“How did you get away?” the half-elf asked, astonished at the casual cruelty of the human race.
“I dove underneath a nearby wagon. If it hadn’t been there, I’m sure they would have murdered me. One good thing came out of it, though,” he said, brightening.
“What was that?”
“I came up with a joke. Do you want to hear it?” he asked. His thin face was dark with wariness.
“You sure you want to tell it to me?”
“If you promise not to slay me if you don’t like it.”
Tanis nodded. Scowarr sat up. His voice dropped an octave. Tanis could almost see him on a stage somewhere. “Did you hear about the funny man who told the same jokes three days running?”
“No,” Tanis replied encouragingly.
“He wouldn’t dare tell them standing still.”
Tanis smiled. “That’s good,” the half-elf said kindly.
Scowarr, obviously frustrated, ran one hand through his short, tufted, light brown hair. Close-shorn hair was rare among humans, except for children and some warriors. Tanis could almost believe Scowarr favored the style because it would bring an immediate smile to people’s lips. Then again, maybe he cut it himself. The human’s face showed anything but a smile now, though. “What do you mean, That’s good’? You didn’t laugh!”
“But I can see that it’s funny,” Tanis protested.
“You have to feel that it’s funny, not see that it’s funny.” Scowarr turned back toward the sea, reminding Tanis suddenly of an out-of-temper sparrow with its feathers in a fluff.
Despite himself, Tanis was beginning to like Scowarr. He was about to say so when a wave broke high against the seacliff wall and sent salty spray into the cave.
The campfire sizzled. Another wave brought a small flood sloshing across the floor, washing out the fire. In an instant, Tanis and Scowarr were up on their feet, the water at ankle depth.
“The tide is rising,” said Tanis, venturing near the cave mouth and looking out into the strait. “We have to get out of here.”
That’s when he spotted a ship anchored just down the coast in the harbor of the elven village. Small fishing vessels, lying heavy in the water, ferried boatloads of citizens to the waiting ship.
“They’re evacuating,” Tanis said sadly. “The humans must be massing a huge army to make elves flee their homes.”
Scowarr joined the half-elf at the cave mouth. The human was a full head shorter than he. “Yes,” Scowarr said, “that skirmish you were involved in was only the beginning of the battle. The humans want all the land north of Qualinesti, and they make no secret about their wish to either drive the elves south or into the sea. And they’ve just about done it, too.”
Another wave broke high on the cliff and covered them with green foam. Scowarr, thin clothes clinging to his spare frame, shivered.
Tanis feared that the tunnels might flood before the two could get to higher ground. There were only two choices. One was to jump out of the cave and swim to safety. The rising tide was pounding against the side of the cliff, however; one unlucky move and the pair could be crushed or drowned. The other possibility was somehow to climb the sheer cliff face to the top. The obvious problem with that choice, Tanis thought, leaning carefully out the cave mouth, was that it looked all but impossible. But not thoroughly impossible.…
“Can you climb?” asked Tanis.
Scowarr recklessly stuck his head out of the cave and looked up. Tanis lunged for a fistful of the human’s shirt to keep him from tumbling into the sea and hauled the man back in. Scowarr appeared unaware of his close call, although his eyes were round with Tanis’s suggested escape route. “Now I know why you don’t laugh at my jokes,” Scowarr said. “You’re mad.”
“It’s not as far as it looks. Maybe thirty feet,” said Tanis. “Besides, there are tree roots sticking out of the rock face,” he added. “We can use them for handholds.”
“You go first,” insisted the funny man.
It hadn’t occurred to Tanis to do anything except go first, so he carefully dug his foot into the rock ledge at the side of the cave mouth and began to climb. He found a crevice for his right foot, a small outcropping to grab with his left hand, then a bush growing out of the rock face in which to steady his left foot, then another crevice for his right hand, and so it went until he was halfway to the top. The sea continued to rise, the deadly waves beating against the cliff until Tanis feared for the safety of the man waiting below.
“The water is up to my waist!” cried Scowarr, his voice drifting up to Tanis on the surf-soaked wind. “I’m coming! Don’t fall, or you’ll knock me in, too!”
“At least he’s managed that announcement without telling a joke,” Tanis muttered.
“… which could certainly put a damper on things!” the human sang triumphantly.
Tanis stifled a groan.
The half-elf continued to climb, his hands cut from grabbing the sharp-edged rocks, the blood mixing with his sweat to make everything he touched slick and slippery. Still, he worked his way closer to the top, hand over hand, foot over foot, edging toward safety. He settled his left foot on a tree root. His right foot rested on a protruding rock. He held on to a fossilized piece of driftwood with his left hand, and then reached for a grayish bush with dying flowers with his right.
The bush didn’t hold.
The plant came out of the sea cliff wall in a rush of broken clods of rock, dirt, and rotten roots. The dirt flew in Tanis’s face. He lost his balance, and both feet slipped off their moorings.…
7
Multicolored Hope
“No!” shouted Scowarr from below as the tiny avalanche reached him, pelting him with stones and a shower of dirt. Luckily, the bush itself didn’t hit him. And neither did Tanis, who clung to the fossilized driftwood with one hand while desperately trying to reclaim his toeholds.
“Hang on!”
Tanis’s heart leaped with hope; the new voice came from the top of the cliff!
“I don’t have a rope,” the female voice, pitched low, volunteered, “but I have something else. Please! Hang on!”
Tanis’s arm felt as if it were going to rip right out of the socket. If only he could find some halfway solid footing. But the more he struggled to find a place for his feet, the greater was the strain on his arm.
“I’m lowering it,” the woman called out. “It’s coming down on your right. See it?”
He saw it—a thin, pink shawl dangling in the wind.
He grabbed it with his free hand. The shawl, and other shawls of red, blue, purple, and yellow to which it was tied, went taut.
Breathlessly, Tanis called out, “What’s your end tied to?”
“A cart,” came the reply. “I put stones under the wheels, but it’s sliding toward the edge of the cliff. The cart’s too light, and I can’t hold it. Hurry!”
Tanis heaved himself up the multicolored rope of shawls as if he were climbing a vine in the forest.
“Hurry!” the woman pleaded. “The cart’s sliding faster!”
Hand over hand, Tanis struggled. His arms ached, and his mouth was as dry as the loose dirt that kept breaking away from the rock face.
But he was getting close to the top. Just a few more heaves up the makeshift rope …
The half-elf looked up, hoping to see a hand stretched out to help him. Instead, he heard a scream and saw the cart coming over the top of the cliff. He wasn’t going to make it!
The cart tumbled over the edge, smacking into Tanis, who had been a mere few feet below it when it fell.
Stunned by the blow, Tanis knew only that something terrible had happened. He flailed helplessly as the churning sea rushed up to meet him—until a wind like no other Tanis had experienced blew up from beneath him with such force that it stopped his fall and sent him flying upward. At the same instant, the cart crashed into the seacliff, breaking apart in the wind. Splintered wood whipped all around him, its lighter weight sending it careening skyward far fas
ter than Tanis’s own flight.
Unable to breathe, Tanis tried to turn over on his back as he soared ever higher on an invisible carpet of air. All he could manage, though, was to roll over and over as the wind caught his arms, turning him in ever-faster circles. On one of his revolutions, he caught sight of Scowarr surging skyward, catching up with him.
By the time Tanis reached the lip of the seacliff wall, Little Shoulders was within easy reach. His face a portrait in terror, Scowarr reached out with both hands and gripped Tanis’s left shin so hard that the half-elf thought the human might snap it.
They floated up over the top of the cliff, where the calmer air sucked them out of the gale. They hit the ground in a sprawl, tearing up meadow flowers as they rolled over the bumpy ground.
Confused, gasping for air, Tanis lay still for a moment. Then he remembered the woman. He struggled to his knees and, sensing a presence behind him, turned.
The woman, a matronly dwarf with eyes like green chips of malachite, ran toward him. Walking slowly behind her was a young man who also looked vaguely familiar. Tanis’s senses were still reeling, and he had trouble focusing.
The woman reached him first and took his bloody hands in her own. “I heard a cry and that’s when I saw you,” she said in a comforting, motherly voice—the same voice that had signaled rescue from the top of the cliff. “I thought you’d be killed for certain when my cart went over the cliff.” Her hand moved to his forehead. “I’m so sorry I couldn’t stop it.”
Her hands were soft and warm. Instinctively, he leaned close and breathed in her scent. It was a fragrance of spring flowers tinged with the clean aroma of fresh cotton. He felt comforted by her presence.
“I’m sorry about your cart,” he said finally, feeling a deep pang of guilt. “You lost everything, didn’t you?”
“It was nothing compared to the loss of a life.” She glanced at Scowarr, who was finally stirring. “Two lives.”
“I … we … thank you most sincerely for what you tried to do,” Tanis said with humility.
“What about me?” boomed the man, who swaggered up behind the woman. “Don’t I get any thanks? After all, it was my magic that actually saved you.”
Tanis blinked. The face was thinner, the hair thick and black, and the robes clean and crimson. Was it Kishpa? The man was so young, so healthy, so full of vigor. His blue eyes gleamed in a young face. It seemed impossible. Yet …
“You will speak to Yeblidod, but not to me?” questioned the man good-humoredly. He turned to the woman and kidded her, saying, “Mertwig will be jealous.” Then, more seriously, he added, “Don’t be concerned about your loss. I’ll talk to Mertwig about replacing what went over the cliff.”
She looked up at the wizard and nodded humbly.
Meanwhile, in his mind’s eye, Tanis tried to picture him as an ancient man with charred skin, lying on a blanket, begging for help. They were so much the same, yet so markedly different.
Although still dazed, Tanis knew that he had to be careful. He remembered Kishpa’s warning: “There will be many who will try to stop you. I can warn you about one of them … me.”
When the mage turned back to him, Tanis awkwardly tried to rise to his feet. “I’m sorry for my lack of good manners,” said Tanis. “Let me thank you now.” He swayed but remained erect; even though he still heard the wind howling in his ears, only a light, early afternoon breeze ruffled the flowers and grasses at the top of the cliff. “May your magic always be a blessing to you,” he added with an unsteady bow.
The woman reached out and took his arm to keep him from falling.
The magic-user bowed in return, saying, “Your words do you credit. But I must say,” he added, narrowing his eyes, “you are not of my village, and your blood lines appear to be, let us say, betwixt and between. One might ask where your loyalties lie.”
Accustomed to such queries, Tanis was able to reply evenly, although annoyance, as usual, burned just below the surface. He pretended to be unaware of Kishpa’s elven bloodlines. “My loyalties lie with those who call me friend,” Tanis said steadily. “And you? To my eye, you appear to be a human and potentially an enemy to Ankatavaka yourself. Where are your loyalties?”
The dwarf pulled at Tanis’s sleeve. “You know not of what you speak,” she said, apparently embarrassed to be overheard by the wizard. “This is Kishpa, grandson of Tokandi, who was a much-revered elder of Ankatavaka.”
“Who was also a notorious lover of human females,” the young Kishpa chimed in with a hearty laugh. “My father was like you,” he said, gesturing at Tanis. “He was a half-elf. He married a human woman—it seems to be a family weakness—and they gave birth to me. You ask me of my loyalties. I answer: This is my home. These are my people, and the humans who have gathered to attack it are my enemies. Enemies,” he added with sudden harshness, “like this one.” He pointed at Scowarr.
Little Shoulders seemed to shrivel with fear. He was not only speechless, but for once, jokeless. Kishpa’s life-saving magic had left him awestruck.
“Scowarr is no enemy of yours,” Tanis intervened. “The humans tried to kill him, and he fled. And when I was about to be killed by this same enemy, he saved my life. Let a man’s actions speak for him, rather than the accident of his birth.”
Kishpa studied Tanis. “Ah, a philosopher, too?”
“Hardly.”
The wizard smiled. “And modest. But tell me this—what is your name?”
“Tanthalas, or Tanis, as you please.”
“Tell me, Tanis, what brings you to this place?” Kishpa’s voice lowered. “Why are you here, and why now?”
The intensity of the man’s tone startled Tanis. It was as if this young Kishpa suspected something. Lying was not in the half-elf’s nature; on the other hand, he feared telling the young mage the real reason he had come. Yet he had to say something, something that was true, so he blurted, “A dying man asked me to find someone for him. I came as soon as I could, and I will leave for home, I think, very soon. At least I hope so.”
Kishpa seemed unconvinced. Tanis wondered if he had blundered already.
8
At the Barricades
In the hope of diverting Kishpa’s thoughts, Tanis quickly gave his attention to the quivering Scowarr. “Where is your good humor, my friend? Isn’t laughter born out of fear?”
The funny man looked at Tanis balefully before replying, “I’m getting so used to being scared that when I feel safe it scares me.”
Yeblidod giggled.
Scowarr brightened at the woman’s reaction. “But now I’m starting to feel better,” he added.
“Where are the two of you going?” asked Yeblidod, a plump, sweet-looking dwarf. She gestured around her at the meadow, flowers waving in the light breeze, the rising sea crashing in the background, the shouts of elven residents of Ankatavaka thin in the distance.
“We’re going nowhere in particular right now,” Tanis answered evasively, “but what of you? Where were you going with your cart before you tried to rescue us?”
The woman pointed out over the cliff to the ship anchored in the village harbor to the south. “Mertwig is delivering our son and many of our belongings to that boat. I was to bring the rest. You see, we live outside the village, and we can’t protect our house. Mostly, we just want our boy to be safe from the fighting.”
“You should be going, too,” scolded Kishpa. “It isn’t going to be safe here when the humans mount their attack. You’re setting a bad example for Brandella.”
Tanis nearly jumped at the sound of the woman’s name. She was here. But was she leaving on that ship in the harbor? Kishpa had noted the half-elf’s sudden movement, Tanis could see; the wizard was giving him a curious glance. But Yeblidod rattled on, drawing the mage back into conversation with her when she said, “Oh, Brandella makes up her own mind. You know that. Nothing I do, one way or the other, will have any effect on her.”
“Nor anything I do, either, it seems,” complained the w
izard. “You know it will go hard with her if the village falls. A human woman living among elves …” He let the thought remain unspoken. “By the gods,” he went on, frustrated, “I wish both of you would take that boat out of Ankatavaka so Mertwig and I could fight with clear minds. As it is, the odds are much against us.”
Correctly interpreting Tanis’s raised eyebrow as a question, Kishpa continued to the half-elf and Scowarr, “Since the winter of sickness, I am the only magic-user left in the village, and I am still not fully trained. Worse, our scouts say the human army outnumbers our fighters by at least six to one. Isn’t it better that the women, the children, and the very old ones should be safe at sea when the siege begins in earnest?” he pleaded.
Yeblidod countered, “Those who want to go should go. But Canpho says I can help him with the healing. You know that the healer will need all the help he can get.” She continued, her mild alto growing strident for the first time, “As for Brandella, she is good with a longbow—better than most. She will do the village far more good fighting here than she will marooned on a ship out in the sea. Besides,” the dwarf concluded simply, “she and I are willing to take the risk.”
Kishpa looked put out, but Tanis was relieved. Brandella intended to stay. But where was his father? He wouldn’t leave until he’d found the man. His father most likely was with the massing human army. It wouldn’t be until the battle was joined that the half-elf would have a chance of spotting him—and how easy was that going to be?
Tanis felt himself slipping into melancholy.
“You seem unhappy,” said the dwarf, her small, delicate mouth creased into a frown. “Just moments ago you were saved from certain death. You even chided your human friend about his somber face. And now, for no reason that I can see, your face crumbles into sadness.”
Tanis tried to marshal a smile, but Yeblidod seemed unconvinced. “Kishpa!” she called out, a sudden grin crinkling her emerald eyes. “Perhaps one of those spells you’ve collected will cheer him. Why don’t you try the one that makes his toes sticky?”
Tanis the Shadow Years Page 5
