Shuddering, Elansa sat before a low fire, a round of rock and flame in the shadow of the high stony staircase. Watched by Char and a few others, she tried to manage her meal. She ate out of a rough stone bowl, dipping her fingers into thin gritty gruel and spooning it into her mouth. The food tasted like a mixture of corn and barley with the barest flavoring of meat. Tiny globules of fat rimmed the bowl itself, so she knew someone else had lately used it. Her stomach turned, but turning, it also growled with hunger. She pressed three fingers together, made a hook of them, and scooped up more of the awful porridge.
Char watched her, not afraid she'd flee-afraid she'd be stolen out of his charge. So, that's you, she thought, gauging him. Given a charge and determined to see it through to its proper end. She didn't know what that understanding would do for her, but she was a princess, used to navigating the troublous waters of court life. She'd learned how to look at courtiers and servants and lords and reckon out the core of them, to know who was trusty and who was not. She'd learned, as well, that any insight gained was worth remembering.
Eating, she looked around, her glances small and not obvious. Though she wanted to see, she wanted less to call attention to herself. The place held little light. A few torches were tucked into stony niches on the walls, and one wide brazier smoldered in the center of the cavern. That might have flared high with fire sometime while she slept, but only embers winked in it now. The robbers’ den, yesterday filled with people and noisy, was almost empty now, so quiet it seemed her breathing must echo. She heard the distant trickle of water, a spring she could not see, perhaps in another chamber. Other chambers there were, of this Elansa was certain.
Three dark gaps in the walls yawned like the mouths of tunnels or hallways leading to other places. Yesterday the bandits had split and some returned to the cavern by another way. Did one or more of these openings lead to those other ways?
A few hounds lay nearby, chins on paws, eyes half-closed and ears up. They all looked like they shared the same parents, long limbs, prick ears, short yellow hair and curling tails. This, she knew, is what dogs become when they are not under the care of kennel masters and breeders: tough and wild and far removed from their sires who might well have once lain at a hearthside or gamboled with their master's children. She looked past the dogs where a half dozen outlaws lay wrapped in their cloaks, sleeping. They were only hunched shapes, and Elansa had no way to know if they were men or women.
Behind Char, a lanky tow-headed boy stood talking with a pot-bellied elder. The boy had a sun-reddened face of one who'd been long outdoors. The old man's face was pale and pasty, his skin unhealthy and dry. The two cast covert glances at her, elbowing each other and leering. In the darkness beyond those two, another watcher lurked, red eyes glaring in the firelight. The figure moved, and Elansa’s heart leaped with sudden fear as she caught a glimpse of a long slanted head, narrow eyes, and orange hide.
"That’s the goblin," Char said. "Never mind about him."
Elansa looked away from the glaring eyes, but she didn't stop listening to the sound of the goblin's breathing, a hoarse, wet sound that made her skin crawl. She finished her meal, such as it was, and drank another cup of water. Then, because she could withhold no longer, she said, "Char, I want to wash and tend my needs."
The boy behind them snickered, and the old man said something in a voice so low that Elansa couldn't make out his words. One of the hounds picked up his head, and Char scratched his bearded chin, thinking.
"Well," she said, "there is a place for that, isn't there?"
Char allowed there was. "But I ain't sending you there unguarded."
The skinny boy’s snickering became outright laughter. Elansa swallowed hard as Char’s eye narrowed, a look she was getting to recognize as the dwarf considering. Then he slapped his knees and got to his feet. "All right then."
He rose, gesturing her to do the same. Behind, one of the hounds, a large raw-boned male, got to its feet to stretch and watch him curiously. "Follow me."
She did, and when she moved the dog fell in behind.
They went past the sleepers, some of whom stirred when they passed. One of the sleepers, snorting and cursing, cracked an eye and rolled over again. When he moved, Elansa shuddered. This one was an elf! How far had he fallen to find himself among this rabble? And where was he from? Not from Qualinost, she knew that much. No elf had been cast out from there in as long as she could remember, and none had left voluntarily. What elf would? Yet here he was among outlaws, a dark elf, driven from his home for some terrible sin or crime, forbidden the forest and communion with any of his race.
The dog trailing, his nails clicking on the stone, Elansa followed Char past the sleepers, past the place where she had slept, to the first of the openings in the stone wall. The sound of water came stronger now, splashing. They stepped into the darkness of the opening, and she stumbled a little when the ground dropped. Catching herself against the wall, she said, "I need light."
Unimpressed, Char said, "Too bad. Let your eyes adjust. They will. Fang," he said, naming the dog. "Keep." He hung back, saying no more, and the dog slipped in behind her, another guard.
She stood in the dark, trying to focus on nothing. The dog's aura was the only light she saw, his breathing sounded loud, hollow, and so she knew she stood in a narrow space. The music of water falling echoed, perhaps a small stream slipping down the stone. She stood still, waiting for her eyes to adjust. Soon she saw the smooth, level floor curving ahead. Following the sound of water, she walked until she came to the curve in the way. There the passage changed, dropping at the left. Looking over the side, she saw a series of three ledges like broad steps. These didn't look worked, they seemed like the craft of river and time, rough but not unlovely. Beyond the last, two streams ran, one narrow and slipping along the ground, the other a steady trickle of water issuing from a crack in the far wall. Someone had placed a basin beneath the fount to catch the trickle. She peered downstream, wondering if there was a way out. None, or not a very big one. The hound sitting beside her wouldn't be able to wriggle through the opening. Certainly a grown woman couldn't. It was the same upstream, only a little space in the stone from which the water issued.
Pale light drifted now from the distant ceiling. Elansa looked up to see a narrow fissure through which the light came. It looked like dawn light, gray and weak. I've been a day gone, she thought, a day and a night in the hands of outlaws. The moons would rise full in six more days. She smiled, a chill smile to contemplate what must come at the rising of those moons. In six days she would see herself avenged, and the blood of outlaws would paint the tale on the very stones of the borderland.
She found what she needed, a privy space at the running stream where waste would wash out of the cave, and cool fresh water from the crack in the wall with which to wash. The dog, clearly a long inhabitant of the place, crossed the stream beside her and lapped from the water fallen into the basin.
Clean, or cleaner, she watched the dog drink and, watching, she decided to test him. One small step she took, back from the basin. The hound never lifted his head, but his low warning growl gave a clear message. He'd been told to keep her, and keep her he would. When she left, he followed her, shadowing her steps, close beside as they came to the entrance again, the darkest place where the light leaking in from the fissure in the stony ceiling didn't reach. Char stood waiting, arms folded across his chest, head back, watching her.
"Fang," he said, never taking his eyes from Elansa. "Go."
The dog brushed past her, past Char, and vanished into the wider cave.
"Come along," Char said. He jerked his head. "There's something to see."