Khallayne slid to the ground, too. They knew, as long as Kaede held Jelindra in her thrall, that she would follow them.
The woods had become silent. Gone was the chit-ter of birds and the rustle of small animals in the undergrowth. The cool, leaf-shaped shadows had become menacing.
Beside the trail, Kaede discovered what was making the horses so restive. Dumped carelessly between the roots of a huge, old tree were what was left of two Ogre guards, a male and a female, wearing uniforms that had probably once been the immaculate white-and-red of the Dalle Clan. The cloth was so stained with blood and dirt, coated with dead leaves and twigs, that it was difficult to know for sure. It seemed as if they had been hacked and battered to death, the bodies dragged off the trail and left for the animals.
“No attempt to hide the bodies,” Jyrbian whispered, sliding close to Kaede so that his lips barely made a sound. “Whoever did this didn’t care who discovered the evidence.”
“Humans!” The word was a hiss, a warning, a curse. Kaede turned away, one hand on her sword hilt, one on her stomach as if she were sick.
Jyrbian knew, however, that she actually clutched the dagger she wore tucked in her belt, hidden beneath the folds of her tunic. He backed carefully away from the bodies and back onto the hard ground of the trail, careful to make as little noise as possible among the leaves and dead twigs.
They were west of Thorad by at least two day’s ride. If he remembered correctly, the trail forked ahead, heading east down into a valley and west up into the mountains, bypassing the city. Intuition told him the humans would be to the east, on the more passable trail. Food would be easier to find, and so would prey.
He grinned at Kaede. “Shall we see what lies ahead?”
He glanced back. Khallayne was on foot, leading her stallion, staring at the two guards’ bodies with dread fascination. Jelindra was still mounted, staring off into space.
“Can you make her watch the horses?” Jyrbian gestured toward the trees on the opposite side of the trail.
They were very near where the trail came out on a low ridge overlooking the valley.
Kaede spoke for a moment with Jelindra, words Khallayne couldn’t hear, and then left her holding the horses. “Shell be all right,” Kaede assured Jyrbian.
Crouched low, hidden by scrubby plants and rough, sharp-edged boulders, Jyrbian and Kaede edged through the sparse woods, out to the ridge overlooking the valley. Khallayne followed.
Just clear of the shadows of the forest, where the trail ran along a rocky ridge that circled the valley below, Jyrbian paused, lay down on his belly, and crept to the edge of the crest, keeping his head low.
A troop of Ogres was camped in the curve of a gurgling stream. The camp was orderly. Bedrolls of four to five warriors were laid out neatly around campfires that ringed the field tent. The Ogres were busy cooking. They stood out in the green field, wearing the red-and-white silks of Clan Dalle.
Jyrbian made a sound of disgust. They might as well be painted with targets.
Kaede sidled up beside him, shushed him, and pointed toward the slope to their left.
There, among the thin forest that marched down the hillside, was flitting movement!
Silent shadows weaved in and out among the trees, working their way down to hiding places among the shrubs at the water’s edge.
Whoever commanded the company, whoever had chosen such a vulnerable place to camp, deserved to die, to be gutted and left for carrion birds! Unless the approaching humans made noise, they would be upon the guards on two sides of the camp before an alarm was raised.
Kaede tensed, ready to rise and warn her compatriots of the approaching danger. Her sword was already half drawn when Jyrbian grabbed her.
She yanked free of his grasp. “They’ll be slaughtered!”
“Wait! Think!” He held her arm. “If you shout now, the humans will melt back into the forest. And we’ll be alone up here with them.”
“So what do we do?”
Jyrbian grinned, a crooked, thin-lipped expression that made his eyes look as hard as granite. “We go down.”
Before she could question him, stop him, he melted back into the shadows.
A moment later, he came crashing past, mounted.
Kaede stared up at him as if he were crazy, then leapt to her feet and followed. Khallayne hesitated a moment.
As Jyrbian reached the edge of the ridge, he drew his sword and held it high over his head. The blade threw out glinting red highlights from the evening sun as he forced his horse to leap down the slope.
The ground was a mixture of dark soil and creek-side sand, cut through with gullies of rainwater. The slope was steep, and his horse went down at an angle, sliding, running, falling.
As he reached the level ground, Jyrbian tugged viciously at the reins and sent his horse careening along the edge of the stream, toward the tree line. As he flew past, he noted dark-skinned faces with silver eyes open wide with surprise.
“Humans on your flank!” he shouted. He tore into the woods, into the nearest concentration of humans, and flailed about with his sword. He hit one on the side of the head with the flat of his blade and felt another taste its sharp edge.
The humans had to stand and fight, exposing their positions to the Ogre company.
Jyrbian wheeled his horse among the trees, slashed at a human with a wooden pike, then wheeled back to meet another with a sword. His steel blade sang against inferior metal. He felt as near to ecstasy as could be.
He realized the overwhelming numbers, saw his own death if the sluggish company of Ogres did not respond, then raised his voice in the first, terrible notes of a battle song, a death song.
His foot landed squarely on the chest of a human woman and echoed with a thud and crack. The human emitted a gurgle and fell back. His sword made a welcome whir in the air as he wheeled to meet the next attacker.
Then Kaede was coming to his aid, leading Jelin-dra into the battle, their horses sending up a spray of sand and pebbles. Her cry of attack made the hair on the back of his neck stand on edge. At last, the Ogres responded to Kaede’s battle cry, ran for their weapons, and rushed across the stream to join in the attack.
Jyrbian allowed the first of them to sweep by him, then met the next handful of charging warriors, blocking their path. “That way,” he commanded, pointing with his bloody sword. “Into the woods. Flank them.”
If there was any hesitation on their part to follow the orders of a complete stranger, he didn’t see it. Swords waving, they raced up the hill as he had directed, meeting further waves of humans in the woods.
Quickly, he dispatched others, five here, ten there, any he could commandeer, until the enemy was engaged in a melee all along the stream and through the woods. The Ogre troops might have been slow to respond, but they were making up for it with ferocity.
Three humans fell for every Ogre overcome. Leaping free of his horse, Jyrbian rejoined the fighting for the pure joy of making the odds even heavier. Every human whose throat he slashed, whose belly he stabbed, bore Eadamm’s face. He fought and fought harder, mind lost to battle lust.
Finally, he wheeled, sword held before him, and wheeled again, disappointed to find no remaining opponents. Nearby a young female with a short sword was battling a human male with two daggers. Jyrbian stepped into the fray and plunged his sword into the man’s chest. As the man slid free of the blade, leaving it coated with his blood, Jyrbian lunged cruelly and cut his throat as well, from ear to ear.
The blood was like an intoxicant. He raised his sword to strike at the body even as it lay, already dead, then Kaede stepped in front of him.