The orogs cried out a retreat, a command goblins were always ready to follow. Elbereth and Danica moved first, though, catching the nearest goblins in a furious rush, while Shayleigh concentrated her fire on the orogs.
Those monsters not engaged ran wildly, picking their escape routes through the thick trees and brush.
When a wall of mist rolled up before them, terrified goblins skidded to a stop. The orogs prodded them from behind, knowing that to halt was to die.
An arrow thudded into the back of an orog, and another bolt followed its flight just a heartbeat later. The remaining two orogs shoved the lead goblin into the fog.
Watching from the boughs above, Tintagel launched another spell, throwing his voice into the mist through a rolled-up cone of parchment. His fog wall itself was harmless, but the cries of agony the wizard caused to emanate from within made the hesitant creatures think otherwise.
Three arrows took down the second orog. The remaining brute scrambled, seeking cover behind its goblin fodder. It came out the side of the group, thinking to circle around the fog wall … but it found Elbereth—and Elbereth’s sword—instead.
“It’s about time ye got here!” Ivan growled when Pikel finally made his way down the towering tree to come to his side. Yards from the host of elves, and with many monsters between them, Ivan had been sorely pressed. Still, the tough dwarf had managed to escape any serious injury, for the bulk of the monsters were more interested in escaping than in fighting.
And it had quickly become obvious to the goblins that any who ventured near Ivan’s furious axe would not long survive.
Back to back, the dwarf brothers elevated the battle to new heights of slaughter. They overwhelmed the nearby monsters in moments then shuffled up the path to overwhelm another group.
The elves cut in just as fiercely, swordsmen driving the monstrous throng every which way, and archers, just a short distance behind, making short work of those creatures that broke out of the pack. The goblinoids had nowhere to run and nowhere to hide. Already, more monsters lay dead than those standing to continue the fight, and that ratio came to favor the elves more and more with every passing heartbeat.
Tintagel watched as the first goblin that had been pushed into the wall emerged from the other side unharmed. The elf wizard resisted the urge to blast the thing down. His role was to contain the monsters so that Elbereth, Shayleigh, and Danica could finish them. He pulled more dried peas from his pouch and tossed them to the ground, perpendicular to the mist wall. Uttering the proper chant, the wizard summoned a second fog wall to box the monsters in.
Danica followed Shayleigh’s next three arrows into the confused horde. She whipped her daggers into the nearest targets, killing one goblin and dropping a second in screaming pain, and came in with a fury that her enemies couldn’t hope to match.
Nor could the remaining orog match Elbereth’s skill. The creature parried the elf’s initial, testing swing then brought its heavy club across wickedly. Elbereth easily sidestepped the blow and waded in behind, jabbing his fine sword repeatedly into the slower beast’s chest.
The creature blinked as though it was trying to focus through eyes that no longer saw clearly. Elbereth couldn’t wait for it to decide its next move. He whipped his shield arm around, slamming the shield—which had belonged to his father not so long ago—against the orog’s head. The monster dropped, star-shaped welts from the embossed heraldry of Shilmista crossing the side of its porcine face.
Shayleigh, sword in hand, came up beside the elf king and together they waded confidently into the goblins.
With no options left them, the trapped goblins began to fight back. Three surrounded Danica, hacking wildly with their short swords. They couldn’t keep up with her darting movements, dips, and dodges, though, and weren’t really coming very close to connecting.
Danica bided her time. One frustrated creature whipped its sword across in a harmlessly wide arc. Before the goblin could recover from its overbalanced swing, Danica’s foot snapped straight up, connected under its chin, and drove its jaw up under its nose. The goblin promptly disappeared under the brush.
A second beast rushed at the distracted woman’s back.
Bolts of magical energy flashed down from the tree above, burning into its head and neck. The goblin howled and grabbed at the wound, and Danica spun a half-circle, one foot flying wide, and circle-kicked it across the face. Its head looking too far back over one shoulder, the goblin joined its dead companion on the ground.
Danica managed to nod her thanks to Tintagel as she waded into the lone goblin facing her, her hands and feet flying in from all sides, finding opening after opening in the pitiful creature’s defenses. One kick knocked its sword away and before it could cry out a surrender, Danica’s stiffened fingers rifled into its throat, tearing out its windpipe.
Then it was over, with no more monsters to hit. The four companions, three of them covered in the blood of their enemies, stood solemn and grim, surveying their bestial but necessary handiwork.
“Ye know, elf,” Ivan said when Elbereth and the others came back to the group on the trail, “this is getting too easy.”
The dwarf spat in both hands and grasped his axe handle, the blade of his weapon buried deeply into an orog’s thick head. With a sickening crack, Ivan pulled the mighty weapon free.
“First fight in a tenday,” Ivan continued, “and this group seemed more keen on running than fighting!”
Elbereth couldn’t deny the dwarf’s observations, but he was far from upset at what the goblins’ retreat indicated.
“If we are fortunate, it will be another tenday before we find the need to fight again,” he replied.
Ivan balked, and drove his gore-stained blade into the earth to clean it.
As Elbereth moved away, the dwarf muttered to his brother, “Spoken like a true elf.”
THREE
HEARTFELT
You sit here and wait while all of our dreams—all of the dreams Talona herself gave you—fall to pieces!” Dorigen Kel Lamond, second most powerful wizard in all of Castle Trinity, sat back in her chair, somewhat surprised by her own uncharacteristic outburst. Her amber eyes looked away from Aballister, her mentor and superior.
The hollow-featured, older wizard seemed to take no offense. He rocked back in his comfortable chair, his sticklike fingers tap-tapping in front of him and an amused expression upon his gaunt face.
“Pieces?” he asked after a silence designed to increase Dorigen’s discomfort. “Shilmista has been, or soon will be, reclaimed by the elves, that much is true,” he admitted. “But by all reports their insignificant number has been halved—less than a hundred of them remain to defend the forest.”
“We lost more than a thousand,” Dorigen snapped. “And thousands more have fled our dominion, gone back to their mountain holes.”
“Where we can reclaim them,” Aballister assured her, “when the time is right.”
Dorigen fumed but remained silent. She brushed a bead of sweat from her crooked nose and again looked away. Sporting two broken hands, the woman felt vulnerable with both unpredictable Aballister and upstart Bogo Rath in the private room, to say nothing of Druzil, Aballister’s pet imp. That was one of the problems with working beside such devilish men, Dorigen reminded herself. She could never be certain when Aballister might decide he was better off without her.
“We still have three thousand soldiers—mostly human—at our immediate disposal,” Aballister went on. “The goblinoids will be brought back when we need them—after the winter, perhaps, when the season is favorable for an invasion.
“How many will we need?” he asked, more of Bogo than Dorigen. “Shilmista has but a shadow of its previous strength, and the Edificant Library, too, has been severely wounded. That leaves only Carradoon.” The tone of Aballister’s voice showed clearly how he felt about the farmers and fishermen of the small community on the banks of Impresk Lake.
“I’ll not deny that the library has been
wounded,” Dorigen replied, “but we really don’t know to what extent. You seem to have underestimated Shilmista as well. Must I remind you of our most recent defeat?”
“And must I remind you that it was you, not I, who presided over that defeat?” the older wizard growled, his dark-eyed gaze boring into Dorigen. “That it was you who fled the forest at the most critical stages of the battle?”
Seeing her cowed, Aballister again rocked back in his chair and calmed.
“I sympathize with your pain,” he said. “You have lost Tiennek. That must have been a terrible blow.”
Dorigen winced. She had expected the remark, but it stung her nonetheless. Tiennek, a barbarian warrior she had plucked from the northland and trained to serve as her consort, had replaced Aballister as her lover. Dorigen didn’t doubt for a moment the older wizard’s satisfaction upon hearing that the great warrior had been killed. A woman nearly two feet shorter than Tiennek and barely a third of his weight had done the deed. In reporting the incident, the imp Druzil had purposely downplayed the young woman’s prowess, Dorigen knew, just to fan the flames that had risen between the two wizards.
Dorigen wanted to fight back, wanted to shout in the wizard’s face that he could never understand the power of that young woman, Danica, the monk escort of Cadderly, and of all the enemies she had met in Shilmista. She looked at Druzil, who had been there beside her, but the imp covered his canine face with his leathery wings and made no move to support her.
“Wretched, cowardly creature,” Dorigen muttered. Since their return to Castle Trinity, Druzil had avoided contact with Dorigen. He held no loyalty to Aballister, she knew, except that Aballister was in control, and the prudent imp always preferred to be on the winning side.
“Enough of this bantering,” Aballister said. “Our plans have been delayed by some unexpected problems.”
“Like your own son,” Dorigen had to put in.
Aballister’s smile hinted that Dorigen might have overstepped her bounds. “My son,” the wizard echoed, “dear young Cadderly … Yes, Dorigen, he has proved the most unexpected and severe of our problems. Do you agree, Boygo?”
Dorigen looked to the youngest of Castle Trinity’s wizards, Bogo Rath, whom she and her mentor routinely called “Boygo.”
The young man narrowed his eyes at the insult, not that he hadn’t expected it. He was so very different from his two peers, and so often the butt of their jokes. He jerked his head back and forth, flipping his long, stringy brown hair over one ear, away from the side of his head that he kept shaved.
Dorigen, tiring of Bogo’s outrageous actions, almost growled at his ridiculous haircut.
“Your son has indeed proved to be quite a problem,” Bogo replied. “What else might we expect from the offspring of mighty Aballister? If young Cadderly must fight on the other side, then we would be wise to pay attention to him.”
“Young Cadderly,” Dorigen mumbled, her face locked in an expression of disgust. “Young Cadderly” had to be at least two or three years older than that upstart Bogo!
Aballister held up a small, bulging bag and shook it once to show the others that its thickness came from many coins—gold, surely. Dorigen understood the bag’s significance, understood what it would buy for Aballister, and for Bogo as well. Bogo had come from Westgate, a city hundreds of miles to the northeast, at the mouth of the Lake of Dragons. Westgate was notable as a bustling trade town, and it was known, too, for a band of assassins who were among the cruelest killers in Faerûn.
“Even your Night Masks will have a difficult time striking at our young scholar, whether he’s in Shilmista or has returned to the Edificant Library,” Dorigen asserted, if for no better reason than to take some of the bite out of Aballister’s icy demeanor concerning his son. For all that she hated Cadderly—he had broken her hands and stolen several magical items from her—Dorigen simply couldn’t believe Aballister’s viciousness toward his own son.
“He is not in Shilmista,” Bogo replied with a grin, his brown eyes flashing with excitement, “nor in the library.” Dorigen stared at Bogo, and her sudden interest obviously pleased the young wizard. “He is in Carradoon.”
“Rousing the garrison, no doubt,” Aballister added.
“How can you be certain?” Dorigen asked Bogo.
Bogo looked at Aballister, who shook the bag of gold once more. Its tinkling coins sent a shiver along Dorigen’s spine. Bogo’s connections in Westgate, his one claim to any prestige in Castle Trinity, were already on the scholar-priest’s trail.
Even though her hands continued to throb, Dorigen felt a twinge of pity for the young scholar.
“One problem at a time, dear Dorigen,” Aballister said, a thought he had iterated before, when he’d first told Dorigen of his plans for his son. Again the older wizard shook the bag of gold, and again a shiver coursed along Dorigen’s spine.
Elbereth and Danica sat atop Deny Ridge, a defensible position that the elves had taken as their base. Few of the People were about in the starry night, and there was no longer any danger demanding an alert garrison. Indeed, according to Hammadeen—and the dryad’s information had proven accurate since Cadderly had pressed her into service tendays earlier—no monsters were within ten miles of the ridge. It was peaceful and quiet, not the ring of swords or the cries of the dying to be heard.
“The wind grows chill,” Elbereth commented, offering Danica his traveling cloak. She accepted it and lay in the thick grass beside the elf, looking up to the countless stars and the few black forms of meandering clouds.
Elbereth’s soft chuckle led her to sit up once more. She followed the elf’s gaze to the base of the sloping hill. Squinting, she could just make out three forms—one elf and the other two obviously dwarves—darting in and out of the shadows along the tree line.
“Shayleigh?” Danica asked.
Elbereth nodded. “She and the dwarves have become great friends in the last couple tendays,” he noted. “Shayleigh admires their courage and is not ungrateful that they have remained to aid in our fight.”
“And you?” Danica asked.
Elbereth smiled as he recalled his first meeting with the dwarves, how he had come close to trading blows with Ivan. How long ago that seemed! Elbereth had been just a prince then, in disfavor with his father at a time when the forest was in grave peril.
“I, too, am not ungrateful,” he replied. “I will never forget the debt I owe those dwarves … and you.” He locked stares with Danica then, his silver eyes catching the woman’s rich brown orbs in an unblinking gaze.
Their faces lingered, barely an inch apart.
Danica cleared her throat and turned away. “The fighting nears its end,” she remarked, stealing the romance from the moment. Elbereth knew at once where her comment would lead, for she had been hinting at her plans for several days.
“We will be ridding Shilmista of the goblin vermin for the rest of the season,” the elf king said. “And I fear that a new attack might begin in the spring, after the mountain trails are clear.”
“Hopefully by then Carradoon and the library will be roused,” Danica offered.
“Will you help with that?”
Danica looked back down the grassy slope. The three shadowy forms steadily approached.
“Never did care much for trees,” they heard Ivan complain as he rubbed at his nose.
“I would have thought that one as short as a dwarf would be able to avoid low-hanging branches,” Shayleigh replied with a melodic laugh.
“Hee hee hee,” added Pikel, prudently swerving out of Ivan’s backhanded reach.
“The time has come for Ivan and Pikel and I to depart,” Danica blurted, hating the words but having to say them.
Elbereth’s smile was gone in an instant. He looked long and hard at the woman but did not respond.
“Perhaps we should have left for the library with Avery and Rufo,” Danica went on.
“Or perhaps you should trust them to handle affairs at the library, and i
n Carradoon,” Elbereth put in. “You could remain here, all three of you. The invitation is open, and I assure you that Shilmista takes on an entirely new beauty under winter’s white blanket.”
“I don’t doubt that,” Danica replied, “but I fear I must go. There’s—”
“Cadderly,” Elbereth interrupted, smiling despite his disappointment.
Danica didn’t reply, wasn’t even sure how she felt. She looked back to the slope and watched Ivan and Pikel tried to make their way to where Shayleigh waited. They almost made it, but Ivan must have muttered something that offended his brother, for Pikel sprang upon him and the two rolled down once more. The elf maiden threw up her hands in surrender and sprinted the rest of the way to Danica and Elbereth.
As soon as she joined the two, her smile was replaced by a curious expression. She studied Danica’s face for a moment then said, “You are leaving.”
Danica could hardly look her in the face.
“When?” Shayleigh asked, her tone still calm and composed.
“Soon—perhaps tomorrow,” Danica replied.
Shayleigh spent a long moment considering the bittersweet news. Danica was leaving after the victory, with the forest secured. She could return, or the elves could go to her, freely, with little threat from goblins and orcs.
“I applaud your choice,” Shayleigh said, and Danica turned to regard her, caught off guard by the elf’s approval.
“The fight here is won, at least for now,” the elf maiden continued, gaily spinning a turn in the clean, crisp evening air. “You have many duties to attend to, and of course, you have your studies back at the Edificant Library.”
“I expect that Ivan and Pikel will accompany me,” Danica replied. “They also have duties at the library.”
Shayleigh nodded and looked back to the slope, where the brothers were trying a third time to get all the way up. At that angle, in the clear starlight, Danica could see the sincere admiration in the elf maiden’s violet eyes. Danica understood that Shayleigh had put on her carefree attitude because she believed Danica’s decision was the right one, not because she was pleased that Danica and the dwarves would soon depart.