The sound of running filled the air around him. It came from behind, to the left and the right. Sol managed a chuckle that reverberated through his head. Protectors swarmed by Hirad, forming a solid line around him and the rest of The Raven. At the centre of the masked army was a man whose face felt the air.
Garonin surged through the barrier again. Hirad smiled as they faltered in their charge.
‘Good to see you, Ark,’ said the barbarian. He beckoned towards the enemy. ‘Come and get it, boys.’
Ark and the entire Protector line stepped forward. Axes came through left to right, low to high. Swords came the other way, chest-high. Garonin screams filled the air. The weight of fire on the shield intensified still further. Hirad felt the pressure of souls crammed into the small space. At last he turned. The shield was full of Protectors. Hundreds of them materialising in front of Sol and spreading across the space.
‘Bloody hell. Brought a few friends with you too, did you?’ Hirad’s voice rose to a shout. ‘We have to spread the shield. Ilkar!’
Abruptly, the sky darkened once more. The sound of white tears splatting against the cobbles of ruined Xetesk was replaced by silence. Simultaneously, the deluge against the shield ceased. Protectors moved out of its compass, forming a line four deep, stretching across the face of the edifice.
Hirad heard Erienne cry out. In front of him the shield flickered. He turned and ran back to her, glancing up at the images played out above them in huge hideous detail. Black Wings castle. Two boys lay on a filthy bed. It was covered with blood. The boys were unmoving, throats carved open. Hirad slithered to his knees.
‘That’s not the future; it’s the past,’ he said. ‘And we all still grieve for your boys. Don’t let them beat you. Don’t let our new world become another graveyard for us.’
‘I couldn’t save them,’ she said. ‘I couldn’t save Lyanna. I can’t save anyone.’
‘Erienne, you’re saving us right now. Hang on to that. You’re saving the future for everyone still alive and the souls of your boys.’ Hirad turned. ‘Raven! Get here now. Lend Erienne your strength.’
But Hirad could see she was crumbling. Above their heads images played of storms lashing the coast of Balaia and of a little girl in the centre of them, calling out for her mother. Erienne was shaking horribly. Her shoulders were hunched as if against a cold wind and her hands were closing again.
Thraun padded up behind her and sat, leaning his body into hers and nuzzling her neck. Darrick stood in front of her, looking down. He stripped off a glove and placed his hand on the top of her head. Sirendor did not come so close. Sirendor, who had never met her, stood to watch the Garonin. They were unsure for the present as they gauged the Protector force. Hirad looked for Ilkar. The elven mage was moving towards them one moment and gone the next.
For an instant Ilkar thought he had lost faith entirely and simply ceased to be in Ulandeneth. But a warming feeling washed over him, familiar and strong. A metaphorical arm around the shoulders from a huge presence.
‘You need to get your brother to safety now because we haven’t got much time,’ said Sol.
‘Where are you?’ asked Ilkar. ‘Where am I?’
Ilkar could see nothing but a brown and gold blur.
‘Travelling,’ said Sol. ‘And I am where you left me. I hold the door. You and your brother must bring the elves through now. And then you have to return and play your part.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Erienne cannot shield us on her own. Hirad cannot fight them on his own. Belief is only so great in any one of us. Find it in yourself. And think on this. Hirad was right. Absolutely none of what we have seen in Ulandeneth can possibly be happening. So why is it? Find the answer within you and turn this fight around.’
Ilkar wanted to ask more but the blur in front of his eyes coalesced into a scene of devastation. He was standing on the beach of North Bay. Around him the bodies of thousands of elves were scattered in the nauseating attitudes of their deaths. Ilkar tried to move but found he could do nothing but turn on the spot.
Coming towards him across the beach was a small knot of elves pursued by three Garonin firing their weapons. White tears wiped across a flaring, sputtering spell shield. The elves ran on. Not five yards from him they stopped and turned. Four of them, mages, bent to a casting. Rebraal faced the onrushing Garonin with five Al-Arynaar. Ilkar could see his brother was wounded. He held his blade in the wrong hand.
Rebraal was speaking but Ilkar could not hear the words. The Garonin stopped ten yards from them and continued firing. Other enemies were approaching. This was a fight only going one way. But not quietly. From the hands of one of the crouching mages IceBlades tore out. Garonin armour flared white. One of the enemy clutched at his helmet, blood spurting from his eye slit. But, even as he fell, a finger of white lashed out along the path of the spell and buried in the caster’s chest. The mage blew apart. The spell shield flickered but steadied.
‘Rebraal,’ said Ilkar.
Rebraal, with his back to Ilkar, stiffened. His head turned this way and that.
‘I’m behind you. Turn round and look.’
Rebraal shook his head.
‘Bloody hell, little brother, do I have to draw you a map?’
Rebraal spun round, clearly surprising the Al-Arynaar warriors standing by him. His face was angry, his mouth ready to deliver a threat. But his jaw dropped and he pointed directly at Ilkar before beginning to walk towards him. His people were asking him why.
‘Can you not see him? He’s standing right there.’
Ilkar could not hear their responses. But he could see their expressions. Disbelief. And why not.
‘Don’t worry, Rebraal. They can’t see or hear me yet.’
‘Ilkar?’
Ilkar nodded. ‘Well, sort of. I’m still dead but at least I can get you out of here. You don’t need the Wesmen. Come to me, all of you, and I’ll take you home.’
‘We’re scattered, Ilkar,’ said Rebraal. ‘Our people are trapped aboard ship and back along the valley behind me. I cannot leave them.’
‘You won’t be,’ said Ilkar. ‘Reach out to me. Touch me. And we will appear to each and every one of them. End their torment. Bring them home.’
Rebraal shook his head. ‘I’ve seen too much to believe this. It cannot be you.’
‘I cannot prove it but that you look at me and see me,’ said Ilkar. ‘You’re my brother.’
‘Then tell me what you always feared the most,’ said Rebraal.
Ilkar still felt a twinge of pain at the memory. ‘I feared walking this earth long after my friends, The Raven, had gone to their graves. Hundreds of years of bleak grief. Lucky for me that I died in screaming agony before the lot of them, wasn’t it?’
Rebraal’s face cracked into a huge smile and he walked towards Ilkar.
‘You came back for me,’ he said. ‘After all this time.’
Ilkar shrugged. ‘Someone has to look after you.’
‘Where will we end up?’
‘Ah, now that I can’t tell you. After all, I’ll end up elsewhere, being dead and all that.’
Rebraal’s smile faltered. ‘So this is only to be a brief meeting.’
‘The briefest. But worth the moment.’
‘So it is, my brother, so it is.’
Rebraal reached out and touched Ilkar’s hands. Ilkar felt the faintest of physical contact but it was enough to last him eternity. With that touch the doorway opened for every surviving elf on Balaia and on Calaius. And in that same moment Ilkar was thrust back to the desperate now of Ulandeneth but this time with an answer shrieking for attention.
Brothers fall. Grieve for their souls. Run hard. Strike back. Protect The Raven. Protect Sol.
The pulses of thought ran around Ark’s head. The Protector line forged towards the Garonin forward position. They covered the short space quickly but the Garonin weapons were tearing his brothers apart. Behind Ark, the shield of the One mage was guttering. Garonin were waiting for it to fail. His brothers would die to keep them from her. From all who sheltered within it.