For that matter, what chance did Grianne Ohmsford have, Ilse Witch or not? She was still only one, and they were millions.
“Railing, look!” Mirai said suddenly.
To the east, still far distant, a fleet of airships was approaching. Railing snatched the spyglass from its rack and trained it on the newcomers. There were a handful of fighting vessels, but mostly hundreds of skiffs pulling flatbeds crammed with soldiers.
“Dwarves,” he told Mirai. “Come to aid the Elves. But there aren’t nearly enough of them—and they’re mostly foot soldiers, not fliers. If they land those barges, they will be destroyed before they can even get off the ground again.”
“I’d guess they can see that for themselves. But what else can they do? They’ve come all this way; you don’t expect them to turn around and go back again, do you?”
He didn’t know what he expected. A miracle, he supposed. Dwarves or no, the army of the Straken Lord was too massive to be stopped. The Elves might hold the passes through the Valley of Rhenn for a while, but in the end they would fall and Arborlon and the entire Westland would fall with them.
The creatures below them were milling about but not yet advancing, just growling and shrieking, making aggressive gestures and sudden rushes that ended after only a few yards. They were working themselves up, readying for the coming battle. Railing brought the spyglass up again and swept the rim of the mountain walls warding the valley. He saw Elven Hunters everywhere, but no sign of Seersha or Crace Coram. He wondered if perhaps they were responsible for the Dwarves’ appearance and were aboard the skiffs, but that didn’t seem right.
“What are we going to do?” Mirai demanded. “We can’t just watch this happen. We have to do something!”
As she said it, a handful of winged creatures—Harpies and huge vampire bats—lifted off the ground and came at them. They were agile and swift as they closed on the Quickening. The men at the railing backed away, realizing the danger. Weapons appeared. A couple of the Rovers rushed to the rail slings and swung them about protectively.
But before the winged attackers could reach the airship, the witch wraith rose from her crouch and walked to the railing, ragged clothing flying in the wind, dark visage gone almost black. For just a second it seemed to Railing, watching from the pilot box, as if she weren’t there at all. As if all that inhabited the inside of her tattered clothing was a shadow.
The Harpies and bats must have seen something of it, too, and they didn’t like it one bit. As if formed of a single creature, they broke off their attack and swung away abruptly, gathering speed as they went.
The witch wraith turned to him. “Fly to the mouth of the pass!”
He did so without hesitating. Whatever was going to happen now was not something he cared to interfere with. They were here at the witch’s behest; she must have known she would find the Straken Lord’s army attacking the Westland or she wouldn’t have bothered. How she had known he had no idea. But now that they were here, it stood to reason that she intended to face her nemesis—perhaps to do what she had been asked, or perhaps to do something else altogether.
The witch stood where she was, staring down at the army beneath them as they neared the pass. She didn’t speak or move; she gave no indication of what she was thinking. They might have been invisible for all the interest she evidenced. Railing thought it better that way. The less attention she paid to them, the better.
They were closing on the pass when the dragon flew out of the east.
Redden and his companions reached Arborlon before dawn, flying in from the Elven Hunter outpost they had stumbled on several hours earlier, aboard an ancient transport they had persuaded the garrison to put at their disposal. It wasn’t so much what they were asking as the force with which they asked it. Redden in particular had invoked both Aphenglow and her grandfather as friends and protectors. Mention of the latter immediately led to the revelation that the old King was dead, assassinated by his brother, and that the city was preparing for war. But the Hunters agreed it was a good idea that the strange trio proceed to their destination so they could give their report to someone who might act on it—especially after the young girl had begun to cry uncontrollably.
Oriantha, it turned out, could shape-shift in more than one way when the need was present.
But when they arrived in Arborlon, they found the city in chaos, with rumors of another attack on the royal family, this time on the King’s son; of several others killed in the attack, including the Captain of the Home Guard, Sian Aresh; and of a demon army massed at the passes east in the Valley of Rhenn where a terrible battle had been fought the previous day and was expected to continue at sunrise.
The tension and fear they encountered were palpable, and there was a strong sense of panic setting in. It was impossible to get an accurate story from anyone, especially since Tesla’s appearance seemed to scare them away. Not able to find anyone they knew personally or to learn what was happening from those they didn’t, they decided to fly to the site of the pending battle, reasoning that, wherever there was fighting, they would likely find one or more of their friends.
So Redden and Oriantha boarded their transport once more, hauling a decidedly uncertain and fearful Ulk Bog with them, and flew out toward the Rhenn as the sky ahead slowly began to lighten.
“Did you hear the woman who claimed there was a Druid involved in last night’s attack?” Redden asked Oriantha over the rush of the wind in the open cockpit.
“I heard there was and that she might have been killed. I also heard it was only Aresh. I heard lots of things. Did you learn anything useful?”
Redden shook his head. “What are we going to do once we get to the passes?”
Oriantha shook her head. “Look around?”
She was weighing her options, he imagined. His own were troubling. If Railing wasn’t in the Rhenn, did he join in the fighting anyway to help the Elves? Or did he continue looking for his brother? Where were Seersha and Crace Coram while all this was happening? Where were Skint and the Rovers? Oriantha knew no one except Coram, who had been part of their group when she had left him at the portal leading out of the Forbidding but of whom she had heard nothing since.
Still, someone had to know something about what had become of the other members of the expedition.
They flew on, their uneasiness increasing the closer they got to their destination. All Redden could think about was what waited there—Tael Riverine and the entire demon army. He could not stop imagining what it would feel like to be back in their hands—a very real possibility if he were forced into a fight against them. His insides recoiled at the prospect, and if it hadn’t been for his even more pressing fears about his brother, he would have turned around on the spot.
I don’t have to be a part of this fight, he kept telling himself. I don’t have to do anything I don’t want to. I just need to find Railing. I just need to make sure my brother is safe.
But he knew this wasn’t so. He was an irrevocable a part of what was happening and had been from the moment he had left in search of the missing Elfstones. He was even more committed now that he had found the Stones and knew they might make a difference in any struggle with the Jarka Ruus. He could tell himself anything he wanted, but the path his feet were set upon would take him in only one direction.
At one point, Tesla Dart wormed her way forward and pressed up against him. “You don’t forget your promise to me?” she asked, bending close.
He glanced over at her worried face. “I will keep my promise,” he said.
He would try to keep all his promises, he thought, even the ones he had made to himself and was afraid he could not face.
Time passed. They sun crested the horizon, a blazing light shining out on a bright clear day. Ahead, the passes loomed dark and shadowy in the lee of the Rhenn’s forested walls.
They flew straight across the near pass and continued on toward the far. No one tried to stop them; apparently, no one thought it worth the effort
since they were flying such a harmless, decrepit vessel. There was no battle yet, it seemed. There were no sounds of it or activity atop the valley rim. If anything, it was unusually quiet.
“What’s happening?” Redden asked over his shoulder, but Oriantha only shook her head and moved closer to where he sat, peering ahead with him to see what waited.
They had just reached the opening through the second pass when they heard a thunderous roar rise from the creatures massed without.
The witch wraith half turned toward the monstrous dragon when it appeared, facing it with no indication of concern.
“Take me down,” she called over her shoulder to Railing. “Land at the mouth of the pass. Not inside. Out in front, where all those gathered can see.”
Railing did as she ordered. He banked the Quickening a quarter turn and began dropping her earthward. His heart was racing, anticipating what was going to happen next. Clearly, the witch intended to let the Straken Lord know she was there. What more she would do remained to be seen.
Challa Nand moved away from the rail where he had been watching the army of the Jarka Ruus and stepped closer to the pilot box.
“Once we are down and she leaves to do what she thinks she must, we are getting off this vessel,” he said quietly. He glanced in her direction, but her attention was fixed on the dragon. “We’ll make a run for the pass and get inside, where the Elves can offer us protection. We don’t wait. We don’t hesitate. We don’t stop.”
Railing glanced at Mirai, and they both nodded. Challa Nand nodded back and moved away.
As the Quickening descended, Railing hunched his shoulders against a sudden chill and took a surprised look around. Something odd was happening. The temperature, until now warm and pleasant, had suddenly gone as cold as deepest winter. There was no reason for it, no apparent cause, but the change was unmistakable. He glanced over at Mirai and saw that she was tightening her cloak about her shoulders.
On the decks of the sailing vessel, frost was forming.
They landed directly in front of the pass leading into the Valley of Rhenn, placing themselves between the Elven defenders and the Jarka Ruus. He could feel a million eyes watching, all fixed on the airship, but no one came toward it. By now the Quickening was coated with frost from bow to stern, from her decks to the tips of her masts, turned as white as a ghost ship.
The Ilse Witch had changed, too. She had gone from a tattered gray shade to a ghostly white.
Then, abruptly, she began to move. She seemed to float across the main deck to the rail. Before her, the gate leading off the ship unlatched of its own accord, and she passed through the opening without slowing. She was twenty feet off the ground, but she stood in midair and then slowly descended to the plains below. She did not speak to Railing and the others. She did not even look at them.
“Railing!” Mirai hissed, shock reflected in her voice as she pointed.
The witch, having reached the ground, was walking directly toward the army of the Straken Lord. As she did so, she left footprints coated with frost in the grass.
Challa Nand wasted no time. With Austrum beside him, he anchored the ship and threw out the rope ladder. Hurrying from one crewmember to the next, he ordered them off the ship. The Rovers went first, then Woostra, then Skint; finally the Troll lifted Mirai bodily from the pilot box and beckoned Railing after them. Down the ladder they all went, trying to move silently, casting anxious glances at the spectral figure still moving away from them and at the skies where the dragon continued to circle.
On the ground, Railing turned toward the valley pass. Austrum and the other Rovers were already rushing for safety. Skint and Woostra were only a few yards behind. Challa Nand tried to take Mirai’s arm, but she shrugged him off, making it clear that she could manage on her own. Railing, a few steps back, saw the big man glance at the Highland girl, shake his head in surprise, and hurry on.
That was when the boy turned back, unable to resist the urge to know what would happen.
A short distance away, just beyond the Quickening, Grianne Ohmsford’s dark reincarnation was confronting the hordes from the Forbidding. The creatures were massed before her, thousands strong, all of them staring with wonder and uneasiness at this strange being, their eyes shifting back and forth from her to the Elves to the dragon circling overhead. Their growls and snarls and hisses were muted almost to silence. Some had moved back warily.
The witch wraith was not moving at all.
Railing could hear the calls of his companions, urging him to get away. But he stayed where he was. His mind was made up. He would see for himself what he had brought about by trying to bring back Grianne Ohmsford. He would not run and hide.
Seconds later Mirai was at his elbow. “Get out of here,” he said.
She dismissed the suggestion with a shake of her head. “Don’t be ridiculous. What’s she doing?”
Stubborn to the end, he thought. “Waiting, I think.”
So it seemed. With foreknowledge of what was fated to happen, perhaps. He could feel it in his bones.
In moments the Straken Lord descended astride his dragon. The great beast seemed even larger from this new perspective, coming down like a mountainside and landing with an impact that shook the ground and reverberated across the grasslands. Its face was ruined on one side, its eye gone and the pit ragged and raw. Steam leaked from its nostrils and maw, huffing out with each breath—an indication of the intensity of the fire that burned in its inner furnace.
But it was the Straken Lord that riveted Railing Ohmsford. The boy had never seen anything like him. He was huge, even when compared with the Trolls with whom he had spent time on their quest for the missing Elfstones. As black as coal, with spikes sticking out all over his powerful body, he had the look of something conjured in a nightmare and brought to life. He was holding a huge black scepter, and his eyes were fixed on the witch wraith.
Railing could hear the calls of his companions, frantic now, warning both Mirai and himself to run, but he paid them no attention. Instead, he moved forward, skirting the hull of the airship so that he had a clear view of both the dragon and the witch. He watched as Tael Riverine slid down the dragon’s scaly hide to a carefully lifted foreleg that waited to lower him to the ground and advanced on the witch.
“I sense your presence!” he roared. “My Queen-to-be, my promised gift! Where are you?”
“I stand before you, Tael Riverine,” the ghost-white witch replied, her voice ringing out.
The Straken Lord stopped where he was, staring. “Do not lie to me, crone. Reveal her!”
“No one lies to you. No one trifles with your foolish dreams. This is what you wished for. Now you have your wish. What will you do with me?”
“You are not her! What sort of game is this? I feel her to be close! You hide her somewhere!”
The anger he was experiencing was evident in his voice, raw and edged with bitterness. He was advancing again, drawing nearer to her. Railing thought that if she spoke again with words that displeased him, he would use his iron staff to smash her into the earth.
But the witch seemed unperturbed, still standing in place, calmly watching him draw near.
“Long ago, you took me prisoner and collared me like an animal,” she hissed at him. “You tried to discover the extent of my powers. You tried to make me your Queen so that I would bear your children. You failed. I escaped. I returned to my own world and found a place in it where I could forget you and your dark plans. But even though decades have passed and things you cannot begin to comprehend have changed, you still cling to your foolish dream. You still think to make me yours.”
She gestured expansively, arms flinging wide, particles of frost and ice flying into the air about her like a miniature storm. “Well, Tael Riverine, here I am. Don’t you want me?”
“You are not Grianne Ohmsford!” The other screamed it as if it were a personal affront, as if it had been deliberately planned to thwart his purposes and deprive him of his due.
r /> Behind him, the dragon stamped the earth and breathed fire onto the grasslands, setting patches of vegetation aflame. The Jarka Ruus surged backward in response, stumbling over one another in an effort to remain safely clear. Smoke from the dragon-fire rolled across the plains in black clouds.
“Well, in that you are both right and wrong,” replied the witch. “I am here and I am not here. The truth is beyond you, and my patience with this business is at an end. Since you do not wish for me after all, I can admit that I want nothing of you, either. But one of us must give way and I think it must be you. What I want matters most.”
Was he seeing things, Railing wondered, or was the witch wraith growing larger? “We should go,” Mirai whispered in his ear, taking hold of his arm and pulling on it.
“You beg for your life, do you?” Tael Riverine stood rock-still not six yards away from her.
The witch laughed. “I beg for nothing. What I need, I will take. And what I will take is your place as ruler of the Jarka Ruus.”
For a long few seconds, the Straken Lord stared at the apparition, attempting in vain to take her measure. In the vast sweep of the plains, where even an army of hundreds of thousands could not manage to fill the emptiness, Tael Riverine might have recognized the danger. But the demon’s life had been long and hard and filled with other dangers, and his pride convinced him that this was just one more.
“It is you, isn’t it?” he said at last. He bent forward to peer closely at her. “You’ve become a hag, a gathering of cloth and smoke, a bit of nothing. You are Grianne, but changed into this … thing. Once, I would have made you my Queen. Now you are not worthy.”
They faced each other in silence, and it seemed to Railing that each was waiting on a response from the other. He couldn’t have said which of them was the true aggressor and which the intended victim at this point. Perhaps they were both looking to discover this, both deciding what more was to be done.
But it was Tael Riverine who attacked, leaping at the witch with his iron staff raised, swinging for her head. He was quick for such a big man, much quicker than Railing would have thought possible, and for just an instant the boy thought she had simply disintegrated under the blow. But then he realized she wasn’t even there anymore. Instead, she had appeared off to one side.