Valsun took it, but his eyes were wide, stunned.
Darric turned and stomped out of camp.
“Valsun,” said Mandan. “You can’t let him do this.”
Valsun looked to Hweilan. “We’ll talk to him.”
“You do that,” said Hweilan, then looked at Mandan and Jaden. “All of you. Go talk to him. But walk while you talk. Now.”
She put one hand on the dagger at her waist. Uncle padded to her side and growled.
Vurgrim stood. “You heard. Go.”
Trembling and looking like a faithful hound who had just been whipped by his master, Valsun followed after Darric.
Mandan looked to Rhan, then Vurgrim, and finally down at Urlun. “Come.”
He grabbed his own pack, slung his club over his shoulder, and followed his companions.
Jaden slammed his short sword back into the scabbard, shouldered his pack, and gave Hweilan a hesitant smile. “Said I wasn’t walking back by myself. Looks like I’m not by myself anymore.” He gave her a slight bow. “Good luck, lady.”
With that, he followed after Mandan.
Urlun was still sitting, startled. He looked after them, then at the hobgoblins.
“Time to choose, boy,” said Vurgrim.
Urlun grabbed his axe and his pack, and ran after the Damarans.
“And you?” Vurgrim called to Hratt. “You going to run off with your new friends?”
Hratt was still sitting with his head back against the bole of a tree. His eyes were closed, but his hand lay curved around the hilt of the sword that lay beside him. He opened his eyes and sat up. “I serve the Razor Heart,” he said.
The hobgoblins laughed. “And I sup with Shar!” one of them said, bringing more laughter.
The warriors stood and began to gather their own things.
Flet walked up to Hweilan and spoke, his voice low. “Should I take my archers after those five? We don’t want any surprises at our backs.”
“Let them go,” said Hweilan. “You’re going to need all your arrows for what’s in front.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
They stayed in the copse until well past midday. The hobgoblins were used to sleeping in the daylight anyway, and they needed to wait to make sure the other attack parties were in place. While the warriors snored, wrapped up in their cloaks, Hweilan sat with her back to a tree, her mind racing. She could not sleep. Not with the feeling of her enemy so close.
When at last the sun began its downward descent and the shadows in the wood lengthened, Hweilan roused Rhan.
“It’s time.”
Jagun Ghen sat in the middle of the pact circle. His eyes were closed, though for once the harsh sunlight on his skin gave him no pain. His brothers had carved the circle in the stone where the altar had once stood, before his brothers hacked it up and threw it off the cliff.
The circle … how fitting. It was here that his first brother had come into the world. And it was here that he would take the next step to transcendence.
The bleak, rocky shelf on which he sat overlooked the bulk of the ruined fortress. And the battered wall behind him had once held elegant runes and symbols, all in praise of Torm, the Loyal Fury. All gone, torn away. Soon, these people would learn the meaning of true fury.
He could feel the growing power in the circle, like the first trickles of water seeping through the cracks in the dam. Soon, he promised himself.
He could feel her. So close, he could almost taste her on the air.
A shudder passed through him.
His brothers felt it, too.
“What is it, lord?”
“She comes. At last.”
Now that they were back in her country, Hweilan took the lead. Something was happening in Highwatch. The steady beat in her mind had not grown any stronger, so she knew no danger was coming at them, but she could sense a change in the world around her. It was as if Jagun Ghen were thrashing in the middle of a dark pool, and Hweilan sat at the edge, feeling the ripples. But she didn’t know what it was. And so she strung her bow, put one of the hrayeh-etched arrows to the string, and donned her bone mask.
Hweilan led the hobgoblins along the saddle of the hill, taking the high paths. On the heights above and to their left lay the Damaran tombs where her father’s body rested. There, she found the path that snaked around the shoulder of the mountain and into the deeper woods. Throughout Narfell and the foothills, summer was well underway. The snows were melting, the pines had green buds, and the grasses were enjoying their few weeks of green. Damaran land had once been healthier than the woods where they had spent the night. But a blight had since settled in here. The pine and spruce had turned a sickly gray or brown, and many of the trees were shedding their needles. The moss on the barks had blackened and curled, giving off a foul reek when stepped on.
Hweilan could sense the tension in the hobgoblins. Vurgrim had a permanent sneer twisting his face and baring his sharp teeth. His one good ear stood out erect and twitched at every sound.
At the bend in the path where the trees thinned, Hweilan stopped. The sight almost overwhelmed her. From here, they had an unobstructed view of Nar-sek Qu’istrade, the distant cliff walls, and Highwatch itself-the charred husk of Kistrad clinging to its feet. The last time she stood here, thousands of Nar filled the valley and flames ran through Kistrad. Now, there was not so much as a dog roaming the streets or even a wisp of smoke from a torch. The valley where large herds of horses and sheep had once roamed over the grass was barren, save for the remains of a few ragged tents. All was still, yet Hweilan could feel a will fixed upon her. Not the same as being watched exactly, but she knew she held Jagun Ghen’s attention, just as he held hers. He wasn’t deep in the fortress, as she might have expected, but on the heights above it where the Knights had once held their most sacred rites.
She turned and faced Vurgrim, who stared down at the landscape with his warriors. They had long known of and feared this place, but none of them had ever been so close.
“The others are in place?” she said.
“They should be,” said Vurgrim, still not looking up, “if Maaqua kept her word.”
Hweilan looked to Rhan, but his face was expressionless.
“This is where we part,” she said.
Vurgrim tore his gaze off the view and blinked at her. “Eh? What say you? We are zugruuk. We came to fight, not to walk you home.”
His warriors mumbled their agreement, but none shouted out. Something about the fortress before them seemed to demand quiet. But even Rhan looked at her with a disapproving scowl.
“You’ll get your fight,” said Hweilan. “But unless you do what I say, you’ll die fighting. Wouldn’t you rather enjoy a fine slaughter, then go back home as heroes?”
Vurgrim scowled, looked to his warriors, then said. “I’m listening.”
“That demon down there can sense me coming. Anyone going with me will have a big target painted on them.”
Vurgrim snorted. “We don’t fear that.”
“I know you won’t flinch when there’s killing to do. But we are going into a trap. Let me spring the trap, then-”
“We trap the trapper,” said Flet. He smiled. “I like it.”
Hweilan checked the position of the sun again. Just above the western peaks. Down in the valleys and the lower regions of the fortress, shadows were already lengthening.
She looked to Flet. “It’s time. Do it.”
Flet reached into one of his quivers and withdrew a long bundle, an arrow wrapped in tight lambskin. He broke the knots of string with his teeth and unwrapped it. It was like no arrow Hweilan had ever seen. The fletching was not feathers but the membrane from a bat’s wing, and they curved a full hand span down the length of the shaft. The arrow had no head, but instead a small jewel had been fixed there, and it sparkled with a light all its own.