He cocked an ear and listened hard, trying to gain a sense of the potential threat. The noise of the forest surrounded him, the heat stifling even in the hours before dawn. A dozen species of birds called mating or warning, monkeys screeched and greeted, their progress through the canopy marked by the rustle and crack of branches. Myriad insects buzzed, vibrated and rasped and the growl of a wildcat punctuated the pre-dawn cacophony.
In every way but one, it was as every other night Rebraal could remember. This night though, the accent of the warnings was different. There was a change in the atmosphere and every creature in the forest felt it. Strangers. Close and dead ahead.
The clicking of a brown tree frog filtered down from one of the platforms. Rebraal looked up. Rourke signalled eight strangers approaching in single file; warriors and mages hacking a path to Aryndeneth. They were not pilgrims. No pilgrims were due until after the rainy season and that was fifty days away. Rebraal nodded, put fingers to his eyes and drew another across his throat. Whoever they were, they could not be allowed to escape with word of the location.
He snapped his fingers twice and heard Erin'heth and Sheth'erei move up on his left. SpellShields were deployed and he went forward, sensing Mercuun matching his pace. The two warriors made no sound, the mages behind them moving only to keep them within the shields. Glancing at the platforms suspended thirty feet into the trees bordering the apron, Rebraal saw the trio of archers tracking targets. From the angle of the bows, they were close, perhaps fifty yards away, no more. He stopped, hand up.
The blundering of the strangers was easily audible now and the forest around them was quietening. He waved behind him with his left arm, pointing up to send Erin'heth ahead to shield the platform. He drew his slender, quick blade, holding it in his right hand. With his left, he reached across and unclasped the pouch of jaqrui throwing crescents on his belt.
Now he paced forward again, acute eyes narrowing, seeing movement in the darkness ahead. The strangers were carrying no light but that wouldn't hide them. He could hear the regular hack of blades on vegetation, the cracking of twigs underfoot and the odd snatch of speech. No doubt they had been told that noise would deter predators in the rainforest. And so it was but with one particularly deadly exception.
The strangers would never set eyes on the temple. Rebraal called the peculiar wail of the tawny buzzard and began to run, footsteps ghosting over the edge of the apron and on into the forest.
Arrows whipped away from the platforms. Strangled cries came from the strangers and he heard the sound of bodies hitting the forest floor. Another volley thrummed into the dark. Orders and shouts snapped out and the surviving strangers scattered. Rebraal gripped a jaqrui and ducked low as he entered the thick growth, flicking it out backhand when he saw the face of a crouching warrior peering over a fallen log. Shaped like a miniature sickle with a two-fingered grip at one end, the razor-sharp double-edged crescent whispered as it flew, small enough to find gaps in the hanging vines.
The warrior might have heard it but he didn't see it coming, looking straight at its trajectory as it struck him in the forehead just above his eyebrows. He screamed and fell back. Rebraal tore on, flitting through gaps in the lush flora, circling the survivors with Mercuun appearing again in his vision to complete the pincer.
He could see a pair of mages, one crouched, one standing, staring blankly up into the canopy, searching for the platforms. One had prepared a spell, one had cast, his face creased in concentration. Presumably a HardShield to beat away more arrows.
Rebraal stormed in, the standing mage seeing him only when he was within five yards. He leapt the crouched mage and struck his companion with both feet in the chest, the man going down before he had a chance to cast. Rebraal landed astride him, stabbed down into his heart, turned and lashed his sword into the throat of the other, who had turned to stare at their assailant. Another arrow punched through the foliage and a man gurgled and fell close to Rebraal's right side. He heard the clash of steel, the thud of a sword on leather armour and a cry of pain, quickly cut off.
'That's all of them,' came a voice from a platform.
'Keep watching, Rourke,' acknowledged Rebraal. 'Good shooting. '
He checked for signs of life at his feet then moved away into the bush to retrieve his crescent. The warrior was still breathing but blood and brain oozed from the wound. Rebraal skewered his heart with his blade then placed a foot on the man's skull, leaning down to lever the crescent clear. He wiped it on his victim's shirt before returning it to the pouch, which he snapped shut.
He felt Mercuun at his shoulder.
'What shall we do with them?'
Rebraal looked into his friend's dark-skinned face, saw the brow above the angled oval eyes furrowed and his leaf-shaped, gently pointed ears pricking as he tried to come to terms with what had just happened.
'Get Skiriin and take them away from the path they made, over to the clearing north. Keep anything useful, shred their clothes and leave the bodies. The forest will take care of them.'
'Rebraal?' There was an edge to Mercuun's voice.
'Yes, Meru?'
'Who were they and how did they know where to find us?' Rebraal ran a hand through his long black hair. 'Two very good questions,' he said. 'They're from Balaia certainly, but beyond that who can tell? I'm going to track back along their route in the morning, see if I can find anything. Meantime we have to keep vigilant.'
'They won't be the last, will they?' said Mercuun.
'No,' said Rebraal. 'If I had my guess I'd say they were picking the path here. They were travelling too light for anything else. There will be more to come, and they might not be far away. We may not have much time.'
Rebraal looked deep into Mercuun's face and saw the worry that he felt himself. It was bad enough that these men from the northern continent had managed to gain information no man should. But they had also evaded those that fed disinformation and the TaiGethen who killed those who persisted. It was an immense rainforest but the outer circle and town dwellers of his kind had kept the uninvited from Aryndeneth for more than four hundred years.
He clicked his tongue, a decision made. 'Meru, I want you to get the word around. Start at sunrise. We can't wait for the relief. Every available Al-Arynaar must get here as quickly as they can. And the outer circles must press into the north. I want word as far north as Tolt-Anoor, west to Ysundeneth and east to Heri-Benaar. Take supplies for two days, start the message rolling and get back here.'
Mercuun nodded.
Rebraal walked back towards the temple and took in its camouflaged majesty, a sight of which he would never tire. He knelt on the apron and offered a prayer to Yniss, the God of harmony, to protect them all. When he was done, he leant his hands on his thighs and listened again to the forest.
It at least was resting easy once again. Hirad Coldheart shifted his back where he leant against Sha-Kaan's broad neck, feeling the scales chafing him through his wool shirt. He got a taste of the dragon's strong sour oil and wood smell as he did so and was glad they sat in the open air. The Great Kaan's enormous body, more than one hundred and twenty feet from snout to tail, was stretched out along a contour of the slope on which they rested, overlooking the tarnished idyll of Herendeneth.