“Back to the woods,” said Rega, riding up beside Paithan. “It’s the only way. We know the paths. This time, we really do,” she added, flushing slightly.
“Smuggler’s Road,” slurred Roland, weaving in his saddle. “Yes, we know them.” Paithan couldn’t move. He sat, staring. “All these humans, heading for Equilan. What will we do?”
“Paithan?”
“Yes, I’m coming.”
They left the broad trails of the moss plains, taking to the jungle traits.
“Smuggler’s Road” was thin and twisting, difficult to traverse, but far less crowded. Paithan forced them to ride hard, driving their animals, driving themselves—cycle after cycle—until they dropped from exhaustion. Then they slept, often too tired to eat. The elf allowed them only a few hours before he had them up and traveling again. They met other people on the trails—people like themselves, living on society’s fringes, who were well acquainted with these dark and hidden paths. They, too, were fleeing sorinth. One of these, a human, stumbled into their camp, three cycles into their journey.
“Water,” he said, and collapsed.
Paithan fetched water. Rega lifted the man’s head, and held the drinking gourd to his lips. He was middle-aged, his face gray with fatigue.
“That’s better. Thanks.”
Some color returned to the sagging cheeks. He was able to sit up on his own, and let his head sink between his knees, drawing deep breaths.
“You’re welcome to rest here with us,” offered Rega. “Share our food.”
“Rest!” The man lifted his head, gazed at them in astonishment. Then he glanced around the jungle, shivering, and staggered to his feet. “No rest!” he muttered. “They’re behind me! Right behind me!”
His fear was palpable. Paithan jumped up, regarding the man in alarm.
“How far behind you?”
The man was fleeing the campsite, taking to the trail on legs that could barely support him. Paithan ran after him, caught hold of his arm.
“How far?”
The man shook his head. “A cycle. Not more.”
“A cycle!” Rega sucked her breath through her teeth.
“The man’s crazed,” muttered Roland. “You can’t believe him.”
“Griffith destroyed! Terncia burning! Lord Reginald, dead! I know.” The man ran a trembling hand through, grizzled hair. “I was one of his knights!” Looking at the man more closely, they could see he was dressed in the quilted cotton undergarments worn beneath the tyro shell armor. It was no wonder they had not recognized it earlier. The fabric was ripped and stained with blood, hanging from the man’s body in tattered, filthy fragments.
“I got rid of it,” he said, his hands plucking at the cloth covering his chest. “The armor. It was too heavy and it didn’t do any good. They died in it. The fiends caught them and crushed them … arms wrapping around them. The armor cracked, blood … came out from between. Bones stuck through … and the screams …”
“Blessed Thillia!” Roland was white, shuddering.
“Shut him up!” Rega snapped at Paithan.
No one noticed Drugar, sitting alone as he always did, the slight, strange smile hidden by his beard.
“Do you know how I escaped?” The man clutched Paithan by the front of his tunic. The elf, glancing down, saw the man’s hand was dappled with splotches of reddish brown. “The others ran. I was … too scared! I was scared stiff!” The knight began to giggle. “Scared stiff! Couldn’t move. And the giants went right by me! Isn’t that funny! Scared stiff!” His laughter was shrill, unnerving. It ended in a choked cough. Roughly, he shoved Paithan backward, away from him.
“But now I can run. I’ve been running … three cycles. Not stop. Can’t stop.” He took a step forward, paused, turned and glared at them with red-rimmed, wild eyes. “They were supposed to come back!” he said angrily. “Have you seen them?”
“Who?”
“Supposed to come back and help us! Cowards. Bunch of damn, good-for-nothing cowards. Like me!” The knight laughed again. Shaking his head, he lurched off into the jungle.
“Who the hell’s he talking about?” Roland asked.
“I don’t know.” Rega began packing their equipment, throwing food into leather pouches. “And I don’t care. Crazed or not, he’s right about one thing. We’ve got to keep moving.”
The dwarfs rich bass voice rose in song. “You see,” said Drugar, when the verse ended, “I have learned it.”
“You’re right,” said Roland, making no move to help pack. He sat on the ground, arms dangling listlessly between his knees. “That’s who the knight meant. And they didn’t come back. Why not?” He looked up, angry. “Why didn’t they? Everything they worked for—destroyed! Our world! Gone! Why? What’s the sense?”
Rega’s lips tightened, she was flinging packs onto the cargan. “It was only a legend. No one really believed it.”
“Yeah,” muttered Roland. “Nobody believed in the tytans either.” Rega’s hands, tugging at the straps, started to shake. She lowered her head onto the cargan’s flank, gripping the leather hard, until it hurt, willing herself not to cry, not to give way.
Paithan’s hand closed over hers.
“Don’t!” she said in a fierce tone, elbowing him aside. She lifted her head, shook her hair around her face, and gave the strap a vicious tug. “Go on. Leave me alone.” Surreptitiously, when the elf wasn’t looking, she wiped her hand across wet cheeks.
They started on their way, disheartened, dispirited, fear driving them on. They had traversed only a few miles when they came upon the knight, lying face down across the trail.
Paithan slid from the cargan, knelt beside the man, his hand on the knight’s neck.
“Dead.”
They traveled two more cycles, pressing the weary cargans to their limit. Now, when they halted, they didn’t unpack, but slept on the ground, the reins of the cargans wrapped around their wrists. They were giddy with exhaustion and lack of food. Their meager supplies had run out and they dared not take time to hunt. They talked little, saving their breath, riding with slumped shoulders, bent heads. The only thing that could rouse them was a strange sound behind them.
The breaking of a tree limb would cause them to jerk up, swinging around fearfully in the saddle, peering into the shadows. Often the humans and the elf fell asleep while riding, swaying in the saddle until they slumped sideways and came to themselves with a start. The dwarf, riding last, bringing up the rear, watched all with a smile.
Paithan marveled at the dwarf, even as the elf’s uneasiness over Drugar grew. He never appeared fatigued; he often volunteered to keep watch while the others slept.
Paithan woke from terrifying dreams in which he imagined Drugar, dagger in hand, slipping up on him as he slept. Starting awake, the elf always found Drugar sitting patiently beneath a tree, hands folded across the beard that fell in long curls over his stomach. Paithan might have laughed at his fear. After all, the dwarf had saved their lives. Looking back at Drugar, riding behind them, or glancing at him during the few times they stopped to rest, the elf saw the gleam in the watchful black eyes, eyes that seemed to be always waiting, and Paithan’s laughter died on his lips.
Paithan was thinking about the dwarf, wondering what drove him, what terrible fuel kept such a fire burning, when Rega’s shout roused him from his bleak reverie.
“The ferry!” She pointed at a crude sign, tacked up onto a tree trunk. “The trail ends here. We have to go back to the—”
Her voice was cut off by a horrible sound, a wail that rose from hundreds of throats, a collective scream.