The Realms Thereunder

4

They all started down the stairs in silence. Modwyn led them to a room on the fifth level that was nothing more than a completely square chamber with carved ledges in the wall that were used for seating. There was a low metal table in the middle of the room. Modwyn pulled a rope and a small bell tinkled in the distance.

“How long has Ealdstan been thus?” Swi?gar asked.

The door opened and Cnafa stepped into the room. “Bring a map of the Ni?erland and send Godmund here,” she instructed, and then turned to Swi?gar. “Ealdstan has been in such spirits for some time, even before the siege,” she replied in a hushed voice. “Listless and melancholic. We do not see him for months on end, and when we do, he passes by without acknowledgment or sign, leaving us to wonder if we have, in truth, seen him at all.”

“I am sorry that my temper overcame me, brother,” Ecgbryt apologised. “You should not have let me hound the man.”

“No, it was well that you did. I doubt many have challenged him of late. And I agree-why not simply wake a band of knights to come and break the siege?” Swi?gar asked gruffly. “Drive the nasty filth back into the deep tunnels. The solution is so simple that it’s maddening.”

“I would challenge him, were it my place,” stated Modwyn.

“It would not have been right,” agreed Swi?gar. “Ecgbryt and I can be excused our rudeness-”

The door reopened and Godmund entered with a long scroll, which he placed on the table. He unfurled it to show a map of the underground realm, a large oblong with little branches that represented tunnels leading off the sides. Ni?ergeard was marked in the middle, a small knot of structures and streets. They started talking about where the yfelgop army was thickest, where they had come from, and many other details. Daniel watched with fascination as the small military strike was planned and tactics discussed.

“We have no idea where their main force is,” Godmund said.

“We suspect it may be here”-he placed a hand on a section of the map-“but who is to say that they do not move it, or that they are split equally in different areas?”

“What are their main routes into the plain?” Swi?gar asked.

“There is no way to know that either. Seeing that you encountered them, it is possible that they have infiltrated most of the upper tunnels-there would be little enough to prevent the beasts from overrunning them. But do they circulate randomly? Are most of them here? Are they gathered somewhere else? How can we know?”

“None of that matters right now,” came an unexpected voice from among them. All eyes turned to Freya, who was standing near the table, looking down on the map.

“We won’t learn everything in just one raid,” Freya continued, her voice quavering slightly. “The important thing is to test their numbers, their strength, and their reaction after that-that will tell us a lot. Then we can judge the appropriate measures to take, once we have evaluated our resources. Then we can go home, you can find a way to break the siege, and so on.”

Ecgbryt smiled grimly and placed a huge hand on Freya’s shoulder. “The girl has a good head for these matters,” he said.

“I just want to go home,” Freya said, trying to avoid Daniel’s gawking stare.

Swi?gar frowned. “Then it’s decided,” he said. “We will raid them, leaving through the main gates here.” He brought his hand down on an area of the map. “Enough talking. That is what we will do next.”