The Weapons Master's Choice

Khyber faced him squarely. She was not in the least intimidated, Redden thought as he stood off to one side, watching the confrontation unfold.

“We are inside the Forbidding,” she answered. “Just as Grianne Ohmsford was a hundred years ago. Trapped.”

Carrick shook his head. “That isn’t possible.”

“I’m afraid it is. The shimmer of light we passed through was a breach in the wall that had been deliberately altered to suggest it was something other than what it really is. Even my magic failed to detect it. As did your own, Carrick.”

“But you can’t be sure of this! How do you know?”

“The look of the land. The creatures that attacked us on our way in—things not of our world but very much of this one. Giant insects, Goblins. The dragon that attacked us and then took away Oriantha and Crace Coram—when there aren’t any Drachas left in the Four Lands. The way the opening was there one minute and gone the next. There’s no mistaking what we saw. Anyone who knows the history of the Four Lands and its Races would know the truth of it. We are inside the Forbidding.”

There was a stunned silence.

Then Pleysia, still on her knees, began to laugh hysterically. “How much worse can this get? We’ve lost half our number. A dragon has carried away my daughter and the Dwarf. We found our way in and can’t find our way out.” Her laughter died away into sobs. “All of us are caught out on the wrong side of a door we can’t even find, let alone open! Caught among creatures that will tear us to bits once they discover we’re here. It’s madness!”

Carrick whipped around to say something, and then stopped short. “Your daughter? That odd girl is your daughter? Why didn’t you tell us?”

Pleysia hauled herself to her feet, her eyes dark as they fixed on him. “Would it have made any difference to you? What do you care about me and mine, anyway?”

The Trolls were pressing forward as well, talking among themselves, lapsing into their own guttural language as they gestured at the bodies of Garroneck and the other dead. Redden took a step back in spite of himself, even though he wasn’t the one being threatened. If anything, he was being ignored. It was Khyber Elessedil who was bearing the brunt of everyone’s rage and fear.

“Stay calm,” she ordered, raising her voice only a little.

“Stay calm?” Carrick looked wild and dangerous. “We have to get out of here, Mistress. Right now!”

“I’m not leaving my daughter!” Pleysia screamed at him. “We don’t go anywhere until we find her!”

Redden looked around uneasily. They were standing out in the open, and the sound of their voices would carry a long way. If there was anything else out there hunting, anything as dangerous as that dragon, it would find them with no trouble.

“Come close,” the Ard Rhys ordered them, indicating both Druids and Trolls. She did not look at Redden, but he stepped toward her anyway. “Now listen to me,” she said, looking from face to face. “We can’t go back the way we came. The way we came is gone. Or if not gone, lost to us. But before we give up completely on finding it, we should use our magic to see if it can be revealed. Carrick? Pleysia? We should at least try.”

So they did, each one of them separately, conjuring Druid magic and sending it abroad, sweeping the countryside for a hint of where the door might be concealed. But even though they kept at it for long minutes, it showed them nothing.

I could try using the wishsong, Redden thought. But then something else occurred to him.

“Maybe we shouldn’t be doing this,” he said suddenly. All heads turned. “Doesn’t the use of magic attract other magic? Especially here, where there is so much of it?”

“He is right,” Khyber Elessedil said.

“But we can’t stand here and do nothing!” Carrick insisted. “What does it matter if we use our magic or not? The things that hunt us in this monstrous land will find us sooner or later anyway. Our only chance to escape them is to discover a way out and take it!”

The Ard Rhys shook her head. “Maybe nothing is hunting us. Except for the dragon, the creatures that inhabit the Forbidding might not even know we are here. Not yet, anyway. Remember how we got here. The blue Elfstones showed Aphenglow that this was the way to the missing Stones. Her vision was clear enough to get us this far, and everything we have done has followed that vision exactly. Even the shimmer of light was a part of what she was shown. We were not lured here. We came of our own free will at the direction of the seeking-Stones. Whoever created this trap didn’t know that we would be the ones to fall into it.”