They ate a hurried, troubled, silent lunch and started out again cautiously. They tied thick hides about their legs above the boot tops and below the knees to protect against snakes. They pulled on their heavy cloaks and wrapped them close. The heat of the lower slopes was absent here, and the air—which they had thought would turn warm as they moved closer to Killeshan—grew cold. Garth took the lead, deliberately shielding Wren. Shadows moved all about them in the mist, things that lacked shape and form but were there nevertheless. The familiar sounds of birds and insects died away, fading into an expectant hush. Dusk fell early, a draining away of light, and rain began to fall in steady sheets.
They made their camp at the foot of an ancient koa that fronted a small clearing. With their backs to the tree, they ate their dinner and watched the light deepen from smoke to charcoal. The rain slowed to an intermittent drizzle, and mist began to creep down the mountainside in probing tendrils. Already the forest was beginning to turn to jungle, the trees thickly grown and tangled with vines, the ground damp and soft and yielding.
Slugs and beetles crawled through brush and rotting logs. The ground was dry beneath the koa, but the dampness in the air seemed to penetrate everywhere. There was no possibility of a fire. Wren and Garth hunched within their cloaks and pushed closer to each other. The night settled down about them, turning the world an inky black.
Wren offered to stand the first watch, too edgy to sleep. Garth acquiesced without comment. He pulled up his knees, put his head on his crossed arms, and was asleep almost immediately.
Wren sat staring into the blackness. The trees and mist screened away any light from moon and stars, and even after her eyes had adjusted it was impossible to see more than a dozen feet from where she kept watch. Shadows drifted at the periphery of her vision, brief, quick, and suggestive. Sounds darted out of the haze to challenge and tease—the shrill call of night birds, the click of insects, scrapes and rustlings, huffings and snarls. The low cough of hunting cats came from somewhere distant. She could smell faintly the sulfur fumes of Killeshan, wafting on the air, mingling with the thicker, more pungent scents of the jungle. All around her an invisible world was waking up.
Let it, she thought defiantly.
The air grew still as even the drizzle faded away and only fog remained. Time slipped away. The sounds slowed and softened, and there was a sense that everything out there in the blackness lay in wait, that everything watched. She was aware that the shadows at the edge of the encroaching mist had faded away. Garth was snoring softly. She shifted her cramped body but made no effort to rise. She liked the feel of the tree against her back and Garth pressing close. She hated how the island made her feel—exposed, vulnerable, unprotected. It was the newness, she told herself. It was the unfamiliarity of the terrain, the isolation from her own country, the memory of Tiger Ty’s warning that there were monsters here. It would take time to adjust...
She left the thought unfinished as she saw the silhouette of something huge appear at the edge of the mist. It walked upright on two legs momentarily, then dropped down on four. It stopped and she knew it was looking at her. The hair on the back of her neck prickled, and she edged her hand down until her fingers closed about the long knife at her waist.
She waited.
The thing that watched did not move. It seemed to be waiting with her.
Then she saw another of the shadows appear, similar to the first. And another. And a fourth. They gathered in the darkness and went still, invisible eyes glittering. Wren took slow, deep breaths. She thought about waking Garth, but told herself over and over that she would wait just one more minute, just long enough to see what would happen.
But nothing happened. The minutes crawled past, and the shadows stayed where they were. Wren wondered how many were out there. Then she wondered if they were behind her where she couldn’t see them, sneaking up until they were close enough to...
She turned quickly and looked. There was nothing there. At least, nothing within the limited range of her vision.
She turned back again. She knew suddenly that the things in the darkness were waiting to see what she would do, trying to ascertain how dangerous she might be. If she sat there long enough they would grow impatient and decide to test her. She wondered how much time she had. She wondered what it would take to discourage them. If the monsters were here already, only three nights off the beach, they would be there every night from here on in, watching and waiting. And there would be others. There were bound to be.
Wren’s blood pumped through her, racing as quickly as her thoughts. Together, Garth and she were a match for most things. But they could not afford to fight everything they came across.
The shadows had begun to move again, restless. She heard murmurings, not words exactly, but something. She could feel movement all about her, something other than the shadows, things she could not see. The inhabitants of the jungle had discovered them and were gathering. She heard a growl, low and menacing. Beside her, Garth shifted in his sleep, turning away.
Wren’s face felt hot.
Do something,she whispered to herself. You have to do something.
She knew without looking that the shadows were behind her now.
She felt a burning against her breast.
Almost without thinking, she reached down into her tunic and removed the leather bag with the Elfstones. Swiftly, unwilling to think about what she was doing, she shook the Stones into her hand and quickly closed her fingers about them. She could feel the shadows watching.
Just a hint of what they can do, she told herself. That should he enough.
She stretched forth her hand and let her fingers open slightly. The blue light of the Elfstones brightened. It gathered, a cold fire, and issued forth in thin streamers to probe the darkness.
Instantly the shadows were gone. They disappeared so swiftly and so completely that they might never have been there. The sounds died into a hush. The world became a vacuum, and she and Garth were all that remained within it.
She closed her fingers tightly again and withdrew her hand. The shadows, whatever they were, knew something of Elven magic.
Her instincts had told her that they would.
She was filled with a sudden bitterness. The Elfstones were not a part of her life, she had insisted. Oh, no—not her life. They belonged to someone else, not to her. How quick she had been to tell herself so. And how quick to turn to them the moment she felt threatened.
She slipped the Stones back into their container and shoved it within her tunic again. The night was peaceful and still; the mist was empty of movement. The things that lived on Morrowindl had gone in search of easier prey.
It was after midnight when she woke Garth. Nothing further had appeared to threaten them. She did not tell Garth what had happened. She wrapped herself in her cloak and leaned back against him.
They set out again at dawn. Vog lay thick across the slopes of Killeshan, and the light was thin and gray. Dampness filled the air; it seeped up through the ground on which they walked, penetrated the clothing they wore, and left them shivering. After a time, the sun began to burn through the mist, and some of the chill faded. Travel was slow and difficult, the land uneven and broken, a series of ravines and ridges choked by the jungle’s growth. Last night’s hush persisted, a sullen stillness that isolated the pair and spun webs of uneasiness all about them.