"Stop them."
"It is done," the leader whispered.
And it was, Gadar thought as he watched the incorporeal bodies of the spirits thin and fade. It was done. These creatures had never failed to serve him before. They would not fail now.
Regret stirred in the old mage's heart. But it never rose strong enough to call him back from the shadowed path he walked. His remorse was bound by chains, made up of links forged by the deaths that he had caused. And those chains were heavy ones, colored red by the fire of his need.
Riana's sleep had been brief. Having wakened just when Flint roused Tanis to take the second of the night watches, she had drawn close to a fire that she kept blazing high with whatever fuel came to hand. She had not been a talkative companion, Tanis thought now as he watched her stirring thefire to greater brightness, but had spent most of the last watch star ing into the dancing flames.
Now he stood and gently took the long, smoke-blackened stick from her hands.
"Enough," he said, tossing the stick aside. "You put us in danger of roasting to death." He was sorry to see her flinch. He'd meant his words lightly, for the mist that had made black ghosts of the trees earlier in the night had deepened. And though dawn was only an hour away, warmth and light were welcome.
"Pardon," she murmured. She drew her cloak closer around her shoulders, holding it closed with a hand that trembled. Still she did not take her eyes from the fire.
Tanis could taste the bitterness of her fear. "You do well to be afraid, Riana. If you are considering abandoning your search, you have nothing to be ashamed of."
"No!"
Flint stirred where he lay wrapped in his blankets against the cold, damp ground.
"Hush," Tanis whispered. "He's done his watch. Let him sleep."
When she spoke again Riana's voice was low and trembling. "I will not abandon Karel or Daryn." She bit her lower lip, worrying it until Tanis thought it must bleed. "I hate this forest. I am not the fool your friend thinks I am. I–I would like nothing better than to go with you to Solace. But-I cannot. Can you not see that I must at least try to find them? They are all the family I have…" Her words trailed away, as though she did not wish to contemplate a life without her brother or her friend.
In the silence Tanis shivered as the wind grew suddenly sharper. The flames leaped high and then dropped almost to embers. Smoke, thick and acrid, billowed from the campfire, stinging hiseyes to quick tears. Above him he could hear a deep-throated roar ing, the sound wind makes racing across the treetops. Though for an instant he could not see her, Tanis knew that Riana was on her feet. He heard her coughing, a choking sound filled with ragged gasping. Behind him, Flint was up and complaining bitterly about people who could not keep a simple camping fire from burning down an entire forest.
The wind kicked harder at the fire, scattering bright embers around their feet, sucking at the smoke until it rose in a black column to vanish into the unseen limbs of the trees above their heads. Fear danced up Tanis's spine.
"Riana?" he called.
Her voice was small and pinched, only a whimpering response. Then, as swiftly as it had risen, the wind died as though it had never been. Tanis looked around in the stillness, placed Riana where she stood, frozen, across the fire from him, and Flint who braced just behind him, his axe in his hand. He read the danger in the old dwarf's eyes and spun back, his hand on the hilt of the dagger at his belt.
They might have been creatures of the smoke, so dark and insubstantial were they. But their eyes, four sets of crimson embers, spoke of some kind of unholy life. One separated from the group, taller, darker than the rest, and took a bold step toward where the camp-fire, now scattered coals, had been.
Riana's gasp was a shuddering sound of terror and dread. Tanis saw his sword lying just out of his reach and felt his heart sink even as he realized that these must be the creatures who had attacked Riana's camp three nights before. If her tale was true, no sword or dagger would prevail against these phantom raiders now.
As though he realized Tanis's thought, the leader of the black shadow attackers laughed, a high keening sound that chilled the very bones of those who heard it.
"Do not regret your sword," it said, its voice hollow and fell. "It would do you no good did you have it."
"Who-" Tanis's words caught in his throat, constricting with his fear, and he drew a sharp, tight breath. "Who are you?"
"It cannot matter to you. What matters is that we have been sent to stop you." The phantom's red eyes glowed hotly as it laughed again. "And you are stopped."
Riana's little moan of fear was only a whisper. She bowed her head and covered her face with her hands. "No," she sobbed, "no, not again…"
The phantom turned its attention to her, recognition flaring in its bright eyes. "Yes, little one, again. And this time is the last." It reached for her, the motion as smooth as smoke drifting on the wind.
Tanis dove for his sword, scattering the hot coals of the campfire as he ran. He caught up the scabbard and tore the blade from its sheath, whirling just in time to see another of the phantoms flowing toward him. The third, though, swirled away as the glowing embers tumbled like orange jewels at its feet. It feared the fire!
"Flint! Fire! The fire!"
But Flint, faced with attack from the fourth phantom, could not make a move toward the dying fire. Fighting with an instinct that denied Riana's tale of enemies impervious to honest steel, he swung his axe with deadly force at his attacker. It was a blow that would have separated a mortal enemy's head from his shoulders. The blade passed harmlessly through the phantom's neck, whistling in the cold predawn air.
Cursing in both anger and fear, the old dwarf ducked beneath his attacker's reach and dodged to the side, passing close enough to the phantom raider to feel the deathlike chill emanating from its transparent body. He scrambled out of reach, dashed his foot against one of the tumbled stones of the fire ring, and crashed to his knees. As his hand hit the ground to brace for an upward thrust to turn and defend again, burning coals stabbed his palm.
"Flint! Fire!"
"Fire," the dwarf snarled. "I KNOW it's fire-"
Tanis stood between Riana and the leader of the phantom attackers, his sword useless as a defense. Suddenly Flint understood what he meant, and knew what was wanted to fend off these ghostly warriors.
Moving quickly, not daring to look behind to see if the creature he had just escaped was moving to renew the attack, Flint grabbed for the largest pieces of wood that still bore traces of the night's fire. Heedless of their burning teeth, he swept them together into the broken fire ring. He snatched up the scattered kindling from their carefully gathered pile, and heaping it onto the smouldering embers and coals, forced himself to gather more than the shallow breaths of fear necessary to fan the sparks into flame.
"Flint!"
"I'm trying, I'm TRYINGI" Two of the phantom warriors converged on the dwarf, one from the left and one from the right. Ice was at his back. The wind howled above his head with the threat of fury and a grisly death. And the thing that reached for Tanis was about to lay its blood-freezing hand on his neck.
Riana screamed. It might have been the signal for light.
Flames leaped high, whirling and licking at the brittle kindling, snapping loud on the night air. Flint snatched a brand from the fire and tossed it to his friend. He did not wait to see whether Tanis had it, but caught up another and rounded on his attackers.
But there were none to fight. They were gone, vanishing before the bright flames. Only their high, wailing voices were left, lingering in the graying light of day.
Shuddering, Flint retrieved his axe and went to stand as near the fire as he dared. It was not warmth he sought, however, but light. He lifted his burned fingers to his mouth, eyeing Tanis and Riana over his knuckles.