Ashtaway glided through the roughly wooded countryside. The Kagonesti looked upward, hazel eyes sweeping the surrounding crests of tree-lined bluffs and broken, rocky cliffs of granite bracketing these lower valleys. His skin, patterned in dark tattoos, blended with the underbrush even as he moved-he was an intrinsic part of the forest. Yet, for three days he'd been on the hunting trail, and it galled him now that he was still empty-handed as his steps carried him back toward the village.
Indeed, these valleys showed not the slightest promise of game-no tracks in the muddy trails, no padded bower where a doe and her fawn had bedded down, or even any sign of grazing on the supple spring shoots that began to green the woodlands. Shaldng his head in frustration, Ash decided to climb, hoping that the increased vistas along the rippling bluff line might give him the chance to see something, anything, that could offer a suggestion as to the whereabouts of game.
The rocky heights, in the foothills of the Khalkist Mountains, had been the hunting grounds of his tribe since the time, more than two thousand years ago, when the Kagon- esti had split from the elves of Silvanesti in the Great Sundering. The warriors of the wild elves tattooed their skin in black ink, as a sign of their permanent removal from the ranks of their civilized kinfolk. Ash bore a vivid imprint of an oak leaf enclosing his left eye, while on his chest was emblazoned the wide-winged silhouette of a hawk. He carried several weapons, including the strung bow in his hands, with a quiver of arrows and a long-hafted axe slung over his shoulder.
The wild elf reached the mouth of a scree-filled ravine and turned upward, grasping branches with his wiry hands, unerringly finding with his moccasins those rocks set securely in the midst of the loose gravel. Breathing easily, his longbow and quiver resting on his back, Ashtaway glided toward the ridge with the same fluidity of movement that had carried him through the forest shadows.
A wall of rock, perhaps thirty feet high, blocked the crest of the gully, and here the elf's progress slowed-but only slightly. Without halting, Ash started up the sheer face, picking his route as he went, seizing with his fingertips narrow holds, or perching his toes on outcrops barely a fraction of an inch wide.
Reaching the top, he jogged through open woodland, but despite the increasing vistas surrounding him, he saw no indication of any game worth his sleek, steel-tipped arrows. He passed through a sun-speckled meadow, barren of deer or wild pig. No elk grazed in the marshy saddle between two crests, nor did he hear or see sign of the great flocks of geese that were overdue to make their springtime migration.
Ashtaway thought of Hammana and felt a sense of urgency-he would love to impress the elf woman with fresh game, to see her eyes shining at him during the celebration feast, while Iydaway Pathfinder played his horn in joyous affirmation of the kill. Tomorrow, perhaps, she would consent to walk with him beside the lake-nothing in his knowledge could be finer than a few uninterrupted hours with the serene, gentle elfmaid.
Though she was younger than Ashtaway by several decades, Hammana had already proven herself to be a healer of great skill, renowned among the four tribes. Her father, Wallaki, was the shaman of the Bluelake Kagonesti, and he had shared his priestly arts with his daughter. Hammana had used her natural talents to ease the sufferings of countless wild elves afflicted by illness or injury. Despite her youth, Hammana possessed maturity and inherent grace in measures far beyond the other women of the tribe, and Ashtaway's heart pounded faster at the memory of her soft, impeccable beauty.
Hammana would indeed be proud if he brought back a fine deer or pig, but would it be more than pride that gave her eyes that alluring light? In the corner of his mind, Ashtaway hoped that another emotion dwelled there as well-and, slowly, over the course of the past few seasons, he had begun to believe that it did. The feeling between them was a truth pressing with increasing force toward the surface of his and, hopefully, her awareness.
Abruptly a shiver of alarm rippled along Ashtaway's shoulders and, for the first time in several hours, he froze.
He looked around at the steep bluffs rising in leonine majesty from the surrounding woods. Something unseen, but powerfully menacing, threatened to trouble this pastoral place. He thought he knew the nature of the threat, and he was afraid.
Ashtaway stood atop the summit of one of the granite precipices, concealed by lush undergrowth and a few large boulders. The place was familiar to him-indeed, the bluff's top had been one of his favorite overlooks since he had discovered it as an exploring youth nearly a hundred years before. Crouching, he examined the valley floor, and almost immediately the glint of sunlight on metal caught his eye. Expressionless, he watched a file of armored riders pass along a lowland trail, moving at an easy walk. Often the treetops concealed the horsemen from his view, but occasionally they passed through a meadow or along the shore of a rock-bordered lake, giving him ample time to study the interlopers.
He was very interested in the humans, but as he remembered his ripple of apprehension, he knew that they were not the thing whose presence had troubled the forest itself. Vet they still deserved watching. All of them were cloaked in metal clothes and rode steeds much larger than the other horses the Kagonesti had seen. The man in the lead carried a pennant bearing an insignia of a red rose.
Ashtaway suspected that the men might be Knights of Solamnia. During his rare contacts with the Qualinesti elves he had heard of the knights, surprised that even the haughty, long-lived House Elves spoke of them in not uncomplimentary terms. Tales of knightly discipline, bravery, and loyalty to an altruistic cause had impressed the young Kagonesti warrior, and now, given the chance to watch the mounted, armored warriors, he seized the opportunity with all of his woodland skill.
Of course, humans in general were the traditional enemies of his tribe. Ash had never personally battled them, but for centuries the older warriors had ceaselessly driven men from the forests whenever they had tried to build their towns or to cut their long, unnatural roadways. Many men had fallen to Kagonesti arrows, and not a few braves had felt the cut of human steel.
Ashtaway wondered about the purpose of this company's presence here. The column numbered several dozen men, each mounted on a horse the size of a bull elk. Clad all in metal, except for visors raised to expose their races, the knights must have been stiflingly hot. Yet none seemed to object, and indeed they held to that steady walk.
Again the Kagonesti felt a shiver of alarm, and now the menace had a familiar taste. Ashtaway looked skyward, кч his eyes sweep toward the distant horizons.
The first tangible sign of approaching danger was the shade flickering across the ground, dappling the sun- speckled waters of a lake where only a cloud shadow should be. Looking farther upward, Ashtaway saw a pair of young red dragons-not as massive as the hugest of their kind, but still terrifying. The wyrms searched for the knights, he sensed, and flew on a course that would take them directly over their enemies.
Ashtaway watched, fascinated, as the dragons swept closer. The knights had not observed the danger yet-a ract that could only test their mettle to the limit when battle was ultimately, suddenly, joined. As the file of riders entered a broad, wet clearing, the Kagonesti knew that the mutual discovery would soon occur.
The wild elf had experienced the awesome horror of dragons, and he fully expected the knights, when they saw the serpents, to tumble from their saddles and writhe in abject horror as the crimson wyrms dove toward them.