He warmed still more over dinner, and finally came out with something entirely unexpected.
"I knew your father," Cheynar offered. "I mean, I met him— he was here just before he disappeared."
That electrified Kyrtian, and he could not conceal his shock. "What?" he exclaimed. "But—why didn't you—"
"Why didn't I say something?" Cheynar asked shrewdly. "I did, to Lord Dyran. I suppose he didn't think it important enough to pass it to your Lady Mother. But then, he wasn't at all pleased with what your father was hunting."
"The old devices the Ancestors brought with them." Kyrtian was torn between excitement and despair. If his mother had known where her husband had last been seen, would it have made a difference? Could they have found him still alive?
Cheynar nodded. "One of those—your father said—would put those of us with weak magic on a par with those who are stronger," he told Kyrtian. "I don't know if Lord Dyran knew that. Your father told me, at least in part because he saw all the mechanical devices I use around here instead of magic, but he might not have said anything to Dyran." He shrugged.
"And Lord Dyran was one of the Great Lords of the Council, anyway," Kyrtian sighed. "And my father and I—well, we're nothing like the equals of any Great Lord. I doubt that Lord Dyran even paid any heed to anything father said. You know." He half-smiled at Cheynar, hoping that Cheynar would warm a little further, and see himself in the same position as Kyrtian. "When we're useful, we're equals at the feast-table, but once they don't need us anymore ..."
Cheynar took the bait. "Probably he just thought that the man was half-crazed, if he even took time for a thought at all," Cheynar said, and with some sympathy. "But I can tell you this—"
He paused significantly.
"If you are going Wizard-hunting in those caves, you'll be walking in the steps of your father. Because the last time any¬one saw him—that was where he was going, too."
27
One set of items in their packs was immediately useful the moment they entered the forest: rain gear. Kyrtian had never seen so much rain in his life; he was glad that he'd checked on the climate when arranging for the sup¬plies. And oh, the advantage of being on equal terms with one's females in an elven household! He had not realized that silk could be made so completely waterproof. Evidently that oft-derided "women's magic" used for flower-sculpting had a great many other purposes that the women themselves knew but sel¬dom shared. He certainly didn't blame them, the "lords of cre¬ation" that Elvenlords considered themselves to be would probably greet such innovations as trivial and women kept pent up in their bowers, disregarded and discarded as toys them¬selves could hardly be expected to share such knowledge vol-
untarily. He could well imagine several disgruntled ladies sit¬ting around in their bower, contemplating their dripping men¬folk, and saying to each other with glee, "Well, why don't they just stop the rain?"
Rain-capes, with hoods snugged in around their faces, coats with an outer water-proofed surface beneath that, meant that what could have been a miserable situation was merely interest¬ing. Provided that one could manage somehow to see past the gloom, this was a truly unique forest.
More waterproofed sheets—which would later serve as shel¬ters for their three tents—covered the seven packs carried by the pack mules. This meant that their supplies and belongings were dry and would stay dry; no small consideration when, at the end of the day, they were going to be able to camp dry.
Too much water was, in the long run, better than too little. This could have been a hunt in the desert, and even Kyrtian was not entirely sure that magic would be enough to ensure water for everyone. Grels were the only option in the desert for trans¬portation, but neither he nor anyone on his estate knew any¬thing about grels. Their main problem here—and to some extent, in the caves—would be to prevent getting wet and cold with no way to get warm and dry again.
Game was certainly available, if not precisely plentiful. One would expect large game here, and yet the only animals that made an appearance were small game. Well, the advantage of traveling with foresters was that they didn't scorn small game in a futile search for something larger. The four foresters quickly traded their heavier bows and arrows for hand cross-bows, and took careful shots without ever seeming to aim. One by one, plump little bodies accumulated, tied to the cantles and pom¬mels of saddles.
The rain never stopped. It let up, from time to time, decreas¬ing to a mere drizzle, which percolated down through the trees and dripped from every limb, every needle. Then, when the rain resumed, it obscured everything in the distance, far or near, re¬ducing visibility to a few horse-lengths ahead of the lead rider.
Which was not Kyrtian.
He knew very well that he was not a forester. That was why
he rode in the dead middle of the string, with Lynder in front of him and Hobie behind, two of the young foresters ahead and two behind. It surprised him, a little, that an entire train of four¬teen animals could make so little noise, but the track that they followed, which led in the general direction of a purported cave-entrance, was ankle-deep in a layer of pine needles. They proceeded at an ambling walk, and not just to save the horses.
Up at the head of the string, Noet rode with his head slightly cocked, listening. Behind him, Shalvan concentrated on peer¬ing through the mist and rain. At the rear of the train, Halean and Resso shared the same duties.
Beyond the omnipresent sounds of rain plopping onto their capes, into the needle-bed, trickling down trunks, and dripping onto leaves, there were other sounds of life that Kyrtian took to be good signs that nothing else was stalking them. Once the crows got used to their presence, the birds stopped making alarm-calls and went back to their crow-business with only an occasional appearance as if to take note of their progress. Un¬expected showers of droplets heralded the passage of small birds through the branches, and little rustles betrayed the pas¬sage of those plump little squirrels and rabbits.
By mid-afternoon, Kyrtian knew his men were looking for a place to stop and make camp for the night. Already there was a change in the quality of light under these trees, and his nerves were just a trifle on edge. He didn't know why, just that there was something ... odd....
Noet held up a hand, and the entire cavalcade stopped. Now Kyrtian knew what had him on edge—the absolute absence of any sound other than the dripping of water. Even the crows were gone.
"I don't like this," Noet said, in a low voice, but one that car¬ried easily in the silence. "The horses and mules haven't no¬ticed anything, but—"
"But maybe that's the point, if this is a hunter," Resso replied. "If it works by ambush and stealth."
"Should we turn back?" Kyrtian asked.
"Yes—but slowly and carefully. Just turn your horses and mules in place, people. Shalvan and I will become rear-guard.
We'll stop back at that stream we crossed, and try following it for a while."
"With any luck, it'll lead us to the caves anyway," Hobie opined.
One by one, they turned their horses and drew the mules be¬hind them, the rearmost first. Shalvan and Noet already had their heavy bows out with arrows nocked to the strings. And as for Kyrtian—
His fingers tingled with power. At any moment, he could, and would, launch a levin-bolt into whatever might emerge.
"It's out there, all right," Shalvan said grimly, as Noet turned his horse and mule. "It's up the trail—off to one side, in the bushes. Every so often the bush shakes, and from the move¬ment, I'd say that it's about the size of a haywain. It's not mov¬ing much, though. I don't know if that's because it's not certain of us, or if it's territorial."
He turned his horse as Noet stood guard and they moved at the same leisurely pace they'd maintained all along, back up the way they had come. The back of Kyrtian's neck prickled. What would—whatever it was—think of its prey moving away from it?
"Uh-oh—" That was Resso, now in the lead, and the hair on Kyrtian's head literally stood straight up. Pacing deliberately towards them was—not one—an entire herd of alicorns. Their red eyes flashed, and the black stallion in the lead tossed his head with its wicked, slightly curved, spiral horn.
"Don't move," Halean said in a strangled voice.
Kyrtian had no intention of moving. One alicorn was danger¬ous; what was a herd? They were trapped, between a very visi¬ble menace an invisible one.
The alicorn stallion snorted and moved towards them. Kyrt¬ian wondered what was going on in those narrow heads. Should he fling a levin-bolt at them? But if he did, what would the thing behind them do? And wouldn't their horses spook if he did? None of them were war-trained—
None of them are war-trained. Mules will run until there's no pursuit. The mules are tethered to the horses—and vice versa.
"Give your horses free rein, and hang on," Kyrtian ordered,
feeling that sense of presence and danger at his back increas¬ing, just a little. "And duck your heads on the count of three."
The alicorn-stallion pawed the ground and bared its fangs.
"One. Two. Three!"
On the count of three, Kyrtian fired a kind of levin-bolt— straight up over their heads. It exploded in a blinding flash and a violent boom that actually shattered the nearby limbs of trees. The horses, as Kyrtian had hoped, bolted—and so did the alicorns.
The horses shot forward in the direction they had been fac¬ing, along the game trail. The alicorns, foe and prey forgotten, scattered in all directions, some off into the woods to either side of the trail, some turning and fleeing, and three, following the stallion, charging head-down towards them. At the last mo¬ment, the alicorns veered a little to the left, and the hysterical horses to the right.
Kyrtian hung onto his mount with every bit of strength that arms and legs possessed, ducking low along its neck to keep from being knocked out of his saddle by low-hanging boughs. Hooves thundered all around him; even if the horses weren't sticking to the game-trail, they were at least staying together. Behind him he heard a roar, and the battle-scream of an al-icorn, but whatever was going on would have to remain a mystery.
His heart raced, his hands and legs ached, and he clenched his teeth; he couldn't see what was happening or where they were going. His mount's mane lashed his face until his eyes watered.
Then, sooner than he'd thought, he felt the horse beginning to slow, felt a weight tugging at the lead-rein fastened to the saddle. The horse didn't like it; he tried to surge forward. The mule wasn't having any.
Gradually, the mule won. The headlong gallop slowed to a canter, a trot, and finally, the horse's sides heaving and sweat pouring from his neck and shoulders, a walk. Kyrtian took up the slack in the reins and brought his mount to a stop, and looked around.
The rain had slackened again, and through the mizzle, he
counted his men scattered among the trees and quickly came up with the right number of riders and pack mules.
"Ancestors!" he breathed, in profoundest relief. The men said nothing; they simply guided their weary beasts back to¬wards him until once again they formed a coherent group.
"Everyone all right?" he asked, as their horses stood with heads hanging, and flanks a-foam with sweat. Only the mules looked unperturbed.
"I've been worse," replied Noet laconically. "Gonna kill whoever designed this saddle with a pommel right where it don't belong, though."
Noet did look a little pale, and in a certain amount of pain. Kyrtian winced, and hastily changed the subject. "Does anyone know where we are?"
"We bolted in the general direction of where we wanted to go," reported Shalvan. "So the stream should still be that way—" he pointed with his chin, rather than his hand. "We might as well get on with it, the horses aren't going to be the better for standing in the cold and rain, and they're going to need water after this."
Once again they formed up, but this time not in single file since they weren't following a trail; Halean rode on the right flank and Resso on the left. And, not too much later, they came to the stream, much to everyone's relief.
There wasn't much time before nightfall, and with the over¬cast skies and the forest all around, darkness would come soon. They quickly made camp, with Kyrtian tending to the fire-making chores. They pitched their three tents in a triangle, with the fire in the center. Once the tents were pitched and Resso took up the cooking, the rest gathered more firewood while Kyrtian ran a circle of mage-lights around the tents to stand be¬tween them and whatever was in the woods or across the stream. As firewood was brought in, he stacked it near enough to the fire that it stood a decent chance of drying out some be¬fore it was used.
The last thing he did was to run a string hung with small bells around the trunks of trees beyond the glow of the magelight at
about ankle-height. Anything that brushed against that string would set the bells jingling.
"Do you think we need to worry about something coming in from above?" he asked Noet, with a frown of concern.
Noet glanced up. "Not through branches that thick," he replied. "I wouldn't think, anyway."
Darkness, as Kyrtian had anticipated, came quickly. They tethered the horses—and tethered the mules to the horses— within the circle of magelight. The rain actually stopped once darkness fell, and as they gathered around their fire, Kyrtian felt their mutual fear of what lurked outside that magic circle draw¬ing them all together despite rank and race.
Resso had managed to grill the day's catch tastily, with a minimum of burning, skewered on twigs over the fire. With that and journey-cake, and sweet water from the stream at their backs, they made a satisfying meal. They had thrown the bones into the fire and were ready to divide the night into watches, when a voice from the darkness saluted them.