Bearers of the Black Staff

She spent the rest of the day studying the barricades and listening to the builders explain why they believed them strong enough to repel any attack. She was briefed on the defensive positions and the strategy that Haren Crayel intended to employ if the attack came. Afterward, she had dinner with her cousins and the Elves they were closest to, back to telling stories and sharing ale.

It was late when she rolled into her blankets near a fire they had built for her, the mountain air cold and the wind gusting through the pass. She was tired enough to begin drifting off right away, even though she was still thinking about the reason that the Trolls were making no effort to search for a way through the mountains. Odd, she kept repeating to herself, that they should come so near Aphalion Pass and then do nothing to find it.

If Arik Sarn were there, perhaps he could explain it. She thought of him sitting in the gardens and drawing flowers, and it made her smile. He was pretty odd himself. He would understand the behavior of the Drouj and Taureq Siq better than any of them.

She had almost fallen asleep when the first hint of the answer she had been searching for came to her as a sharp-edged possibility that until that moment she had never considered. Doing so now, she went cold all the way down to her bones.

Within seconds she was shaking Tasha and Tenerife awake.





TWENTY-FIVE




TRUE TO HIS WORD, ON REACHING GLENSK WOOD at midday two days earlier, Sider Ament left Panterra behind and continued on alone for Declan Reach. He took time to reassure the boy that he would do whatever was necessary to recover Prue safely from the Troll camp and would bring her back as quickly as possible. He could read the dissatisfaction and frustration in the boy’s face. The boy wanted to go with him and be a part of whatever rescue effort he intended. But Sider had already determined that it would be more dangerous for all three of them if the boy came along and would add nothing to have him there.

“Just do as I asked you,” he repeated. “Tell Aislinne what has happened and make sure your report reaches Pogue and the other members of the village council. Confirm that the effort to fortify the pass is under way and if for some reason it isn’t, do what you can to change that. Wait for me there if you wish; I’ll come through on my return.”

Then he was gone, moving quickly away, fading into the trees and not looking back.

He walked the remainder of the day, ascending the steeper mountain slopes toward Declan Reach. By nightfall, he had reached a place at the upper edges of the thinning woods where he could see the entrance. He considered entering the pass itself. In the black silence of the night, he could hear the murmur of voices and see the dim flicker of fires burning within the cut. Someone was camped there, presumably those who had been sent to begin work on the fortifications, and he could have joined them. But he was by nature solitary, and he preferred to keep his own company.

So he stayed where he was, finding a spot where he could make his camp and keep watch. He ate his meal cold, did not start a fire, and long before midnight had wrapped himself in his cloak and blanket to ward against the night’s chill and was asleep.

His sleep was deep and dreamless, the first time in a long time, and he woke refreshed and reassured that he was doing the right thing. He hadn’t told the boy, but he had a plan. It wasn’t fully formed and it depended on the efforts of someone other than himself, but he believed it had a chance to work. Without it, in any case, there was probably little hope for the girl. He had not shared any of this, not wanting to give the boy anything further to think about, hoping his efforts with the fortifications would help take his mind off the matter.

Probably that wouldn’t happen, he acknowledged. Probably there was no diminishing the pain of what he was going through.

He departed at sunrise for the pass, gratified to discover that a sizable workforce was in the process of constructing the needed fortifications, a mix of Trackers and builders under the command of Trow Ravenlock. He stopped long enough to make a quick report to the Tracker leader and to reassure himself that Skeal Eile was not doing anything to interfere with his efforts at summoning help from the other communities, and then he moved on. Ravenlock wanted to know where he was going, but he said only that he was going out to scout the movements of the Troll army and left things at that.

He traversed the length of the pass and emerged into the outside world without incident. The landscape he remembered was unchanged, still a mix of barren rock and empty flats spreading away toward distant mountains west and patches of forest that mingled trees both fresh with new growth and withered with death’s approach, all beneath skies that were clear and bright and sun-filled. He stood at the opening for a time, just studying the sweep of the terrain, watchful for anything that looked odd or threatening. He saw neither, and even though he knew there would be hidden dangers he felt he was better prepared for them this time.