Authors: Joshua Palmatier
They’d only moved a short distance when, with a warning splatter of light mist in their faces, it began to rain.
“Oh, great,” Karen said, before she hunched her shoulders and bowed her head.
Colin was instantly drenched in the downpour, spluttering as the frigid water sluiced down his back. Holding Karen a little tighter, he plowed forward, keeping the wagon close to his left side.
They struggled through the storm, the lightning making the surrounding landscape harsh and ethereal, the grasses thrashing in the wind and rain, swirling like the ocean. During the first hour, Colin saw two of the wagons close by, but after that the worst of the lightning moved farther west, and any sign of the other groups in the wagon train vanished into the darkness. They were enfolded by torrential rain, by darkness, by the receding sound of thunder and the occasional crack of a strike nearby. Once he thought he saw the vibrant orange glow of a lantern’s light out in the grass, but the image was fleeting, lost in the sheets of rain before he could turn and focus on it. And once he thought he heard shouting, close, but the wind tore the sounds away.
He lost track of time, his feet stumbling over each other, over stones and ridges of land he couldn’t see, but he kept close to the wagon, reached out and brushed its side to make certain it was still there, even though he could hear the occasional creak of the wheels as they moved. At one point, the guardsman appeared out of nowhere, his horse snorting and stamping, and he shouted, “Have you seen Peg? Either of you?” When both Colin and Karen shouted no, he swore and rode past them. Colin heard him asking the rest of the group, catching only a word here and there, the rest torn away by the wind. He traded a grim look with Karen, and they trudged on. If Peg was lost, there was no hope of finding her until after the storm ended.
And they couldn’t stop. Not with the dwarren behind them. When the storm finally broke, the rain fading to a drizzle, then halting entirely, it was already midmorning, the light a pale, thin gray as clouds scudded by overhead. Colin glanced up into that sky, clothes soaked with chill water, hair plastered to his face, then turned toward Karen, shivering slightly at his side as she moved forward, but still holding tight to his arm. Her face was blank, her head bent, eyes on the grass that had been beaten flat by the rain.
He shook her gently. She turned exhausted eyes on him, her face white.
“It’s over,” he said.
The words took a moment to sink in, and then her steady footsteps faltered and she halted. She looked up into the sky, where patches of blue sky had begun to peek through as the clouds began to tatter.
She smiled. It was a weary smile, haggard and torn from lack of sleep, but it was still beautiful.
The guardsman galloped up from where the wagon had drawn to a halt at the top of a knoll. “Look for the other wagons. We need to regroup as quickly as possible. And keep an eye out for Peg. She got separated from the wagon during the storm.”
Colin nodded as the guardsman moved on, then turned to scan the horizon. To the east, the plains sloped down from the ridge they stood on, the land rumpled, before hitting a flat area edged with darkness. In the vague light, it took Colin a moment to realize that the dark stain on the plains wasn’t a shadow but a forest of trees, what looked like pines, the dark green, needled branches blowing in the wind. The forest stretched into the distance, both to the east and curving around to the south where the plains broke into low hills.
Movement caught his attention, and he tore his gaze away from the trees. “I see one of the wagons,” he shouted.
“Where?” the Armory guardsman asked, and Colin pointed as he brought his horse up to Colin’s side.
“There. Between us and the forest. They just rose up out of that dip.”
The guardsman sighed with relief, a sound that didn’t carry far at all.
“There are two more to the north,” Karen said. “They’re already headed toward us.”
Colin turned away from the east and the darkness of the forest, caught sight of the two wagons Karen had spotted—
And then someone behind them muttered, “Holy Diermani protect us. Look!”
Everyone spun to where one of the women in the group pointed to the west. The storm still raged on the horizon, the black clouds lit from within by lightning above, rain and the cloud’s darker shadow completely obscuring the plains below.
But as Colin watched, as the storm receded, something emerged from that shadow.
The dwarren. Thousands of them. Headed straight for the wagons. Fast.
The guardsman swore, and Colin felt his stomach clench tight. “Barte!” the guardsman spat. The driver of the wagon leaned out from the side. “Get the damn wagon moving! Head toward the two wagons to the north! The dwarren are right behind us!”
Barte’s pudgy face turned toward the west, his eyes going wide as he caught sight of the dwarren army, and then he vanished, the wagon shaking as he dropped back into his seat. Colin heard him shout at the horses, and the wagon rolled forward, but slowly. Far too slowly. The horses had been worked almost to their limit.
The guardsman watched the wagon begin ambling down the far side of the ridge, glanced toward the other two wagons, then back toward the dwarren, and he swore again, more vehemently.
“Someone’s riding hard toward us from the other two wagons,” Karen said. She frowned as she squinted into the distance. “I think it’s your father, Colin. And Walter. The Alvritshai are right behind them on foot. I don’t see Arten.”
The guardsman kneed his horse and took off toward the figures, surging out ahead of them, his horse’s hooves kicking up clods of dirt behind him. Frowning, Colin grabbed Karen’s hand and said, “Come on.”
They ran forward, slipping in the wet grass on the steep slope, but they outpaced the wagon and the rest of those walking beside it. Ahead, the guardsman and the others met. The guardsman shook his head, pointed back over the ridge. Everyone turned in that direction, including the Alvritshai, faces grim, and then Colin and Karen were close enough to catch the conversation.
“—we can’t,” his father was saying. “The reason we’re headed toward you is there’s another dwarren force to the north. They’re converging here.”
“What about the Alvritshai?” Walter spat, his face dark. But even though his words were harsh, there was a look of desperation around his eyes.
Tom frowned. “They’re farther to the north, out of the dwarren’s path.”
For the first time, Colin noticed that Aeren and Eraeth had been joined by two other Alvritshai, both with bows strung and ready, their focus on the plains.
Looking at Aeren, whose gaze held his, the skin around his eyes tight with concern, Colin said, “Maybe we should join them. Maybe they can protect us.”
But his father was already shaking his head. “We can’t. We’ll never make it in time, the dwarren are too close. We’ll have to go east, take refuge in the forest, hope that the dwarren are more concerned with their own fight than with us.”
Aeren suddenly stepped forward, his gaze flicking back and forth between Colin and his father. “No. No trees.”
“Why not?”
Aeren turned his full attention on Tom with an intensity Colin hadn’t seen there before, even during their formal first meeting, when they’d shared food and drink. “No trees. Sukrael there.”
At the word sukrael, the other Alvritshai shifted, unsettled. “Sukrael?”
Aeren motioned with his hands. “Sukrael,” he said in frustration, in impatience, then pointed to the ground. “Sukrael!”
Everyone looked to where Aeren pointed in confusion. “He’s pointing to your shadow,” Karen said, hesitantly.
“What the hell does that mean?” Walter asked. Behind him, the two wagons they’d been escorting topped the rise and trundled down toward them.
“It doesn’t matter,” Tom said, his back straightening as he saw his wife at the head of the wagons, her eyes wide with fear. “We’re out of time.”
He began to turn, but Aeren’s hand suddenly latched onto his arm, held him in place, even though he sat on a horse. The other Alvritshai sucked in a sharp, stunned breath, their faces openly shocked, and Colin suddenly realized that none of the Alvritshai had ever touched any of them, had never gotten close enough except to hand over food. Now, Eraeth and the others took an uncertain step away from Aeren.
“No trees.”
The words hung in the tense air. The guardsman’s hand had fallen to his sword’s hilt. The other Alvritshai—those with bows nocked—had shifted, their shock at Aeren’s action gone now, their focus on the guardsman. The tableau held, Tom staring down into Aeren’s face. Colin couldn’t see what his father saw, but he’d heard the warning in Aeren’s voice, could see the cold, rigid tension emanating from the Alvritshai’s body.
And then Ana barked, “Tom! They’re right behind us!”
Tom slid out of Aeren’s grasp, and in a harsh voice, tinged with apology, he said, “We have no choice.”
He broke his gaze with Aeren, spun toward the two wagons. “Sam! Paul! Head toward the forest! The dwarren are right behind Colin’s group as well! The forest is our only chance!”
The wagons turned instantly, Ana pivoting to wave everyone on foot in that direction. People moaned, all of them looking as exhausted as Colin felt, wet and weary, but edged with fear.
The guardsman yanked his horse’s reins hard. “Barte!” he shouted. “Head west, head toward the forest!” But Barte couldn’t hear him. With a muttered curse, he sped off, his horse leaping forward as he dug in his heels.
Eraeth snorted, said something obviously derisive to Aeren’s back. Aeren’s face darkened, and he called something heated in reply, not even turning, something that made Eraeth bow his head in shame.
Tom turned, brow furrowed. Then he nodded in Aeren’s direction, ignoring the cold look Eraeth cast him. “Thank you. For everything.”
Aeren nodded in return.
Colin felt his father’s gaze fall on him, and something stabbed deep down into his gut at the despair he saw there. He’d never seen a look like that on his father’s face before. Not even in Portstown.
“Colin,” he said, his horse shifting closer, sensing its rider’s tension. “Stay with the others. Help them as best you can.”
It seemed he would say something more, but he shook his head instead. Then he and Walter spun their horses and rejoined the wagons. Overhead, the clouds began to clear completely, the gray sunlight strengthening to a late summer yellow, vibrant on the rainwashed grass all around. Colin felt it against his skin, felt it touch his hair, but he discovered it didn’t warm him. It should have, but it didn’t. Coldness had seeped into him—from the rain, the storm, the nightlong trek through the darkness—a coldness that penetrated deep, to his very bones. A coldness he’d seen in his father’s eyes.
Aeren looked toward him, stepped close and grabbed his shoulders, locked eyes with him. “No trees,” he said, adamantly, his hands tightening. And then, softly, sadly, “No trees.”
“No trees,” Colin repeated.
Aeren let his hands drop from Colin’s shoulders, reluctantly.
At his side, Karen shifted. “Colin.” One word. But Colin heard the terror in it, the need to move, to run.
“Let’s go,” he said, grabbing Karen’s hand, but refusing to look in her eyes. He didn’t want her to see what he’d seen in his father’s eyes, didn’t want her to feel as cold as he did.
They ran, back toward Barte and the wagon, now angled toward the dark line of the forest to their left, still shuddering down the slope of the ridge, the others scattered around it, all of them running, sprinting toward the safety of the forest. Colin glanced back over his shoulder, saw the Alvritshai standing alone on the plains, Eraeth trying to get Aeren to move, Aeren watching them retreat stoically, his expression troubled.
And then more movement caught his eye. Farther out on the plains, farther east, he saw the fifth wagon as it crested another ridge, silhouetted against the cloud-driven sky a moment before it plunged down the side of the slope toward them. Colin’s heart leaped, and he skidded to a halt and cried out. A wordless shout, cut off as Karen’s hand was wrenched from his own and they both stumbled to the grass.
“Colin!” Karen gasped, her breath harsh from running.
Colin ignored her, cupped his hands around his mouth as he bellowed, “The other wagon!” Ahead of them, the guardsman pulled his mount to a halt, frowning back at him, and Colin shouted, “It’s the other wagon!” as he turned and pointed.
The Alvritshai had vanished.
The sudden elation over seeing the other wagon died on Colin’s lips.
“Diermani’s balls,” he whispered to himself.
To the north, on the ridge to the right of the fifth wagon, the dwarren were spilling down the slope, riding their gaezels hard. A sudden cacophony of noise erupted from the dwarren as they spotted the wagon, a battle cry ripped from a thousand throats, threaded through with a sudden frenzy of drums, with the thunder of a thousand gaezels hooves and hundreds of dwarren feet pounding into the grassland as they charged. Colin couldn’t see any difference between this group of dwarren and the ones they’d run into near the underground river, not at this distance, but it didn’t matter. The group of dwarren that had attacked them appeared on the ridge to the southeast, raising their own battle cry and they charged down into the dip, the wagon trapped between them.
At his side, Karen gasped and scrambled to her feet. She tugged on his shoulder. “Colin, we have to go.” But Colin didn’t move, rooted to the spot in horror. He watched as the driver of the wagon realized the dwarren were close, watched as he lashed the horses, trying to get them to run faster. Those on foot were scattered to the sides and behind, running as fast as they possibly could, a few of the men out in front of the wagon itself. One of the women stumbled and fell, her shout faint with distance, almost lost in the thundering charge of the dwarren armies—
And then, like an ocean wave, the dwarren army to the north struck, the charging gaezels overrunning the wagon, smothering them, the people on foot lost instantly, trampled beneath a thousand hooves. The wagon remained in sight for another breath, but then the driver was pulled from his seat, the horses themselves cut down and dragged beneath the horrendous tide of dwarren. The hides that covered the wagon shuddered and jerked as the dwarren surged around it, and then gave way, the faint screams of children piercing the general roar on the plains.