tents, the high canvas shapes screening them from the rest of the camp. She could feel his eyes on her back as she walked, and finally she could no longer resist the urge to turn and look at him.

“What do you want with me?” he asked, his voice surprising her with its total lack of fear.

“I won’t hurt you,” she replied, suddenly angry when the elf smiled slightly in response.

“Move, you!” grunted one of the guards, stepping in front of his companion and waving his blade past Kith-Kanan’s face.

Kith-Kanan reached forward with the speed of a striking snake, seizing the guard’s wrist as the blade veered away from his face. Holding the man’s hand, the elf kicked him sharply in the groin. The swordsman gasped and collapsed. His companion, the warrior who had slain the elf in the tent, gaped in momentary shock—a moment that proved to be his last. Kith pulled the blade from the fallen guard’s hand and, in the same motion, drove the point into the swordsman’s throat. He died, his jaw soundlessly working in an effort to articulate his shock.

The dead guard’s helmet toppled off as he fell, allowing his long blond hair to spill free when he collapsed, face first, on the ground.

Kith lowered the blade, ready to thrust it through the neck of the groaning man he had kicked. Then something stayed his hand, and he merely admonished the guard to be silent with a persuasive press of the blade against the man’s throat.

Turning to the one he had slain, Kith looked at the body curiously. Suzine hadn’t moved. She watched him in fascination, scarcely daring to breathe, as he brushed the blond hair aside with the toe of his boot.

The ear that was revealed was long and pointed.

“Do you have many elves in your army?” he asked.

“No—not many,” Suzine said quickly. “They are mostly from the ranks of traders and farmers who have lived in Ergoth and desire a homeland on the plains.”

Kith looked sharply at Suzine. There was something about this human woman. . .

She stood still, paralyzed not so much by fear for herself as by dismay. He was about to escape, to leave her!

“I thank you for inadvertently saving my life,” he said before darting toward the corner of a nearby tent.

“I know who you are!” she said, her voice a bare whisper. He stopped again, torn between the need to escape and increasing curiosity about this woman and her knowledge.

“Thank you, too, then, for keeping the secret,” he said, with a short bow. “Why did you ... ”

She wanted to tell him that she had watched him for a long time, had all but lain beside him, through the use of her mirror. Suzine looked at him now, and he was more glorious, prouder, and taller than she had ever imagined. She wanted to ask him to take her away with him—right now—but, instead, her mouth froze, her mind locked by terror.

In another moment, he had disappeared. It was several moments longer before she finally found the voice to scream.

The elation Kith-Kanan felt at his escape dissipated as quickly as the gates of Sithelbec shut behind him and enclosed him within the sturdy walls of the fortress. His stolen horse, staggering from exhaustion, stumbled to a halt, and the elf swung to the ground.

He wondered, through his weariness, about the human woman who had given him his chance to flee. The picture of her face, crowned by that glory of red hair, remained indelibly burned into his mind. He wondered if he would ever see her again.

Around him loomed the high walls, with the pointed logs arrayed along the top. Below these, he saw the faces of his warriors. Several raised a halfhearted cheer at his return, but the shock of defeat hung over the Wildrunners like a heavy pall.

Sithelbec had grown rapidly in the last year, sprawling across the surrounding plain until it covered a circle more than a mile in diameter. The central keep of the fortress was a stone structure of high towers, soaring to needlelike spires in the elven fashion. Around this keep clustered a crowded nest of houses, shops, barracks, inns, and other buildings, all within other networks of walls, blockhouses, and battle platforms.

Expanding outward through a series of concentric palisades, mostly of wood, the fortress protected a series of wells within its walls, ensuring a steady supply of water. Food—mostly grain—had been stockpiled in huge barns and silos. Supplies of arrows and flammable oil, stored in great vats, had been collected along the walls’ tops. The greater part of Kith-Kanan’s army, through the alert withdrawal under Parnigar, had reached the shelter of those ramparts.

Yet as the Army of Ergoth moved in to encircle the fortress, the Wildrunners could only wait.

Now Kith-Kanan walked among them, making his way to the small office and quarters he maintained in the gatehouse of the central keep. He felt the tension, the fear that approached despair, as he looked at the wide, staring eyes of his warriors.

And even more than the warriors, there were the women and children. Many of the women were human, their children half-elves, wives and offspring of the western elves who made up the Wildrunners. Kith shared their sorrow as deeply as he felt that of the elven females who were here in even greater numbers.

They would all be eating short rations, he knew. The siege would inevitably last into the autumn, and he had little doubt the humans could sustain the pressure through the winter and beyond.

As he looked at the young ones, Kith felt a stab of pain. He wondered how many of them would see spring.

6

Lord Quimant came to Sithas in the Hall of Audience. His wife’s cousin brought another elf—a stalwart-looking fellow, with lines of soot set firmly in his face, and the strapping, sinewy arms of a powerful wrestler—to see the Speaker of the Stars.

Sithas sat upon his emerald throne and watched the approaching pair. The Speaker’s green robe flowed around him, collecting the light of the throne and diffusing it into a soft glow that seemed to surround him. He reclined casually in the throne, but he remained fully alert.

Alert, in that his mind was working quickly. Yet his thoughts were many hundreds of miles and years away.

Weeks earlier, he had received a letter from Kencathedrus describing Kith-Kanan’s capture and presumed loss. That had been followed, barely two days later, by a missive from his brother himself, describing a harrowing escape: the battle with guards, the theft of a fleet horse, a mad dash from the encampment, and finally a chase that ended only after Kith-Kanan had led his pursuers to within arrow range of the great fortress of Sithelbec. Sithelbec—named for his father, the former Speaker of the Stars. Many times Sithas had reflected on the irony, for his father had been slain on a hunting trip, practically within sight of the fortress’s walls. As far as Sithas knew, it had been his father’s first and only expedition to the western plains. Yet Sithel had been willing to go to war over those plains, to put the nation’s future at stake because of them. And now Sithas, his firstborn, had inherited that struggle. Would he live up to his father’s expectations?

Reluctantly Sithas forced his mind back to the present, to his current location. He cast his eyes around his surroundings to force the transition in his thoughts. A dozen elven guards, in silver breastplates and tall, plumed helmets, snapped their halberds to attention around the periphery of the hall. They stood impassive and silent as the noble lord marched toward the throne. Otherwise the great hall, with its gleaming marble floor and the ceiling towering six hundred feet overhead, was empty.

Sithas looked at Quimant. The elven noble wore a long cloak of black over a silk tunic of light green. Tights of red, and soft, black boots, completed his ensemble.

Lord Quimant of Oakleaf was a very handsome elf indeed. But he was also intelligent, quick-witted, and alert to many threats and opportunities that might otherwise have missed Sithas’s notice.

“This is my nephew,” the lord explained. “Ganrock Ethu, master smith. I recommend him, my Speaker, for the position of palace smith. He is shrewd, quick to learn, and a very hard worker.”

“But Herrlock Redmoon has always handled the royal smithy,” Sithas protested. Then he remembered: Herrlock had been blinded the week before in a tragic accident, when he had touched spark to his forge. Somehow the kindled coal had exploded violently, destroying his eyes beyond the abilities of Silvanost’s clerics to repair. After seeing that the loyal smith was well cared for and as comfortable as possible, Sithas had promised to select a replacement. He looked at the young elf before him. Ganrock’s face showed lines of maturity, and the thick muscle of his upper torso showed proof of long years of work.

“Very well,” Sithas agreed. “Show him the royal smithy and find out what he needs to get started.” He called to one of his guards and told the elf to accompany Ganrock Ethu to the forge area, which lay in the rear of the Palace of Quinari.

“Thank you, Your Eminence,” said the smith, with a sudden bow. “I shall endeavor to do fine work for you.”

“Very good,” replied the Speaker. Quimant lingered as the smith left the hall. Lord Quimant’s narrow face tightened in determination as he turned back to Sithas.

“What is it, my lord? You look distressed.” Sithas raised a hand and bade Quimant stand beside him.

“The Smelters Guild, Your Highness,” replied the noble elf. “They refuse—they simply refuse—to work their foundries during the hours of darkness. Without the additional steel, our weapon production is hamstrung, barely adequate for even peacetime needs.”

Sithas cursed quietly. Nevertheless, he was thankful that Quimant had informed him. The proud heir of Clan Oakleaf had greatly improved the efficiency of Silvanost’s war preparations by spotting details—such as this one—that would have escaped Sithas’s notice.

“I shall speak to the smelter Kerilar,” Sithas vowed. “He is a stubborn old elf, but he knows the importance of the sword. I will make him understand, if I have to.”

“Very good, Excellency,” said Lord Quimant, with a bow. He straightened again. “Is there news of the war?”

“Not since the last letter, a week ago. The Wildrunners remain besieged in Sithelbec, while the humans roam the disputed lands at will. Kith has no chance to break out. He’s now surrounded by a hundred thousand men.” The lord shook his head grimly before fixing Sithas with a hard gaze. “He must be reinforced—there’s no other way. You know this, don’t you?” Sithas met Quimant’s gaze with equal steadiness. “Yes—I do. But the only way I can recruit more troops is to conscript them from the city and the surrounding clan estates. You know what kind of dispute that will provoke!”

“How long can your brother hold his fort?”

“He has rations enough for the winter. The casualties of the battle were terrible, of course, but the remainder of his force is well disciplined, and the fortress is strong.”

The news of the battlefield debacle had hit the elven capital hard. As the knowledge spread that two thousand of the city’s young elves—two out of every five who had marched so proudly to the west—had perished in the fight, Silvanost had been shrouded in grief for a week.

Sithas learned of the battle at the same time as he heard that his brother had fallen and was most likely lost. For two days, his world had been a grim shroud of despair. Knowing that Kith had reached safety lightened the burden to some extent, but their prospects for victory still seemed nonexistent. How long would it be, he had agonized, before the rest of the Wildrunners fell to the overwhelming tide around them?

Then gradually his despair had turned to anger—anger at the shortsightedness of his own people. Elves had crowded the Hall of Audience on the Trial Days, disrupting the proceedings. The emotions of the city’s elves had been inflamed by the knowledge that the rest of the Wildrunners had suffered nowhere near the size of losses inflicted upon the elves of Silvanost. It was not uncommon now to hear voices raised in the complaint that the western lands should be turned over to the humans and the Wildrunner elves, to let them battle each other to extinction.

“Very well—so he can hold out.” Quimant’s voice was strong yet deferential.

“But he cannot escape! We must send a fresh army, a large one, to give him the sinew he needs!”

“There are the dwarves. We have yet to hear from them,” Sithas pointed out.

“Pah! If they do anything, it will be too late! It seems that Than-Kar sympathizes with the humans as much as with us. The dwarves will never do anything so long as he remains their voice and their ears!” Ah—but he is not their voice and ears. Sithas had that thought with some small satisfaction, but he said nothing to Quimant as the lord continued, though his thoughts considered the potential of hope. Tamanier Ambrodel, I am depending upon you!

“Still, we must tolerate him, I suppose. He is our best chance of an alliance.”

“As always, good cousin, your words are the mirror of my thoughts.” Sithas straightened in his throne, a signal that the interview drew to a close. “But my decision is still to wait. Kith-Kanan is secure for now, and we may learn more as time goes on.”

He hoped he was right. The fortress was strong, and the humans would undoubtedly require months to prepare a coordinated assault. But what then?

“Very well.” Quimant cleared his throat awkwardly, then added, “What is the word of my cousin? I have not seen her for some weeks now.”

“Her time is near,” Sithas offered. “Her sisters have come from the estates to stay with her, and she has been confined to bed by the clerics of Quenesti Pah.”

Quimant nodded. “Please give her my wishes when next you see her. May she give birth speedily, to a healthy child.”

“Indeed.”

Sithas watched the elegant noble walk from the hall. He was impressed by Quimant’s bearing. The lord knew his worth to the throne, proven in the halfyear since he had come to Silvanost. He showed sensitivity to the desires of the Speaker and seemed to work well toward those ends.

He heard one of the side doors open and looked across the great hall as a silk-gowned female elf entered. Her eyes fell softly on the figure seated upon the brilliant throne with its multitude of green, gleaming facets.

“Mother,” said Sithas with delight. He didn’t see much of Nirakina around the palace during these difficult days, and this visit was a pleasant surprise. He was struck, as she approached him, by how much older she looked.

“I see you do not have attendants now,” she said quietly to Sithas, who rose and approached her. “So often you are busy with the affairs of state ... and war.”

He sighed. “War has become the way of my life—the way all Silvanost lives now.” He felt a twinge of sadness for his mother. So often Sithas looked upon the death of his father as an event that had placed the burden of rule on his own shoulders. He tended to forget that it had, at the same time, made his mother a widow.

“Take a moment to walk with me, won’t you?” asked Nirakina, taking her son by the arm.

He nodded, and they walked in silence across the great hall of the tower to the crystal doors reserved for the royal family alone. These opened soundlessly, and then they were in the Gardens of Astarin. To their right were the dark wooden buildings of the royal stables, while before them beckoned the wondrous beauty of the royal gardens. Immediately Sithas felt a sense of lightness and ease.

“You need to do this more often,” said his mother, gently chiding. “You grow old before your time.” She held his arm loosely, letting him select the path they followed.

The gardens loomed around them—great hedges and thick bushes heavy with dewy blossoms; ponds and pools and fountains; small clumps of aspen and oak and fir. It was a world of nature, shaped and formed by elven clerics—devotees of the Bard King, Astarin—into a transcendent work of art.

“I thank you for bringing me through those doors,” Sithas said with a chuckle. “Sometimes I need to be reminded.”

“Your father, too, needed a subtle reminder now and then. I tried to give him that when it became necessary.”

For a moment, Sithas felt a wave of melancholy. “I miss him now more than ever. I feel so ... unready to sit on his throne.”

“You are ready,” said Nirakina firmly. “Your wisdom is seeing us through the most difficult time since the Dragon Wars. But since you are about to become a father, you must realize that your life cannot be totally given over to your nation. You have a family to think about, as well.”

Sithas smiled. “The clerics of Quenesti Pah are with Hermathya at all times. They say it will be any day now.”

“The clerics, and her sisters,” Nirakina murmured.

“Yes,” Sithas agreed. Hermathya’s sisters, Gelynna and Lyath, had moved into the palace as soon as his wife’s pregnancy had become known. They were pleasant enough, but Sithas had come to feel that his apartments were somehow less than his own now. It was a feeling he didn’t like but that he had tried to overlook for Hermathya’s sake.

“She has changed, Mother, that much you must see. Hermathya had become a new woman even before she knew about the child. She has been a support and a comfort to me, as if for the first time.”

“It is the war,” said Nirakina. “I have noticed this change you speak of, and it began with the war. She, her clan of Oakleaf, they all thrive upon this intensity and activity.” The elven woman paused, then added, “I noticed Lord Quimant leaving before I entered. You speak with him often. Is he proving himself useful?”

“Indeed, very. Does this cause you concern?”

Nirakina sighed, then shook her head. “I—no-no, it doesn’t. You are doing the right thing for Silvanesti, and if he can aid you, that is a good thing.” Sithas stopped at a stone bench. His mother sat while he paced idly below overhanging branches of silvery quaking aspen that shimmered in the light breeze.

“Have you had word from Tamanier Ambrodel?” Nirakina asked. Sithas smiled confidentially. “He has arrived at Thorbardin safely and hopes to get in touch with the Hylar. With any luck, he will see the king himself. Then we shall find out if this Than-Kar is doing us true justice as ambassador.”

“And you have told no one of Lord Ambrodel’s mission?” his mother inquired carefully.

“No ” Sithas informed her. “Indeed, Quimant and I discussed the dwarves today, but I said nothing even to him about our quiet diplomat. Still, I wish you would tell me why we must maintain such secrecy.”

“Please, not yet,” Nirakina demurred.

A thin haze had gradually spread across the sky, and now the wind carried a bit of early winter in its caress. Sithas saw his mother shiver in her light silken garment.

“Come, we’ll return to the hall,” he said, offering his arm as she rose.

“And your brother?” Nirakina asked tentatively as they turned back toward the crystal doors. “Can you send him more troops?”

“I don’t know yet,” Sithas replied, the agony of the decision audible in his voice. “Can I risk arousing the city?”

“Perhaps you need more information.”

“Who could inform me of that which I don’t already know?” Sithas asked skeptically.

“Kith-Kanan himself.” His mother stopped to face him as the doors opened and the warmth of the tower beckoned. “Bring him home, Sithas,” she said urgently, taking both of his arms in her hands. “Bring him home and talk to him!”

Sithas was surprised at his own instinctive reaction. The suggestion made surprisingly good sense. It offered him hope—and an idea for action that would unite, not divide, his people. Yet how could he call his brother home now, out of the midst of a monstrous encircling army?

The next day Quimant again was Sithas’s first and primary visitor.

“My lord,” began the adviser, “have you made a decision about conscription of additional forces? I am reluctant to remind you, but time may be running short.”

Sithas frowned. Unbidden, his mind recalled the scene at the riverbank when the first column departed for war. Now more than half those elves were dead. What would be the city’s reaction should another, larger force march west?

“Not yet. I wish to wait until . . .” His voice trailed off. He had been about to mention Ambrodel’s mission. “I will not make that decision yet,” he concluded. He was spared the necessity of further discussion when Stankathan, his palace majordomo, entered the great hall. That dignified elf, clad in a black waistcoat of wool, preceded a travel-stained messenger who wore the leather jerkin of a Wildrunner scout. The latter bore a scroll of parchment sealed with a familiar stamp of red wax.

“A message from my brother?” Sithas rose to his feet, recognizing the form of the sheet.

“By courier, who came from across the river just this morning,” replied Stankathan. “I brought him over to the tower directly.” Sithas felt a surge of delight, as he did every fortnight or so when a courier arrived with the latest reports from Kith-Kanan. Yet that delight had lately been tempered by the grim news from his brother and the besieged garrison. He looked at the courier as the elf approached and bowed deeply. Besides the dirt and mud of the trail, Sithas saw that the fellow had a sling supporting his right arm and a dark, stained bandage around the leggings of his left knee.

“My gratitude for your efforts,” said Sithas, appraising the rider. The elf stood taller after his words, as if the praise of the speaker was a balm to his wounds.

“What was the nature of your obstacles?”

“The usual rings of guards, Your Highness,” replied the elf. “But the humans lack sorcerers and so cannot screen the paths with magic. The first day of my journey I was concealed by invisibility, a spell that camouflaged myself and my horse. Afterward, the fleetness of my steed carried me, and I encountered only one minor fray.”

The Speaker of the Stars took the scroll and broke the wax seal. Carefully he unrolled the sheet, ignoring Quimant for the time being. The lord stood quietly; if he was annoyed, he made no visible sign of the fact.

Sithas read the missive solemnly.

I look out, my brother, upon an endless sea of humanity. Indeed, they surround us like the ocean surrounds an island, completely blocking our passage. It is only with great risk that my couriers can penetrate the lines—that, and the aid of spells cast by my enchanters, which allow them some brief time to escape the notice of the foe.

What is to be the fate now of our cause? Will the army of Ergoth attack and carry the fort? Their horses sweep in great circles about us, but the steeds cannot reach us here. The other two wings have joined General Giarna before Sithelbec, and their numbers truly stun the mind.

General Giarna, I have learned, is the name of the foe we faced in the spring, the one who drove us from the field. We have taken prisoners from his force, and to a man they speak of their devotion to him and their confidence that he will one day destroy us! I met him in the brief hours I was prisoner, and he is a terrifying man. There is something deep and cruel about him that transcended any foe I have ever encountered.

Will the dwarves of Thorbardin march from their stronghold and break the siege from the south? That, my brother, would be a truly magnificent feat of diplomacy on your part. Should you bring such an alliance into being, I could scarce convey my gratitude across the miles!

Or will the hosts of Silvanost march forth, the elves united in their campaign against the threat to our race? That, I am afraid, is the least likely of my musings—at least, from the words you give me as to our peoples’ apathy and lack of concern. How fares the diplomatic battle, Brother?

I hope to amuse you with one tale, an experience that gave us all many moments of distraction, not to mention fear. I have written to you of the gnomish lava cannon, the mountain vehicle pulled by a hundred oxen, its stony maw pointed skyward as it belches smoke and fire. Finally, shortly after my last letter, this device was hauled into place before Sithelbec. It stood some three miles away but loomed so high and spumed so furiously that we were indeed distraught!

For three days, the monstrous structure became the center of a whirlwind of gnomish activity. They scaled its sides, fed coal into its bowels, poured great quantities of muck and dust and streams of a red powder into its maw. All this time, the thing puffed and chugged. By the third day, the entire plain lay shrouded beneath a cloud from its wheezing exhalations.

Finally the gnomes clambered up the sides and stood atop the device, as if they had scaled a small mountain. We watched, admittedly with great trepidation, as one of the little creatures mixed a caldron at the very lip of the cannon’s interior. Eventually he cast the contents of the vessel into the weapon itself. All of the gnomes fled, and for the first time, we noticed that the humans had pulled back from the cannon, giving it a good half-mile berth to either side. For a full day, the army of Ergoth huddled in fright, staring at their monstrous weapon. Finally it appeared that it had failed to discharge, but it was not until the following day that we watched the gnomes creep forward to investigate. Suddenly the thing began to chug and wheeze and belch. The gnomes scurried for cover, and for another full day, we all watched and waited. But it was not until the morning of the third day that we saw the weapon in action. It exploded shortly after dawn and cast its formidable ordnance for many miles. Fortunately we, as the targets of the attack, were safe. It was the gathered human army that suffered the brunt of flaming rock and devastating force that ripped across the plains.

We saw thousands of the humans’ horses (unfortunately a small fraction of their total number) stampede in panic across the plain. Whole regiments vanished beneath the deluge of death as a sludgelike wave spread through the army.

For a brief moment, I saw the opportunity to make a sharp attack, further disrupting the encircling host. Even as I ordered the attack, however, the ranks of General Giarna’s wing shouldered aside the other humans. His deadly riders ensured that our trap remained effectively closed.

Nevertheless, the accident wreaked havoc among the Army of Ergoth. We gave thanks to the gods that the device misfired; had its attack struck Sithelbec, you would have already received your last missive from me. The cannon has been reduced to a heap of rubble, and we pray daily that it cannot be rebuilt.

My best wishes and hopes for my new niece or nephew. Which is it to be?

Perhaps you will have the answer by the time you read this. I can only hope that somehow I will know. I hope Hermathya is comfortable and well. I miss your counsel and presence as always, Brother. I treat myself to the thought that, could we but bring our minds together, we could work a way to break out of this stalemate. But, alas, the jaws of the trap close about me, and I know that you, in the capital, are ensnared in every bit as tight a position as I.

Until then, have a prayer for us! Give my love to Mother!

Kith

Sithas paused, realizing that the guards and Quimant had been studying him intently as he read. A full range of emotions had played across his face, he knew, and suddenly the knowledge made him feel exceedingly vulnerable.

“Leave me, all of you!” Sithas barked the command, more harshly perhaps than he intended, but he was nevertheless gratified to see them all quickly depart from the hall.

He paced back and forth before the emerald throne. His brother’s letter had agitated him more than usual, for he knew that he had to do something. No longer could he force the standoff at Sithelbec into the back of his mind. His mother and his brother were right. He needed to see Kith-Kanan, to talk with him. They would be able to work out a plan—a plan with some hope of success!

Remembering his walk with Nirakina, he turned toward the royal doors of crystal. The gardens and the stables lay beyond.

Resolutely Sithas stalked to those doors, which opened silently before him. He emerged from the tower into the cool sunlight of the garden but took no note of his surroundings. Instead, he crossed directly to the royal stable. The stable was in fact a sprawling collection of buildings and corrals. These included barns for the horses and small houses for the grooms and trainers, as well as stocks of feed. Behind the main structure, a field of short grass stretched away from the Tower of the Stars, covering the palace grounds to the edges of the guildhouses that bordered them.

Here were kept the several dozen horses of the royal family, as well as several coaches and carriages. But it was to none of these that the speaker now made his way.

Instead, he crossed through the main barn, nodding with easy familiarity to the grooms who brushed the sleek stallions. He passed through the far door and crossed a small corral, approaching a sturdy building that stood by itself, unattached to any other. The door was divided into top and bottom halves; the top half stood open.

A form moved within the structure, and then a great head emerged from the door. Bright golden eyes regarded Sithas with distrust and suspicion. The front of that head was a long, wickedly hawklike beak. The beak opened slightly. Sithas saw the great wings flex within the confining stable and knew that Arcuballis longed to fly.

“You must go to Kith-Kanan,” Sithas told the powerful steed. “Bring him out of his fort and back to me. Do this, Arcuballis, when I let you fly!” The griffon’s large eyes glittered as the creature studied the Speaker of the Stars. Arcuballis had been Kith-Kanan’s lifelong mount until the duties of generalship had forced his brother to take a more conventional steed. Sithas knew that the griffon would go and bring his brother back.

Slowly Sithas reached forward and unlatched the bottom half of the door, allowing the portal to swing freely open. Arcuballis hesitantly stepped forward over the half-eaten carcass of a deer that lay just inside the stable. With a spreading of his great wings, Arcuballis gave a mighty spring. He bounded across the corral, and by his third leap, the griffon was airborne. His powerful wings drove downward and the creature gained height, soaring over the roof of the stable, then veering to pass near the Tower of the Stars.

“Go!” cried Sithas. “Go to Kith-Kanan!” As if he heard, the griffon swept through a turn. Powerful wings still driving him upward, Arcuballis swerved toward the west.

It seemed to Sithas as if a heavy burden had flown away from him, borne upon the wings of the griffon. His brother would understand, he knew. When Arcuballis arrived at Sithelbec, as Sithas felt certain he would, Kith-Kanan would waste no time in mounting his faithful steed and hastening back to Silvanost. Between them, he knew, they would find a way to advance the elven cause.

“Excellency?”

Sithas whirled, startled from his reverie by a voice from behind him. He saw Stankathan, the majordomo, looking out of place among the mud and dung of the corral. The elf’s face, however, was knit by a deeper concern.

“What is it?” Sithas inquired quickly.

“It’s your wife, the Lady Hermathya,” replied Stankathan. “She cries with pain now. The clerics tell me it is time for your child to be born.”

7

The oil lamp sputtered in the center of the wooden table. The flame was set low to conserve precious fuel for the long, dark months of winter that lay ahead. Kith-Kanan thought the shadowy darkness appropriate for this bleak meeting.

With him at the table sat Kencathedrus and Parnigar. Both of them—as well as Kith, himself—showed the gauntness of six months at half rations. Their eyes carried the dull awareness that many more months of the same lay before them.

Every night during that time, Kith had met with these two officers, both of them trusted friends and seasoned veterans. They gathered in this small room, with its plain table and chairs. Sometimes they shared a bottle of wine, but that commodity, too, had to be rationed carefully.

“We have a report from the Wildrunners,” Parnigar began. “White-lock managed to slip through the lines. He told me that the small companies we have roaming the woods can hit hard and often. But they have to keep moving, and they don’t dare venture onto the plains.”

“Of course not!” Kencathedrus snapped.

The two officers argued, as they did so often, from their different tactical perspectives. “We’ll never make any progress if we keep dispersing our forces through the woods. We have to gather them together! We must mass our strength!”

Kith sighed and held up his hands. “We all know that our ‘mass of strength’

would be little more than a nuisance to the human army—at least right now. The fortress is the only thing keeping the Wildrunners from annihilation, and the hit-and-run tactics are all we can do until . . . until something happens.” He trailed off weakly, knowing he had touched upon the heart of their despair. True, for the time being they were safe enough in Sithelbec from direct attack. And they had food that could be stretched, with the help of their clerics, to last for a year, perhaps a little longer.

In sudden anger, Kencathedrus smashed his fist on the table. “They hold us here like caged beasts,” he growled. “What kind of fate do we consign ourselves to?”

“Calm yourself, my friend.” Kith touched his old teacher on the shoulder, seeing the tears in the elven warrior’s eyes. His eyes were framed by sunken skin, dark brown in color, that accentuated further the hollowness of the elf’s cheeks. By the gods, do we all look like that? Kith had to wonder. The captain of Silvanost pushed himself to his feet and turned away from them. Parnigar cleared his throat awkwardly. “There is nothing we can accomplish by morning,” he said. Quietly he got to his feet. Parnigar, alone of the three of them, had a wife here. He worried more about her health than his own. She was human, one of several hundred in the fort, but this was a fact that they carefully avoided in conversation. Though Kith-Kanan knew and liked the woman, Kencathedrus still found the interracial marriage deeply disturbing.

“May you rest well tonight, noble elves,” Parnigar offered before stepping through the door into the dark night beyond.

“I know your need to avenge the battle on the plains,” Kith-Kanan said to Kencathedrus as the latter turned and gathered his cloak. “I believe this, my friend—your chance will come!”

The elven captain looked at the general, so much younger than himself, and Kith could see that Kencathedrus wanted to believe him. His eyes were dry again, and finally the captain nodded gruffly. “I’ll see you in the morning,” he promised before following Parnigar into the night.

Kith sat for a while, staring at the dying flame of the lantern, reluctant to extinguish the light even though he knew precious fuel burned away with each second. Not enough fuel . . . not enough food . . . insufficient troops. What did he have enough of, besides problems?

He tried not to think about the extent of his frustration—how much he hated being trapped inside the fortress, cooped up with his entire army, at the mercy of the enemy beyond the walls. How he longed for the freedom of the forests, where he had lived so happily during his years away from Silvanost. Yet with these thoughts, he couldn’t help thinking of Anaya—beautiful, lost Anaya. Perhaps his true entrapment had begun with her death, before the war started, before he had been made general of his father’s—and then his brother’s—army.

Finally he sighed, knowing that his thoughts could bring him no comfort. Reluctantly he doused the lantern’s flame. His own bunk occupied the room adjacent to this office, and soon he lay there.

But sleep would not come. That night they had had no wine to share, and now the tension of his mood kept Kith-Kanan awake for seeming hours after his two officers left.

Eventually, with the entire fortress silent and still around him, his eyes fell shut—but not to the darkness of restful sleep. Instead, it was as though he fell directly from wakefulness into a very vivid dream.

He dreamed that he soared through the clouds, not upon the back of Arcuballis as he had flown so many times before, but supported by the strength of his own arms, his own feet. He swooped and dove like an eagle, master of the sky.

Abruptly the clouds parted before him, and he saw three conical mountain peaks jutting upward from the haze of earth so far below. These monstrous peaks belched smoke, and streaks of fire splashed and flowed down their sides. The valleys extending from their feet were hellish wastelands of crimson lava and brown sludge.

Away from the peaks he soared, and now below him were lifeless valleys of a different sort. Surrounded by craggy ridges and needlelike peaks, these mountain retreats lay beneath great sheets of snow and ice. All around him stretched a pristine brilliance. Gray and black shapes, the forms of towering summits, rose from the vast glaciers of pure white. In places, streaks of blue showed through the snow, and here Kith-Kanan saw ice as clean, as clear as any on Krynn.

Movement suddenly caught his eye in one of these valleys. He saw a great mountain looming, higher than all the others around. Upon its face, dripping ice formed the crude outlines of a face like that of an old, white-bearded dwarf. Kith continued his flight and saw movement again. At first Kith thought that he was witnessing a great flock of eagles—savage, prideful birds that crowded the sky. Then he wondered, could they be some kind of mountain horses or unusual, tawny-colored goats?

In another moment, he knew, as the memory of Arcuballis came flooding back. These were griffons, a whole flock of them! Hundreds of the savage half-eagle, half-lion creatures were surging through the air toward Kith-Kanan. He felt no fear. Instead, he turned away from the dwarfbeard mountain and flew southward. The griffons followed, and slowly the heights of the range fell behind him. He saw lakes of blue water below him and fields of brush and mossy rock. Then came the first trees, and he dove to follow a mountain rivulet toward the green flatlands that now opened up before him. And then he saw her in the forest—Anaya! She was painted like a wild savage, her naked body flashing among the trees as she ran from him. By the gods, she was fast! She outdistanced him even as he flew, and soon the only trace of her passage was the wild laughter that lingered on the breeze before him. Then he found her, but already she had changed. She was old, and rooted in the ground. Before his eyes, she had become a tree, growing toward the heavens and losing all of the form and the senses of the elfin woman he had grown to love.

His tears flowed, unnoticed, down his face. They soaked the ground and nourished the tree, causing it to shoot farther into the sky. Sadly the elf left her, and he and his griffons flew on farther to the south.

Another face wafted before him. He recognized with shock the human woman who had given him his escape from the enemy camp. Why, now, did she enter his dream?

The rivulet below him became a stream, and then more streams joined it, and the stream became a river, flowing into the forested realm of his homeland.

Ahead he finally saw a ring of water where the River Thon-Thalas parted around the island of Silvanost. Behind him, five hundred griffons followed him homeward. A radiant glow reached out to welcome him.

He saw another elf woman in the garden. She looked upward, her arms spread, welcoming him to his home, to her. At first, from a distance, he wondered if this was his mother, but then as he dove closer, he recognized his brother’s wife, Hermathya.

Sunlight streamed into his window. He awoke suddenly, refreshed and revitalized. The memory of his dream shone in his mind like a beacon, and he sprang from his bed. The fortress still slumbered around him. His window, on the east wall of a tower, was the first place in Sithelbec to receive the morning sun. Throwing a cloak over his tunic and sticking his feet into soft, high leather boots, he laced the latter around his knees while he hobbled toward the door. A cry of alarm suddenly sounded from the courtyard. In the next moment, a horn blared, followed by a chorus of trumpets blasting a warning. Kith dashed from his room, down the hall of the captain’s quarters and to the outside. The sun was barely cresting the fortress wall, and yet he saw a shadow pass across that small area of brightness.

He noted several archers on the wall, turning and aiming their weapons skyward.

“Don’t shoot!” he cried as the shadow swooped closer and he recognized it.

“Arcuballis!”

He waved his hand and ran into the courtyard as the proud griffon circled him once, then came to rest before him. The lion’s hindquarter’s squatted while the creature raised one foreclaw—the massive, taloned limb of an eagle. The keen yellow eyes blinked, and Kith-Kanan felt a surge of affection for his faithful steed.

In the next moment, he wondered about Arcuballis’s presence here. He had left him in charge of his brother back in Silvanost. Of course! Sithas had sent the creature here to Kith to bring him home! The prospect elated him like nothing else had in years.

It took Kith-Kanan less than an hour to leave orders with his two subordinates. Parnigar he placed in overall command, while Kencathedrus was to drill and train a small, mobile sortie force of cavalry, pikes, and archers. They would be called the Flying Brigade, but they were not to be employed until Kith-Kanan’s return. He cautioned both officers on the need to remain alert to any human stratagem. Sithelbec was the keystone to any defense on the plains, and it must remain impregnable, inviolate.

“I’m sure my brother has plans. We’ll meet and work out a way to break this stalemate!” The autumn wind swirled through the compound, bringing the first bite of winter.

He climbed onto the back of his steed, settling into the new saddle that one of the Wildrunner horsemen had cobbled for him.

“Good luck, and may the gods watch over your flight,” Kencathedrus said, clasping Kith’s gloved hand in both of his own.

“And bring a speedy return,” added Parnigar.

Arcuballis thrust powerful wings, muscular and stout enough to break a man’s neck, toward the ground. At the same time, the leonine hindquarters thrust the body into the air.

Several strokes of his wings carried Arcuballis to the top of a building, still inside the fortress wall. He grasped the peaked roof with his eagle foreclaws, then used his feline rear legs to spring himself still higher into the air. With a squawk that rang like a challenge across the plain, he soared over the wall, climbing steadily.

Kith-Kanan was momentarily awestruck at the spectacle of the enemy arrayed below him. His tower, the highest vantage point in Sithelbec, didn’t convey the immense sprawl of the army of Ergoth—not in the way that Arcuballis’s ascending flight did. Below, ranks of human archers took up their weapons, but the griffon already soared far out of range.

They flew onward, passing above a great herd of horses in a pasture. The shadow of the griffon passed along the ground, and several of the steeds snorted and reared in sudden panic. These bolted immediately, and in seconds, the herd had erupted into a stampede. The elf watched in wry amusement as the human herdsmen raced out of the path of the beasts. It would be hours, he suspected, before order was restored to the camp. Kith looked down at the smoldering remains of the lava cannon, now a black, misshapen thing, like a burned and gnarled tree trunk leaning at a steep angle over the ground. He saw seemingly endless rows of tents, some of them grand but most simple shelters of oilskin or wool. Everywhere the flat ground had been churned to mud.

Finally he left the circular fortress and the larger circle of the human army behind. Forests of lush green opened before him, dotted by ponds and lakes, streaked by rivers and long meandering meadows. As the wild land surrounded him, he felt the agony of the war fall away.

Suzine des Quivalin studied the image in the mirror until it faded into the distance, beyond the reach of her arcane crystal. Yet even after it vanished, the memory of those powerful wings carrying Kith-Kanan away—away from her—lingered in her mind. She saw his blond hair, flying from beneath his helmet. She recalled her gasp of terror when the archers had fired, and her slow relaxation as he gained height and safety. Yet a part of her had cursed and railed at him for leaving, and that part had wanted to see a human arrow bring him down. She didn’t want him dead, of course, but the idea of this handsome elf as a prisoner in her camp was strangely appealing.

For a moment, she paused, wondering at the fascination she found for this elven commander, mortal enemy of her people and chief opponent of the man who was her . . . lover.

Once General Giarna had been that and more. Smooth, dashing, and handsome, he had swept her off her feet in the early days of their relationship. With the aid of her powers with the mirror, she had given him information sufficient to discredit several of the emperor’s highest generals. The grateful ruler had rewarded the Boy General with an ever increasing array of field commands.

But something had changed since those times. The man who she thought had loved her now treated her with cruelty and arrogance, inspiring in her fears that she could not overcome. Those fears were great enough to hold her at his side, for she had come to believe that flight from General Giarna would mean her sentence of death.

Here on the plains, in command of many thousands of men, Giarna had little time for her, which was a relief. But when she saw him, he seemed so coldly controlled, so monstrously purposeful, that she feared him all the more. With an angry shake of her head, she turned from the mirror, which slowly faded into a reflection of the Lady Suzine and the interior of her tent. She rose in a swirl of silk and stalked across the rich carpets that blanketed the ground. Her red hair swirled in a long coil around her scalp, rising higher than her head and peaking in a glittering tiara of diamonds, emeralds, and rubies. Her gown, of blood-red silk, clung to the full curves of her body as she stalked toward the tent flap that served as her door. She stopped long enough to throw a woolen shawl over her bare shoulders, remembering the chill that had settled over the plains in the last few days.

As soon as she emerged, the six men-at-arms standing at her door snapped to attention, bringing their halberds straight before their faces. She paid no attention as they fell in behind her, marching with crisp precision as she headed toward another elegant tent some distance away. The black stallion of General Giarna stood restlessly outside, so she knew that the man she sought was within.

The Army of Ergoth spread to the horizons around her. The massive encampment encircled the fortress of Sithelbec in a great ring. Here, at the eastern arc of that ring, the headquarters of the three generals and their retinues had collected. Amid the mud and smoke of the army camp, the gilded coaches of the noble lancers and the tall, silken folds of the high officers’ tents, stood out in contrast.

Before Suzine arose the tallest tent of all, that of General Barnet, the overall general of the army.

The two guards before that tent stepped quickly out of the way to let her pass, one of them pulling aside the tent flap to give her entrance. She passed into the semidarkness of the tent and her eyes quickly adjusted to the dim light. She saw General Giarna lounging easily at a table loaded with food and drink. Before him, sitting stiffly, was General Barnet. Suzine couldn’t help but notice the fear and anger in the older general’s eyes as he looked at her. Beyond the two seated men stood a third, General Xalthan. That veteran’s face was deathly, shockingly pale. He surprised Suzine by looking at her with an expression of pleading, as if he hoped that she could offer him succor for some terrible predicament.

“Come in, my dear,” said Giarna, his voice smooth, his manner light. “We are having a farewell toast to our friend, General Xalthan.”

“Farewell?” she asked, having heard nothing of that worthy soldier’s departure.

“By word of the emperor—by special courier, with an escort. Quite an honor, really,” added Giarna, his tone mocking and cruel.

Instantly Suzine understood. The disaster with the lava cannon had been the last straw, as far as the emperor was concerned, for General Xalthan. He had been recalled to Daltigoth under guard.

To his credit, the wing commander nodded stiffly, retaining his composure even in the face of Giarna’s taunts. General Barnet remained immobile, but the hatred in his eyes now flashed toward Giarna. Suzine, too, felt an unexpected sense of loathing toward the Boy General.

“I’m sorry,” she said to the doomed wing commander quietly. “I really am.” Indeed, the depths of her sorrow surprised her. She had never thought very much about Xalthan, except sometimes to feel uncomfortable when his eyes ran over the outlines of her body if she wore a clinging gown. But the old man was guilty of no failing, she suspected, except an inability to move as quickly as the Boy General. Xalthan stood in the path of Giarna’s desire to command the entire army. General Giarna’s reports to the emperor, she felt certain, had been full of the information she had provided him—news of Xalthan’s sluggish advance, the ineptness of the gnomish artillerymen, all details that could make a vengeful and impatient ruler lose his patience. And cause an old warrior who deserved only a peaceful retirement to face instead a prospect of torture, disgrace, and execution.

The knowledge made Suzine feel somehow dirty.

Xalthan looked at her with that puppylike sense of hope, a hope she could do nothing to gratify. His fate was laid in stone before them: There would be a long ride to Daltigoth, perhaps with the formerly esteemed officer bound in chains. Once there, the emperor’s inquisitors would begin, often with Quivalin himself in attendance.

It was rumored that the emperor received great pleasure from watching the torture of those he felt had failed him. No tool was too devious, no tactic too inhumane, for these monstrous sculptors of pain. Fire and steel, venoms and acids, all were the instruments of their ungodly work. Finally, after days or weeks of indescribable agony, the inquisitors would be finished, and Xalthan would be healed—just enough to allow him to be alert for the occasion of his public execution.

The fact that her cousin was the one who would do this to the man didn’t enter into her considerations. She accepted, fatalistically, that this was the way things would happen. Her role in the court family was to be one who remained docile and sensitive to her duties, useful with her skills as seer. She had to play that role and leave the rest to fate.

Just for a moment, a nearly overwhelming urge possessed her, a desire to flee this army camp, to flee the gracious life of the capital, to fly from all the darkness that seemed to surround her empire’s endeavors. She wanted to go to a place where troubles such as this one remained concealed from delicate eyes.

It was only when she remembered the blond-haired elf who so fascinated her that she paused. Even though he had gone, flown from Sithelbec on the back of his winged steed, she felt certain he would return. She didn’t know why, but she wanted to be here when he did.

“Farewell, General,” she said quietly, crossing to embrace the once-proud warrior. Without another glance at Giarna, she turned and left the tent. Suzine retreated to her own shelter, anger rising within her. She stalked back and forth within the silken walls, resisting the urge to throw things, to rant loudly at the air. For all her efforts at self-control, her vaunted discipline seemed to have deserted her. She could not calm herself.

Suddenly she gasped as the tent flap flew open and her general’s huge form blocked out the light. Instinctively she backed away as he marched into her shelter, allowing the flap to fall closed behind him.

“That was quite a display,” he growled, his voice like a blast of winter’s wind. His dark eyes glowered, showing none of the amusement they had displayed at Xalthan’s predicament.

“What-what do you mean?” she stammered, still backing away. She held her hand to her mouth and stared at him, her green eyes wide. A trace of her red hair spilled across her brow, and she angrily pushed it away from her face. Giarna crossed to her in three quick strides, taking her wrists in both his hands. He pulled her arms to her sides and stared into her face, his mouth twisted into a menacing sneer.

“Stop—you’re hurting me!” she objected, twisting powerlessly in his grip.

“Hear me well, wench.” He growled, his voice barely audible. “Do not attempt to mock me again—ever! If you do, that shall be the end your power . . . the end of everything!”

She gasped, frightened beyond words.

“I have chosen you for my woman. That fact pleased you once; perhaps it may please you again. Whether it does or not is irrelevant to me. Your skills, however, are of use to me. The others wonder at the great intelligence I gain concerning the elven army, and so you will continue to serve me thus.

“But you will not affront me again!” General Giarna paused, and his dark eyes seemed to mock Suzine’s terrified stare.

“Do I make myself perfectly clear?” Giarna demanded, and she nodded quickly, helplessly. She feared his power and his strength, and she could only tremble in the grip of his powerful hands.

“Remember well,” added the general. He fixed her with a penetrating gaze, and she felt the blood drain from her face. Without another word, he spun on his heel and stalked imperiously from the tent.

The flight to Silvanost took four days, for Kith allowed Arcuballis to hunt in the forest, while he himself took the time to rest at night on a lush bed of pine boughs amid the noisy, friendly chatter of the woods.

On the second day of his flight, Kith-Kanan stopped early, for he had reached a place that he intended to visit. Arcuballis dove to earth in the center of a blossom-bright clearing, and Kith dismounted. He walked over to a tree that grew strong and proud, shading a wide area, far wider than when he had last been here a year before.

“Anaya, I miss you,” he said quietly.

He rested at the foot of the tree and spent several hours in bittersweet reflection of the elf woman he’d loved and lost. But he didn’t find total despair in the memory, for this was indeed Anaya beside him now. She grew tall and flourished in a part of the woods she had always loved.

She had been a creature of the woods, and together with her “brother” Mackeli, the forest’s guardian as well. For a moment, the pain threatened to block out the happier memories. Why did they die? For what purpose? Anaya killed by marauders. Mackeli slain by assassins—sent, Kith suspected, by someone in Silvanost itself.

Anaya hadn’t really died, he reminded himself. Instead, she had undergone a bizarre transformation and become a tree, rooted firmly in the forest soil she loved and had strived to protect.

Then a disturbing vision intruded itself into Kith’s reminiscences, and the picture of Anaya, laughing and bright before him, changed slightly. A beautiful elven woman still teased him, but now the face was different, no longer Anaya’s.

Hermathya! The image of his first love, now his brother’s wife, struck him like a physical blow. Angrily he shook his head, trying to dispel her features, to call back those of Anaya. Yet Hermathya remained before him, her eyes bold and challenging, her smile alluring.

Kith-Kanan exhaled sharply, surprised by the attraction he still felt for the Silvanesti woman. He had thought that impulse long dead, an immature passion that had run its course and been banished to the past. Now he imagined her supple body, her clinging, low-cut gown tailored to show enough to excite while concealing enough to mystify. He found himself vaguely ashamed to realize that he still desired her.

As he shook his head in an effort to banish the disturbing emotion, a picture of still a third woman insinuated itself. He recalled again the red-haired human woman who had given him his chance to escape from the enemy camp. There had been something vibrant and compelling about her, and this wasn’t the first time he had remembered her face.

The conflicting memories warred within him as he built a small fire and ate a simple meal. He camped in the clearing, as usual making himself a soft bed. The night passed in peace.

He took to the air at first light, feeling as if he had somehow sullied Anaya’s memory, but soon the clean air swept through his hair, and his mind focused on the day’s journey. Arcuballis carried him swiftly and uneventfully eastward. After his third night of sleeping in the woods, he felt as if his strength had been doubled, his wit and alertness greatly enhanced.

His spirits soared as high as the Tower of the Stars, which now appeared on the distant horizon. Arcuballis carried him steadily, but so far was the tower that more than an hour passed before they reached the Thon-Thalas River, border to the island of Silvanost.

His arrival was anticipated; boatmen on the river waved and cheered as he flew overhead, while a crowd of elves hurried toward the Palace of Quinari. The doors at the foot of the tower burst open, and Kith saw a blond-haired elf, clad in the silk robe of the Speaker of the Stars, emerge. Sithas hurried across the garden, but the griffon met him halfway.

Grinning foolishly, Kith leapt from the back of his steed to embrace his brother. It felt very good to be home.