Elfsorrow

'Stand down!' he ordered.

He was already hurrying towards the path when the figure stumbled out of the forest, ran a few unsteady steps across the paving, slipped and sprawled on its damp surface.

'Erys!' Yron shouted, running to the fallen figure. 'Get out here now. Bring me some light. Move!'

He slithered to a halt by the man, who was heaving in great ragged breaths, coughing and shivering the length of his body. He knelt and put a hand on the man's shoulder.

'Calm down, Pavol. You're safe now,' he said.

Pavol tried to push himself up on his hands, his head shaking violently.

'No,' he managed through a clotted throat. 'No.'

'Shhh,' said Yron. 'You're scared and hurt. Take your time. Come on, let me help you over.'

Using his knees as a pivot, Yron turned the young man over so his head lay in the officer's lap. One of his men brought over a lantern and the two of them gasped.

Pavol's face was shredded. The left side had been clawed away, taking his eye with it. Bite marks covered his neck, the punctures oozing blood, and there was a flap of skin hanging from a deep gash in his forehead that had poured blood over his face. His clothes were ripped and torn in a dozen places, his right hand was mangled and broken and across his stomach more claws had gouged their paths.

'Erys!' yelled Yron. 'Where is that bloody mage?'

'Here.' Erys ran up with Ben-Foran.

'Get to work. See what you can do, then we'll get him inside,' said Yron. 'Ben, remember those leaves I showed you earlier? Not the snakebite ones, the others. Take one man and a lantern and collect as many as you can. Get them in a pot and boil them. Make a drink but don't throw away the paste you have left behind. All right?'

'Yes, Captain.' Calling a man to him, Ben-Foran hurried away.

'Erys?' asked Yron.

The mage shook his head. 'It's bad, Captain. He's lost a great deal of blood and he'll be infected from all these gashes and cuts. There's nothing I can do about the eye but we should wrap him up. He's in shock. I'll put him to sleep.'

'N-n-no,' stammered Pavol. 'Let me sp-speak.'

'Later,' said Yron, smoothing back his blood-matted hair. 'You have to rest now.'

Pavol reached round and gripped Yron's arm fiercely, his single eye boring into his captain's face.

'They killed all of them,' he said, each word dragging from his mouth. 'The camp. All dead.'

Yron tensed and put a hand out to stop Erys casting.

'Wait,' he said. 'Pavol, carefully now, tell me what you saw.'

'Something,' said Pavol, and he coughed blood which sprayed on to Yron's face, 'moved so quickly. I should have helped. But I just watched.'

'What were they? What did they do?' urged Yron. 'Animals?'

'No. Elves. Just one or two. I just watched them all die.' The young man's eye filled with tears and he blinked furiously. An ooze of gore slipped from his ruined orb. 'Then I crept away and ran like a coward.'

Yron's heart was thumping in his chest. What he feared most was about to come to pass.

'You're not a coward,' he said. 'You did exactly the right thing. There was nothing you could have done for our people. But you might just have saved all our lives.' He looked down at Pavol's torn body. 'What did this? Jaguar?'

'Panther,' he rasped. 'Big. Black. Stalked me for hours.'

'A panther? But there are no…' Yron's voiced trailed away.

'Attacked me only once. And those eyes. It looked at me. Almost… human.'

'And it left you for dead?' Erys's curiosity got the better of him.

'Yes,' said Yron, his eyes scanning the dark cloak of the rainforest all around them.

'Why?'

'Because, Erys, that panther was not hunting for meat.' Yron rubbed his mouth and chin. At least it couldn't get any worse now.

'Please,' said Pavol. 'It hurts.'

'I know, son. We'll save you.'

But Pavol was suddenly dead. Yron laid his head gently on the ground and turned to Erys, his mind racing with possibilities, a shiver of fear running down his back.

'How's your stamina, you and Stenys?'

'Pretty good. Your herbs do a better job than I'd thought.'

'Right. Get yourselves linked and commune with the ships. I want the reserve out now; I want them to establish defensive positions in front of the estuary entrance. Tell them we're coming in teams. Get to it.'

'That panther-' began Erys.

'Later. Go.' Yron turned away. 'Ben-Foran!'

His lieutenant ran over. 'Sir.'

'I want to see all the squads with cargo ready to go now. Any that aren't ready, get them so. That includes the two with Erys and Stenys. They're leaving now and there'll be a change to their routes. We've just run out of time here.'

'And the rest of us?'

Yron shrugged. 'We get to buy them as much time as we can before we die.' Rebraal stumbled again and crashed heavily into the trunk of a tree, only managing to turn his body at the last moment to avoid Mercuun taking the damage. His shoulder sang out its agony and a cry forced itself out of his mouth. He rested a few moments, panting hard, his pulse pounding in his head, his body soaked in sweat and his limbs shaking with exhaustion.

He had no idea how far he had travelled or for how long. All he knew was that it wasn't far enough and that now, with night full around him, he was fading fast. His eyesight wandered in and out of focus and every step was a trial. He felt constantly nauseous and faint and he was waiting for his body to give out and for Tual to offer him up to the rainforest. Him and Mercuun.

He pushed himself away from the tree and plodded deliberately on, seeking vegetation he could force through without a blade as he had done all day. It added to the distance but there was no way he could do otherwise. Once he put Mercuun down, he didn't think he'd have the strength to lift him again.

He ducked under a stand of broad leaves, his vision swimming again, the colours he could usually pick out so cleanly in the dark all washed out and running together. Again he was forced to stop while his head cleared, each time taking longer than the last, and it was then that he heard what he had most feared. The quiet padding of feet. The almost imperceptible movement of vegetation at odds with the ambient breeze. The careful placement and sinuous movement that spoke of the consummate hunter. Tual had spoken her wishes.

Rebraal was being stalked.

Shivering, his body wracked with the fever pumped around his bloodstream by his exertions, he forced himself on. Mercuun, unconscious for much of the time and incoherent the rest, was a draining weight in his arms. Rebraal knew he hadn't the strength to fight the jaguar, if such it was, and his only hope was to carry on, hoping and praying the animal was diverted from its hunt.

He upped his pace, his body screaming at him to stop, his mind fogging and new blood seeping from the wound in his shoulder. He tripped across a root, dropped to his haunches under a low branch and drove himself upright, gasping. He broke into a trot, imagining the jaguar's footsteps increasing, the shoulders moving under the sleek fur, the eyes piercing the night and the nostrils twitching as they caught the scent of blood.

Behind him, he heard the crack of a twig and the rustle of leaves. He ran, praying for respite or a hiding place. Mercuun bounced in his arms and moaned in his unconsciousness, the pain of his broken limbs finding him even there. Liana and vine slapped Rebraal's face as he went; he twisted this way and that, jumped more roots, slid down a slight slope and forced himself up its other side. He dared not look behind him.

The sounds of the rainforest filled his ears, their volume increasing tenfold, twentyfold, as he ran. The croaking of frogs, the rasping of lizards, the scurrying of ants and spiders. He could hear it all so loud, mingled with his ragged breath as he fought for air. He heaved them over the lip of another incline, not stopping, rushing onwards, splashing through a stream, his skull echoing painfully to the awful noise that built and built.