But Sarthos was almost as skilled as Daried in bladework. He matched Daried's attacks for five heartbeats, steel leaping to meet steel, and Daried managed a quick spiraling riposte that caught the moonblade in the human's hands and sent it spinning through the air. It landed point-down in the forest loam and stuck there, quivering.
The Chondathan lord fell back from Daried's attack and cried out in a harsh, hissing language that brought stabbing pain to the elfs ears. "Nevarhem! Sheor! Aid me!" he shrieked.
In the space of an instant, two more barbed devils appeared in clouds of brimstone smoke, displacing the air in twin thunderclaps as they teleported to their master's aid.
The bladesinger eyed his new adversaries without fear. He had no strength to meet them, but he would try anyway, and death came to everyone in time, didn't it? He could only meet it as best he could. He turned back to Sarthos and smiled coldly through his pain and exhaustion.
"It seems that we have determined who is the better swordsman," he remarked.
"You'll find that little comfort when you're dead!" the Chondathan snarled. He motioned to the devils, and the creatures advanced on Daried, claws and spikes reaching for him.
"You'll precede him, murderer!" Nilsa called.
She stood near the Morvaeril moonblade, drew her bowstring to her ear, and took aim at the warlord. But the barbed devils stalking Daried leaped for her so swiftly that she couldn't take the shot. She whirled and buried her white arrow feather-deep in the chest of the first monster, staggering it in its tracks. Then, out of arrows, she dropped her bow and seized the hilt of the sword in the ground before her.
The instant her hand touched the hilt, the Morvaeril moonblade flared to life. A shock of brilliant white light flashed from the ancient elven steel, and a row of incandescent runes marking the blade flared so brightly that Daried had to look away.
"Impossible," he breathed. "That moonblade was dead. Dead!"
Sarthos and the remaining devil hesitated, blinded and astonished as much as Daried himself. For that matter, Nilsa herself stood staring dumbly at the sword in her hand, struck senseless in amazement. But then the last of the devils recovered from its surprise. With a shrill screech, it hurled itself against Nilsa, talons and spikes reaching for her heart.
"Nilsa, the devil!" the bladesinger cried.
The girl glanced up just in time to bring the swordpoint up. The hamatula halted its mad rush and tried to leap around the blade, but with one efficient turn and cut Nilsa took its foul head clean off its shoulders. The moonblade's white fire seared through its infernal flesh like sunshine burning through a mist. The first hamatula, the one that she had shot, scrambled to its feet and surged at her, but Nilsa backed away two quick steps and slashed its foul talon off its arm as it reached for her. The monster shrieked and stumbled. She stabbed the moonblade through the devil's heart, and sent it back to the foul hell it had been summoned from.
Sarthos paled, then he started to speak the words of a deadly spell against her. But Daried found the strength for one final leap of his own. Spinning through a low crouch he cut Sarthos's legs out from under him, and sent the Chondathan warlord to the ground. The wizard gaped at him in shock and astonishment-and Daried's thinblade pinned him to the ground.
"That was for Nilsa's father," the bladesinger said.
Sarthos gaped up at him, blood starting from his mouth. Then, to Daried's surprise, his features seemed to melt and shift, becoming leaner, more angular. Black-ribbed wings grew from the dying wizard's shoulders, and his pockmarked human face became scarlet and flecked with fine scales. His ears changed from rounded to pointed, and his eyes took on an elfs slant.
"I'll be damned," Daried muttered. "You're a fey'ri."
No wonder Sarthos had shown such skill with both blade and spell. He was likely as much a bladesinger as Daried himself, for the fey'ri were ancient sun elves touched by demonic blood. They wielded magic and blades with the same skill and traditions as Daried or any other son of Evermeet.
"Daried!" Nilsa hurried to his side. "You're wounded." "It's nothing," the bladesinger said. "Go aid your folk, if you can."
He stood over his foe, watching the fey'ri lord die. Then his own strength gave out too, and he toppled to the ground an arm's reach from his adversary.
The last thing Daried saw of the battle was Nilsa raising the Morvaeril moonblade to the setting sun, as the Chondathans staggered away from the deadly woods.
At daybreak of the second day following the Battle of Glen, Daried and his surviving warriors rode slowly out of the town. Only eleven of his small company remained. Hycellyn lived, but Daried's friend Teriandyln had fallen in the fighting along the ridge, killed by the fey'ri's devils while he flung spell after spell with the last of his strength.
The elves found Nilsa and Earek waiting by the White Horse, standing alongside the road to see them off. Nilsa wore a plain blue dress, looking for all the world like a simple village girl instead of a skilled warrior and the heroine of her people. She stood stiffly, her back straight as an iron-beneath her blouse she was bandaged tightly around her ribs, where she'd taken a bad sword-cut during the fighting in the woods. But other than a faint wince of discomfort, she did not let her pain show.
"So that's it?" she asked Daried as he rode past. "You're just going to leave?"
Daried reined in his mount. The rest of his company halted as well, waiting on him. "Yes, I am afraid so," he said. "Vesilde Gaerth is drawing back from Ashabenford. We must rejoin the Crusade."
Earek stepped forward and met Daried's eyes. "Lord Selsherryn, I don't know how to say this, but I'll try: Thank you for helping us against the Chondathans. There is no way we can repay you for the lives of your comrades, other than to promise that we will honor their sacrifice for as long as we and our descendants live in this place."
"We were glad to help. And we will not forget the valor of the folk of Glen, Earek. I am sorry that I did not think better of your people before I had the honor to fight alongside them."
"It's never too late to make a fresh start," the tall innkeeper said with a smile. "Or a first impression."
What a uniquely human way of seeing the world, Daried thought. He shook his head. "One of many things I've learned in the last few days, I think. Good luck to you, Earek."
He picked up his reins again and started to urge his horse forward, but Nilsa held up her hand and stopped him.
"There is something else," she said. She picked up a long, thin bundle from the ground by her feet, and offered it to Daried. "The moonblade of your House."
The bladesinger stopped and stared at the girl for a long moment. Moving slowly and stiffly himself-he had more injuries than he could count, it seemed-he slid out of the saddle and faced her. He accepted the sword from her, but then he gravely bowed and placed it back in her hands.
"It is not mine now, Nilsa," he told her. "The moonblade answered to your hand. For hundreds of years it recognized no elf as a suitable heir to the Morvaerils. But it knew you when you set your hand on it, and it accepted you. Carry the Morvaeril blade for the rest of your days, Nilsa Harvalmeer. Raise your children to be true and strong, so that they will be worthy of it too."
"I can't accept this, Daried. I am not an elf!"
"It's not a question of whether you accept the blade, Nilsa. It's whether the blade accepts you." Daried smiled. "As for whether you are an elf, well, you are clearly elf enough. Perhaps there is more to being Tel'Quessir than an accident of heritage, and this moonblade intends to show us that."
Nilsa snorted, and wrapped the moonblade back in its blanket. "If you have that much faith in the sword's judgment, I guess I do too," she said. Then she leaned forward and kissed Daried on the cheek. "Take care of yourself, bladesinger. Sweet water and light laughter until we meet again."