“But you can barely walk, man! And you wizards are horribly vulnerable when you set your minds on your own spells,” I pointed out. “That’s how they got at Otrick.”
“This enchanter would have to know I was there in order to go hunting me,” Usara said stiffly. “With Guinalle’s help over the last few seasons, we have been finding ways of working magic to evade aetheric notice.”
That was all very well as long as it was only his own sanity he was risking, but if the Elietimm got him they’d be halfway to getting me. Unfortunately, I couldn’t see how I was going to stop him coming short of stabbing him in the other leg, which I couldn’t see going down well with Darni or Gilmarten.
“There’s no chance of you coming into the fess itself; Sheltya clearly have some way of telling mages. You stay with the bowmen and you sit on your hands until after we’ve made our move.” Sorgrad’s decision startled me but his tone made it clear it was final. “I want your word on that, Usara, by everything you hold holy.”
“If he can’t come in and he can’t use his magic, why do we want him along?” objected ’Gren. “And he’ll have to hop all the way there and back.”
“He can learn to use crutches or he’ll just have to follow on behind.” Sorgrad smiled at Usara. “We’re likely to come out of there with every hound in the soke on our trail. Then you can use all the magic you want, Sandy, raise fire to scour our scent clean off the rocks.”
’Gren and I exchanged a look of understanding. Getting in to steal something is only ever half the task. It’s getting out again with the spoils that marks the successful thief.
Nine
In this Mountain tale of how the world was made, we find both familiar and strange ideas. Only the gods know the truth and perhaps they have shared it among the peoples, so that we may only learn by sharing our knowledge.
Teyvasoke,
18th of Aft-Summer
Just walk slowly, keep your hood up and avoid catching anyone’s eye,” ’Gren murmured out of the side of his mouth. He spoke slowly to ensure I understood. Neither brother had talked anything but the Mountain tongue since we had left Apak’s camp, which had done wonders for my understanding of the language. It had been worse for my temper; some days I’d been so frustrated I’d have cheerfully punched them both on the nose. My accent was reasonably convincing by now—having a good ear for a tune helps there—but there were still too many things I just didn’t know the words for.
I ran a hand over my hair, damp with sweat in the noon heat. The short crop still felt strange, the hair strawlike after Harile’s foul-smelling concoction had leached out most of the color. Sorgrad was confident passing eyes would slide incuriously over a light-eyed, sandy blond in the company of two undeniably pure-blooded Mountain Men. Still, I was taking no chances, concealing myself in a sacklike garment ’Gren had acquired. Some woodcutter had learned the hard way not to leave his linen drying on the broom bushes fringing his little steading.
“So where have this lot been?” wondered ’Gren aloud. We’d waited and watched and finally come in on the tail end of a straggle of returning troops.
“Raiding the lowlands,” Sorgrad nodded at the dust kicked up by protesting flocks of abducted sheep in the grassy expanses farther down the valley.
I looked around at the new arrivals competing for cramped space to spread their blankets and set up cook pots. “No one’s going to be surprised to see faces they don’t know hereabouts, are they?”
We walked slowly up the broad floor of the wide valley, which was crowded with tents and rough shelters. On either side ramparts of rock marched down from the heights to enfold the soke with their protection, pierced with the dark entrances of mines. Ahead the land rose in a shallow sweep, past broken ground pocked with workings up to a gentle rise still dotted with a few remaining trees, then it changed abruptly, folded into deep, forested gullies. The twin mountains, light and dark, reared up beyond, clouds streaming like banners from their summits.
I brought my wits back from that distant beauty to considerations closer at hand. They might be a motley crowd but this was more than the ragtag collection of raiding parties that Lescari dukes dignify with the title of army. In the time it had taken us to reach here, a sizable host had gathered. I only hoped they’d disperse as rapidly if we could get rid of the Ice Islander’s enchantments. I looked sideways from beneath my hood at a gang of youths sitting around an unlit fire pit. One with dark eyes startling below corn-silk yellow hair was brushing his mail-shirt free of specks of rust, another with the rounder features of mixed blood was using a whetstone on a sword with a notch in the metal jagged as a freshly broken tooth. A third bent over a dusty boot that looked to have covered more leagues than my own. The ring of hammer and metal punctuated conversation on all sides.
“If we’d bleached what was left of his hair, Sandy could have passed among these mongrels,” ’Gren said cheerfully.
“I think he’s better off where he is. That limp and those crutches are just too noticeable.” We’d left the exhausted wizard with a handful of determined Forest hunters in a disregarded hollow beyond the knife-edged ridge on the sunrise side. He was under strict instructions not to use any magic lest he draw attention of the Sheltya or the Elietimm. Usara might be confident Hadrumal’s tricks would hide him from an enchanter’s notice, but we weren’t prepared to let the mage risk it. Not until we had our quarry. I hoped he’d stay unscathed. I’d left my precious song book with him, for one thing—a mage being the nearest I could find to safekeeping for the present.
But once we had the bastard, I’d welcome Forest arrows or spears of lightning or anything else to cover our flight. Sudden shouts behind me froze the hot trickles of sweat between my shoulder blades, cold fingers of fear running down my spine.