“I was going to say as much,” Jerdren replied.
Eddis merely nodded and went off to talk to her lieutenant.
Thin, high clouds began to move in as their cook got a fire going and began kneading dough for bread. Wind sighed through the high branches, though little reached the camp. Willow found a small, bubbling pool down the north side of the hill, so there was water for soup and washing. The meal was eaten in shifts, with four on guard around the hilltop at all times. Mead ate on his feet, wandering in and out of the trees, often stopping to listen.
Willow, Blorys, and Eddis took turns at listening also. The only nearby sounds were wind, and the crackle of fire, and now and again small birds high overhead.
Later, when Jerdren went down to the spring, a squirrel ran off chattering through the branches, and moments later the unmistakable bounding thumps of a deer crashing through the undergrowth brought him up short. He closed his eyes briefly as the deer moved out of hearing. Odd, he thought. There still wasn’t anything that would have warned Lim to run for it or at least keep a wary eye out. Still, he’d have expected more squirrels, possibly birds lower in the branches and not just high in the firs. He climbed back to the camp, dipped his cup in the pot of tea, and got comfortable.
“If there’s a camp anywhere hereabouts, we’d’ve heard something. I didn’t, and more to the point, neither did Blor or Willow. So I’m thinking,” he added with a glance at Eddis, “that we turn back south tomorrow and angle off toward the east.”
She shrugged, sipped steaming liquid, then turned to look for Mead. The mage was leaning back against the great oak, staring up into its branches.
Willow stirred. “I’d like that. If there’s no one out here, then we’re wasting time and supplies looking.” He shook out his folding leather cup, dipped up a fresh cup of tea, and carried it over to his half-brother.
Jerdren looked at Eddis again, then around the campfire at each of the men there.
“All right. We’ll move out at first light. Some of you gather more wood, enough to keep that thing going all night. Make sure one of you’s watching while the other gathers branches.” His eyes strayed toward the now pacing mage. “He’ll be on watch the entire night, but we’ll keep four men on at all times. Blor, you take someone and bring back water for the morning.”
“Better do it now,” Eddis added. “Once it’s dark, a spring like that could draw all kinds of predators.”
He knows that, Eddis, Jerdren thought tiredly. His brother merely smiled, caught up the empty pot, and took one of the spearmen with him.
The sun was gone from sight, muffled in cloud. There would be no moon until nearly dawn, and the night was very dark. Four at a time kept watch, with one making sure the fire stayed going. Mead walked quietly around the circle of sleepers, or leaned against the oak, his fingers exploring the bark and his eyes troubled.
Eddis came awake at M’Baddah’s light touch and sat up, shoving wisps of hair out of her face. The air was cool and still. Disorienting, she thought. I thought it was autumn, and me back home again. She’d half expected to see the familiar old bed she’d shared with her sisters, and beyond the narrow window opening, the family vegetable garden. Here instead was a campfire and ruddy light on tree trunks, flickering shadows cast by trees and branches, and armed men who moved quietly around the hilltop.
It wasn’t her favorite sight. She’d grown fairly used to woods and the way a campfire made them look, but firelight hid more than it showed, and just now she could imagine all manner of things just out of sight. Don’t imagine, she ordered herself flatly and rubbed her eyes.
“Quiet so far,” M’Baddah whispered.
Eddis nodded and sat cross-legged to string her bow, then looked around. M’Whan squatted by the fire, cup in hand, and two of the Keep men were moving out into the night as two others came in and rolled in their blankets for a few more hours of sleep. Most of the men around the fire were merely dark, blanketed lumps, but Blorys was directly across from her, a shock of red hair spilling over his face. Eddis gathered up her bow and three arrows, making sure the rest weren’t bound together in the quiver the way they sometimes got, and walked away from the light.
Mead was there, pacing around the great oak. If he saw her, he made no sign. Eddis hesitated, then went on. Better not to distract the mage, though his behavior worried her. She hesitated again just off the brow of the hill. Thin fingers of firelight flickered on a pale-barked tree, but it was otherwise dark out here. Once her eyes adjusted, she’d be able to see as well as anyone but an elf. Just don’t trip on something and break your neck, Eddis, she thought. One thing for certain: Any bandits sneaking up on them might see the fire, but they’d see no better than she did, and she’d hear them coming. Every few steps she stopped, but there wasn’t anything to hear. Hope that means the other three are being as cautious as I am and not that they aren’t moving. Or that something got—
She broke that thought immediately. This wasn’t the place to think about “things” getting anyone.
Back the other direction, then. She could make out more of her surroundings this time—like the line of heavy, dry brush on her left that anyone or anything would have to crash through to reach the camp from the west.
She reached the end of the brush and was ready to turn back when Mead’s yell of alarm reached her, and, from the sounds of things, immediately roused the camp. Someone was bellowing orders up there—Jerdren? But another voice topped his—a rough one that didn’t belong to any of their men. She tightened her grip on the bow, shifted the arrows to the same hand and, with her free hand outstretched to keep her from running headfirst into trees, clambered back up the hill as fast as she dared.
The camp looked like utter chaos, with half-wakened men scrambling from their blankets to snatch up the weapons they’d left at hand, and others charging across the open ground to protect them from the half-dozen massive brutes who came striding up from the south. They carried ugly spears and two-handed swords, and she realized with a shock that none of them were human. Jerdren and M’Baddah stood shoulder to shoulder, swords ready, just behind three of the Keep men who braced their spears against the ground. Blorys and Willow were firing arrows as quickly as they could, and as Eddis hesitated at the edge of the clearing, one of the hulking creatures howled and staggered away, two arrows protruding from its thick neck.
Mead stood with his back to the fire, halfway between it and the vast oak, staring up into darkness. Eddis looked in horror as a bloody Keep man fell from the lowest branches and lay unmoving at the mage’s feet. As she set an arrow to her string and started toward Mead, the elf mage waved her back.
“No closer,” he shouted. “It’s a lion!”
Eddis swallowed sudden dread and backed away, eyes fixed on the tree. She was dimly aware of the fighting behind her—men crying out in pain, a clash of swords, and the bellowing of wounded enemy. There. Gods! Twice her height above the ground, she could make out see the green glow of narrowed eyes reflecting firelight. Then M’Baddah had her by the arm, dragging her away toward the fire that their cook was working hard to build up.
“Three of the monsters are dead,” her lieutenant told her. He almost had to shout to be heard above the melee. “The others won’t last much longer. Stay back from that tree, my Eddis. The beast came without warning and snatched him up before any of us could react!”
He knelt to wrap moss around one of the long branches, tied it in place, and poured a dollop of lamp oil over it. He turned away to look over the fighting as Eddis swallowed dread. The cat’s eyes seemed to hold hers. Willow moved past her, bloody sword in one hand, and took up a position not far behind his half-brother.