The cramp in her leg was getting worse. Nianki struggled to keep her head up. A few paces in, it was shallow enough for her to stand on her good leg, but the waves kept pounding her. One especially large roller lifted her off her feet and sent her tumbling onto the beach. In a flash, she was up and heading for the trees as fast as her hopping gait could take her. The strangers shouted to each other in their unknown tongue.
Leg burning with every stride, Nianki gritted her teeth and kept going. Halfway to the dunes her right leg seized completely, and she fell. Immediately she was surrounded by slender hoofed legs.
Coiling her good leg beneath her, Nianki sprang up so suddenly that one of the animals shied away, almost tossing its rider to the sand. Before Nianki could exploit this, a heavy net was thrown over her, and she went down again, tangled in its folds.
Somebody hit her with a wooden spear shaft. More blows followed until a clear, authoritative voice rang out and the beating stopped. Several pairs of hands dragged Nianki upright and pulled the net away from her head. Quaking with rage, Nianki found herself staring at a ring of spear points.
“Be still, and no one will hurt you,” said a calm voice.
The speaker was sitting atop one of the animals. By his age and demeanor, she decided he was the father of the other louts.
“Let me go!” she demanded angrily. “Why do you attack me?”
The speaker said something to his companions in their incomprehensible tongue. They laughed. Nianki worked her hands through the folds of the net and with a few furious shakes, managed to loosen it enough that it fell to the sand around her. Alarmed, the spear carriers shoved their weapons close to her face and chest.
The speaker raised his hand and bade them stop. In the midst of her peril, Nianki was struck by the fact the man’s hands were covered in supple hide, cleverly made to encase each finger separately. His eyes were remarkably large and an arresting shade, bright blue like the sky. He mopped his brow with his sleeve and threw back the hood from his head. Nianki gaped. His ears were bizarrely malformed — tall and pointed. There was no doubt in her mind now. These must be the ones the family had called the Good People. Trouble was, she didn’t think they were people at all.
“Do you understand me?” he asked. She nodded curtly. “My name is Balif, of House Protector, first warrior of Silvanos, lord of all the elves.”
“Words, words, words,” Nianki muttered.
“None of which mean anything to you, I know. Do you have a name?” She maintained a sullen silence. He asked again just as genially.
“Nianki,” she said, biting her name into three hard syllables. “You are the Good People.”
Her words amused Balif, and he said something in his own language to his comrades. They laughed again and she realized he must have translated the phrase for them. To Nianki he said, “Is that what humans call elves?”
“I don’t know ‘elves,’ but you’re the only Good People I’ve met.” She began to feel chilled, sitting naked on the sand. “Well, what will you do? Ravish me, or just take my head as trophy?”
Balif actually looked startled. His sky-colored eyes widened in shock. “Nothing of the sort. Give the human her clothes.”
Sandy buckskins were thrown at her feet. Nianki stood up under the strangers’ gaze, and donned her clothes. One or two comments were made, and she was just as glad not to know what had been said.
Hardly had she cinched the bone buckle around her waist when her arms were seized and a wide collar clamped around her neck. It was cold, hard, and smooth, and try as she might, she couldn’t loosen it. Her captors tied a strong cord to a ring on the front of the collar.
“What is this?” she yelled, pulling at the collar. “What are you doing?”
“I am here on a mission for my lord,” said Balif, turning his beast away. “You will not be harmed if you come peacefully.”
He spoke in his own language, and the elves on foot formed themselves two by two and walked in step back up the beach. The other riding elf was given the end of Nianki’s tether, which he tied to his wrist. He and Balif bumped their heels against their animals’ flanks and rode on.
Nianki dug in her own heels. Her determination, though powerful, was no match for the strength of the long-legged beasts. She was jerked abruptly forward and had to flail about wildly to regain her balance.
She was forced to jog to keep up. The cramp had eased, but her right leg was still sore. Cursing loud and long, she struggled to maintain the pace. If she slowed or fell, she knew she’d be dragged.
“Where are you taking me?” she demanded breathlessly.
“To our camp, a few leagues from here,” Balif replied.
“What’s ‘league’?”
“Five thousand, one hundred paces,” he said, which was no help at all. Nianki had never had cause to count much above a hundred, so the number meant no more to her than the strange word.
“Why are you doing this?” she said, after abandoning the puzzle of distance. “I’ve done no wrong to you.”
“You wouldn’t understand if I told you.”
His easy superiority enraged her. “Yes, I would!”
He pulled back on the lines tied to his animal’s mouth. It stopped immediately. The walking elves halted as well. Nianki decided this Balif must be a stern father. Men and animals alike obeyed him rigidly.
“This territory has been claimed by my lord Silvanos. It will be added to his realm. You wandering barbarians will be expelled from the land east of the Kharolis River, in order that elves can be settled here. Those humans resisting us will be killed. Those captured, like yourself, will be taken to a camp north of here and held until it is determined whether or not you carry lethal diseases. If you’re fit, you’ll be marched to the central plain and released, on condition you never return to our land.”
She understood the words, but the ideas behind them made no sense to her. Land was what you lived on. It wasn’t a thing you could grasp in your hand, like a stone or a spear. How could anyone claim it? The one thing she did clearly comprehend was that they intended to hold her against her will.
The why of it eluded her. Among her people it sometimes happened that men took women as mates against their wills, or a dishonest hunter might covet and take another’s weapon, but this capture baffled her. She had nothing of value the elves could covet, and Balif’s reaction when she’d asked if he intended to ravish her dispelled any notion of lust on his part. For all she knew, Good People weren’t even made like men and women under their clothes.
Still, she had no intention of being led around on a string. Surrounded by the elves with their animals and spears, there wasn’t much she could do at the moment, but she wagered that even the Good People had to sleep sometime.
As she jogged along between the animals, she passed the time by studying her captors. The old man’s words were true and false. The elves — she decided not to think of them as “Good People” any longer — weren’t ugly, though their slenderness and light coloring made them unlike any plainsmen she’d ever seen. They were abundantly clever, with their smooth clothes, bright adornments, and tame animals, but Nianki saw no sign of special spirit-power in them. The spear carriers sweated in the heat as they tramped along behind the riders. They obviously feared her strength and fleetness if they resorted to a collar and cord to restrain her. No, they were strong in cleverness, but not in spirit-power, and that meant she could fight them.
The morning was gone when they reached a shallow valley lined with heavy scrub. On the other side, a dense forest loomed. The ancient trees grew so large and close that it looked like nothing larger than a fox could enter. The elves seemed pleased to see the forest, and Nianki deduced they lived within it.