Alliances ee-2

by Paul B. Thompson

  “What do you think we should do?” Alhana asked.

  “Disperse.” Kerian waved a hand across the surface of the map. “Form a hundred small bands, each with arms to equip a thousand, and spread to every corner of Qualinesti and beyond, into Abanasinia, Kharolis, and Tarsis. Like termites, we’ll work from within, weakening Samuval everywhere while exposing a minimum of our people to danger. Before long the whole rotten structure of Samuval’s realm will collapse.”

  Samar disagreed, the gist of his argument being that Alhana’s royal guards could certainly do what Porthios, Kerian, and a handful of Kagonesti had done. The victory in Bianost should not be squandered. They should strike again.

  Chathendor set aside his silver knife and fork, which bore the arms of the lord mayor of Bianost, and spoke. “Lady Kerianseray’s plan seems an admirable one-for the future, but what of the present, the next several days even? The town volunteers, although enthusiastic, I am sure, are new to fighting. Won’t they need training before going up against bandit mercenaries?”

  Diplomatic as always, the old chamberlain had asked a question to which he knew the answer as well as they. Rising up on the spur of the moment to strike one’s oppressors was one thing. To live wild and plan and execute attacks against a seasoned and ruthless foe were quite another. The militia would be no match for the bandits.

  “I’ll not forsake them,” Alhana said firmly. “They risked all to regain their freedom. I’ll not abandon them to the mercy of Samuval’s barbarians.”

  “A noble sentiment.”

  The voice echoed from the eastern end of the hail. Out of the deep shadows Porthios emerged.

  Kerian glared at him with unconcealed annoyance. “Where have you been?”

  “A better question: Why are you still here?”

  “We’ve been readying the cache of weapons for travel. There still aren’t enough draft animals-”

  “Gathan Grayden is twenty miles away with an army of several thousand.”

  All were on their feet instantly. Alhana gasped, and Samar muttered a curse. Kerian stabbed a hand at the map on the table. “Where, exactly?”

  He did not approach. “Under the walls of Mereklar.”

  Mereklar was a city southeast of Bianost, in the foothills of the Redstone Bluffs. According to Favaronas’s map, it was just less than twenty miles away.

  “Is he coming this way?” asked Chathendor.

  “He will break camp within a day or two. His line of march is the High Road.” This was the paved way that connected Mereklar to Bianost and continued northwest to Frenost.

  “How do you know all this?”

  The masked head turned toward Kerian. “I know. We must leave tonight.”

  Alhana sent Samar to see to the guards’ preparation. Kerian reminded her that the Bianost militia needed to be mustered first. Untrained and on foot, they would require longer to get under way. Also, what of the shortage of draft animals to pull the wagons loaded with the weapons cache?

  “What can’t be moved must be hidden or destroyed,” Alhana said. “You will see to it?”

  Kerian nodded. She and Samar departed in haste. For as long as their voices could be heard, they argued loudly about whether to hide or destroy the surplus weapons.

  Chathendor, rushing away to see to their belongings, paused and glanced at Porthios, whom he did not recognize. “Lady,” he whispered, “perhaps you should not be alone with this person?”

  She clasped his hand and gave him a reassuring smile. “It’s all right, my friend. I am perfectly safe. Now go. We must be ready to depart without delay.”

  When the chamberlain had reluctantly withdrawn, Alhana filled two pewter goblets from a slender silver ewer. Lifting one, she gestured at the other. “Refresh yourself. It’s a long way to Mereklar and back on foot.”

  Porthios entered the warm light of candles and oil lamps. Despite his ragged, too-long robe, he moved with exceptional silence, even for an elf. Watching him take the cup, Alhana was struck by the familiarity of the gesture. Whatever metamorphosis he’d undergone, masked and gloved or not, she would have known him anywhere just by the way he cradled his goblet. The stem nestled between his thumb and middle finger; his other fingers did not touch the cup.

  “What are you watching so intently?” Porthios asked.

  She told him. He glanced at his hand. “Habits are hard to change,” he muttered. He wondered if others could recognize him by such telltale trifles or if that was a skill possessed only by his observant wife.

  Former wife. Part of the life that had been ripped away in fire and pain and blood. But if that were true, then why did he still feel bound to her? Despite his firm intention to remain apart from her, he found himself unable to leave the room. The untouchable nearness of her was agony, but he drew it out a moment more.

  “Where will you go now?”

  Surprise widened her violet eyes. “My habits have not changed either. I go with Kerianseray and the others.”

  “Even if it costs your life?”

  She extended her goblet, tapping it gently against his own. “We all must die, Porthios.”

  His name on her lips was like a thunderclap. Dropping his eyes, he sipped wine. The fine Qualinesti vintage burned his tongue yet had no taste at all. Since the fire, no food or drink smelled or tasted right. The only exception had been the honeydew wafers given him by the god in the forest. The wine did warm his belly, so he emptied the goblet and held it out to be refilled. She poured, and before he could withdraw the cup, she covered his hand with her own.

  Porthios flinched, but to Alhana’s joy, he did not drawback. Through the gloves all she could feel was bone. It was like grasping the hand of a skeleton. But this skeleton still lived. Without warning, he released the pewter goblet and took hold of her hand, gripping it tightly with both of his own as spilled wine spattered her feet.

  * * * * *

  Well after midnight, the elves abandoned Bianost.

  Kerian advocated burning the town to obscure any evidence of what had been found there, but the local militia objected. Despite the pitiful state to which Olin had reduced it, Bianost was their home, and they could not bear the thought of its wholesale destruction. Kerian was not unmoved by their pleas but likely would have overruled them except for Alhana. The former queen also advocated letting the town stand, although for a different reason. If they were to win the hearts of the ordinary folk in Qualinesti, whether elf, human, or other, they had to demonstrate their superiority to the enemy. Torching the empty town was exactly what Samuval’s bandits would do.

  Kerian accepted that logic. With a grin, she said that leaving the town intact would probably delay their pursuers, who would have to work their way through the scabrous dwellings, searching for rebels.

  With wagons laden with much of the arms cache, the elves departed. Hytanthas rode in a wagon with the cargo because he was still too weak to sit a horse. He had come down with a fever soon after being found. One of Nalaryn’s Kagonesti called it a fever of exhaustion, brought on by weeks of little or no food, water, or rest. They made him as comfortable as possible but he knew nothing of the lambswool blankets and soft pillows that had been found for him. He fought phantom nomads and monsters while his fever raged. In his lucid moments, he tried to convince the Lioness to return with him to Khur, to aid the beleaguered Speaker. She rebuffed every attempt. She had been cast aside, she said. Gilthas hadn’t even heard her out. He didn’t need her, didn’t want her help. For all they knew, the elf host had been decimated and Gilthas captured. What was the point in returning to Khur if the war there was over? The future of their race lay in Qualinesti, in the ancient homeland. Strange magic had delivered her here even as Orexas had begun his promising rebellion.

  After consultation with Alhana and Porthios, Kerian led the elves due east out of Bianost. Twenty-five miles down the wide, royal road (its pavement broken, the cracks thick with weeds) lay the former site of Qualinost, where there was only the Lake of Death. The b
andit host was bearing down on Bianost from the south. They would expect the elves to make for their home forest, west of town. Kerian hoped an eastward track would confound the bandits and allow her to put more distance between the fleeing elves and Gathan Grayden’s vengeful host before she turned the column north into the forest.

  They moved by night, resting under the overhanging trees by day. Spies and informers were everywhere in the dark heart of the ruined elf kingdom. Daily Alhana’s vanguard flushed goblins out of the woods, slaying them without mercy. Surprise was one of their few assets. They couldn’t afford to have their position betrayed too soon.

  Caution, as well as the laden wagons and the many civilians on foot, kept their pace slow. Samar chafed at the delays.

  “What a miserable crawl! Oh, for the days when royal elves flew into battle on the backs of griffons! No foe could stand before them!”

  “As I recall, the imperial hordes of Ergoth managed,” Chathendor said dryly.

  That launched the two on an involved discussion of the tactics and strategy of the long-ago Kinslayer War. They proved well matched. Samar was a student of history, and Chathendor had once been a warrior of considerable prowess.

  They rode in company with Alhana and Kerian. Nalaryn remained with his clan, which kept to the fringes of the woods on each side of the road. Porthios, as was his wont, came and went without a word, disappearing and rejoining the march at will.

  Alhana rode slower and slower. So caught up in their argument were Samar and Chathendor, they never noticed her falling behind. Kerian circled back to collect her.

  “Alhana, you must keep up,” the Lioness chided.

  “If we had griffons, it would redress many imbalances,” Alhana mused.

  It would indeed. Kerian mentioned her own griffon, Eagle Eye, who had seen her through many tight spots.

  “But he’s far away, with-in Khur,” Kerian finished awkwardly. She reached for the bridle of Alhana’s white mare. “Highness, we should catch up to the column.”

  Alhana shook off her reverie. She regarded Kerian for a thoughtful moment. “Would you call me ‘aunt’?” she asked. “We are family, are we not, Kerianseray? And I have so little family left.”

  Surprised by the request, Kerian consented readily enough. She was even more surprised when Alhana leaned sideways and rested a hand on her shorn head. “Your beautiful hair,” Alhana said mournfully. “I know it was hardly the worst that might have happened, but it was a vicious, hurtful thing for them to have done.”

  Kerian realized her mistake. “Oh, it wasn’t Olin’s trash who cut it. I did it myself, before they caught me. Seemed a good idea to conceal my identity.”

  Alhana blinked at her for a heartbeat then exclaimed, “What an indomitable spirit you have, niece!”

  Kerian flashed her a grin, and they urged their horses into a trot, catching up with Samar and Chathendor then passing them.

  The column was still more than eight miles from the Lake of Death when signs of the devastation appeared. Broken treetops, toppled markers, and blasted hedges spoke of a huge explosion. The shattered treetops sprouted new leaves, but the effects of Beryl’s fall were unmistakable.

  The Kagonesti grew restless. Normally the most uncomplaining of elves, they dragged their feet. None wanted to penetrate farther into the blighted site of Qualinost. Theryontas and the volunteers from Bianost, who had been at the rear of the line, passed the balking foresters. Kerian had to double back to speak to the laggards.

  “This land is cursed!” one insisted, and another said, “All who enter will be tainted by evil!”

  “I fell in the lake when I first arrived, and I survived,” she told them. Of course, soon thereafter she was captured by slavers, beaten, starved, and nearly flayed alive. Perhaps there was something to their fears after all.

  The end of the caravan rounded a bend, leaving Kerian and the Kagonesti behind.

  “I can’t force you to come,” she said. “But what would the Great Lord have you do?”

  “We will ask him,” said Nalaryn, pointing behind her.

  She whipped around in the saddle and saw Porthios limping along the edge of the road. She rode to him, asking where he’d been.

  “Here and there. I had tasks to perform.”

  “I saved a horse for you. You could ride with Alhana.”

  Even shadowed by the mask, Kerian knew his eyes were glaring at her. “Keep your mind on your own affairs,” he snapped.

  We are family, are we not?

  Kerian knew no feeling of kinship with the short-tempered, arrogant elf before her, but with Alhana’s plaintive question echoing in her mind, she inclined her head with unusual diplomacy to the former Speaker of the Sun and explained the Kagonesti’s reluctance to proceed.

  “They are wise. This land is poisoned.” His mood shifting abruptly, he suddenly added, “Of course! It’s perfect for our purpose! Even brutish humans cannot but be sickened by its miasma. The lake will cover our line of march!”

  “What do you mean?” Kerian asked.

  He told her. They would continue on their current path and not turn north, as Kerian had planned. Instead, they would circumnavigate the Lake of Death: skirt the north shore, turn south to pass around the eastern end, and at last return along the southern shore.

  “To what purpose?” Kerian demanded.

  “We will strike Mereklar.”

  Her jaw dropped. Was he insane? Attack a large, well- defended city?

  Before, she could say more, one of the Kagonesti announced Alhana’s return, and Porthios vanished into the trees. “Come back here!” she hissed. “I’m not through with you!”

  “Kerianseray!”

  Left with no choice, she turned her horse to meet Alhana. The former queen was cantering down the road, escorted by Samar and three warriors. “I have an important idea!” Alhana cried. “Griffons!”

  Her face was alight with excitement, and her thick black hair, for once not confined in its usual scarf, streamed behind her. Nature is not fair, Kerian grumbled silently. She’d washed away the worst of the filth in Bianost and wore clean buckskins borrowed from one of Nalaryn’s clan, but next to Alhana she still resembled a Khuri-Khan goat herder. Alhana was several times Kerian’s age, yet no one would know it to look at her. When Kerian reached that age (if she lived so long), she would probably look like an old boot.

  Kerian repeated politely, “Griffons, aunt?”

  “Yes. If memory serves-and it has been many, many years-there was a haven of griffons on the south face of the Redstone Bluffs. Trainers from Silvanost made pilgrimages there to take griffonlets to raise as war steeds. Perhaps some still remain!”

  It was a captivating notion. Even a handful of griffons would greatly augment their strength. With just Eagle Eye, Kerian had foiled minotaur ambushes and fended off serious nomad attacks.

  “The Kagonesti refuse to go any closer to Nalis Aren anyway,” Kerian said. “We could send them to Redstone to check.”

  The Kagonesti chief was intrigued. He’d never seen a griffon in the flesh. His clan weren’t mountaineers, but the new task was eminently preferable to going any closer to Qualinost’s tomb.

  “We will do as Broom says,” Nalaryn announced.

  Kerian grimaced. The Kagonesti had bestowed the new sobriquet on her in Bianost. Hardly as fierce or romantic as “the Lioness,” it unfortunately described her mangled haircut all too well. They knew she disliked it, but she knew it would do no good to complain. Her people loved nicknames. Each Kagonesti might be called by two or three different ones at the same time. Among Nalaryn’s clan were elves called Sky, Runner, Three-Fingers, and Breakbow.

  “If you can call up Orexas, tell him of the lady’s plan,” she said.

  Nalaryn shrugged. “He will know. The Great Lord has ears upon the wind.”

  The small band quickly vanished into the trees on the south side of the road. Kerian felt oddly at a loss without them. Through all the struggle for Bianost, not a single Kago
nesti had been hurt or killed. They were like warriors of smoke, creatures whom bandit blades could not touch.

  She told Alhana of Porthios’s freshly minted notion to drag them around Nalis Aren and attack Mereklar. She expected outrage to match her own, but Alhana, after brief surprise, supported Porthios’s plan.

  “He was always a bold strategist,” she murmured.

  It was as close as she had yet come to acknowledging the identity of their leader, but all Kerian could think was that Porthios’s wife was as insane as Porthios himself.

  The slow-moving column trudged on. The landscape began to look familiar and nightmarishly different at the same time. Shattered stones appeared along the road. Some were the ruins of local buildings; others were debris thrown out of Qualinost when Beryl hit. Vines with blue-black leaves held the broken stones in a vicious grip. Lofty spires lay like colossal fallen trees, stark white against the twisted foliage. Just a few feet from the road’s edge, the south shoulder sloped away more steeply, adding to the uncertain footing. The weird, toxic atmosphere affected all of them. Conversation faded. Draft animals became sluggish.

  With dawn only two hours away, the column was strung out along the road. A mist was rising, a grayish fog that smelled faintly of rotten flesh. The odor was too much for many of the Bianost elves. Sickened, they fell out of step to find relief by the roadside.

  Even a seasoned campaigner like Samar found the stench hard to bear. Ashen faced, he asked, “Are we doing the right thing? If the air gets much worse, we may not be able to continue!”

  “It certainly will discourage the bandits from following us,” Alhana replied, swallowing hard.

  Samar was silent for a moment, debating how best to bring up the topic that had consumed his thoughts for days: he knew the identity of the masked elf.

  For as long as he could remember, Samar had been in love with Alhana. She did not know, and he intended she never would. Even after her husband’s presumed death, Samar had not allowed his feelings to intrude on her peace. But what would happen to that peace now? Samar feared there could be only one logical reason for Porthios’s masquerade. The fire that had not killed him had maimed him so horribly he could not be seen without his mask. If so, what kind of future could Alhana hope for with him?