Into the Forge

Chapter 33

"In the fore is a banner," whispered Loric.

"What sigil does it bear?" breathed Tipperton.

"A circle-"

Tip's stomach clenched. A ring of fire?

"-a silver circle-"

Not fire!

"-on a field of blue."

Vail stepped forward in the moonlight. "Hdl, men of Riamon!" she called. "We are of Darda Erynian, the Great Greenhall!"

A single arrow was loosed and hissed upslope wide of the mark-Vail stood fast-and someone nigh the head of the column barked a harsh command: "Staande houden!"

Weapons were lowered yet remained in hand.

"Show yourselves all!" demanded the voice.

"We are but three," called Vail.

Now Loric and Tipperton stepped forward.

"You have a child with you?"

"I am no child," cried Tipperton, raising his bow in one hand overhead-and below like weapons were whipped up and aimed-"but a Warrow instead."

"Ik zeggen staande houden!" roared the voice, and all weapons below were lowered again, Tipperton hastily lowering his own.

"Did you say one of the Volkskleini Smallfolk?"

"I don't know whether I am one of those, but I am a Warrow."

There was a whispered word or two, and then: "I did not know that Waldans lived in the Blackwood."

Now Loric spoke. "They do not. Sir Tipperton is from the Wilderland beyond the Grimwall, and I am of late from the Hidden Stand, while Dara Vail is a Dylvana from Darda Erynian-that which thou dost name Blackwood."

"And your name?"

"He is Lord Loric, Lian Guardian," said Tipperton, then added, "And just who by the millstone are you?"

"He's a Waldan, all right," said someone below, "like those in Springwater."

Tip's heart clenched to hear that name, for Springwater had been Rynna's village.

"I am Lord Loden of Dael," replied the man.

"Well, my Lord Loden," said Dara Vail, " 'tis meet thou and thine army have chanced upon us this eve, or we upon ye, for mayhap we have common cause 'gainst a dark foe."

"If you oppose Modru and his ilk, then our cause is indeed shared. We welcome you three into our ranks, for though we are but a brigade, we go to harass a Horde, and all are gladly received who would take up arms against the foe."

"Rather than a trio, wouldst thou prefer fifteen hundred instead?"

"Fifteen hundred? Lady, do you jest?"

"Nay, Lord Loden, I do not."

There was a hurried conference below, and several figures dismounted and started up the incline, while the rest of the column moved on through the draw and away.

Tipperton could see that one of those walking upslope stood a head shorter than the others, yet had shoulders half again as broad. "That one's a Dwarf," he murmured unto himself.

"Aye, he is at that," said Loric.

"Good!" said Loden, the man in chain mail, his helm at his side, his chain coif cast back, revealing honey-gold hair cut short. His pale blue eyes glittered in the light of the waning moon. " 'Tis Fortune indeed that brought us together, for with the joining of our forces we can take the Spawn head-on."

"My Prince," said one of Loden's escorts, an elder man with a white beard.

Prince? His eyebrows raised, Tipperton glanced from Loden to Loric, and the Elf merely shrugged.

"Yes, Tain," replied Loden, turning to the aide.

"My Prince, they are a full Horde-ten thousand Spawn-and even with the joining of our forces we will be but one hundred ten score."

"You forget the Chakka," growled the Dwarf, taking off his plain helm of black-iron and smoothing back stray strands of his dark brown hair from his dark eyes. "With the army of Elves and Baeron and Daelsmen attacking from this side, and the Chakka from the other, we'll trap them between and shatter them like rotten rock."

"And how would you coordinate such an attack, Lord Bekki?" asked Tain.

A guarded look came over Bekki's features and he clapped the helm back onto his head. "There is a way, never fear."

Into Tipperton's mind flashed the memory of the identical look on Raggi's face when Ralk had ordered him to guide the party to the Walkover, a Dwarven secret.

Tip turned to Loric and whispered, "Remember va Chuka."

Loric looked at the Waerling and smiled, then turned to Bekki. "Bekki, en ke, det ta a Chakka na? "

Bekki's eyes widened, and he replied, "Det ta."

Loric turned up a hand. "A na ke ein, ti? "

Bekki nodded, saying, " Ti."

"Kala!" exclaimed Loric, then turned to the others. "Indeed, when we strike, so will the Drimma."

"How do we kn-?" Tain started to ask…

… but Loden held up a hand to stop the oldster's query. "The word of a Dwarf, the word of a Guardian, 'tis enough."

"But-"

"Accept it, Tain."

Tain bowed his head. "As you will, my Prince."

Loden turned to Vail. "We must get word of our alliance to your Coron and to the Chieftain of the Baeron."

Vail glanced at Loric and then said, "I will ride back, for I am swiftest ahorse."

"What about Arylin?" asked Tip. "She should be coming soon."

"Not until late on the morrow," replied Vail. "I can be back there before then."

At a raised eyebrow from the Prince, Tip said, "Arylin is our go-between, that is, between us on far point and our army."

"Ah," said Loden, "a runner." Loden turned to a young man at his side. "Brandt, I would have you go with Dara Vail as my emissary."

"But, brother, I would be at your side," protested the youth. Even as he said it, he looked about, his eye passing over Tain and lighting on Bekki. "Let Bekki go instead, and then he can explain how he'll arrange it so that we crack them like rotten stone. We've plenty of horses he can use."

Bekki blenched and threw out his hands. "Nay, Prince Brandt, I'll not ride a horse."

Tip looked at Bekki in puzzlement. Here is another Dwarven warrior who will not ride a horse. Surely they are not afrai "Brandt, I have spoken," snapped Loden. "You will go in my stead, for you know our strengths and the way to our hidden camp. Too, these wains they bring, you can guide them the easiest course to a rendezvous with us."

At dawn, Vail and Brandt set out southward, trailing two horses apiece. Standing atop the hill in a brisk autumn wind, Tip watched them go, and when they reached the bottom of the hill and rounded the shoulder of another, Tip turned to Loric. "What now?"

Loric raised an eyebrow at Loden, and the Prince said, "Now, Waldan, we go to our own hidden stand."

Drawing the packhorse behind, Tipperton and Loric rode after Loden and Tain and Bekki down the north slope of the hill and into the draw, and together they followed the shallow gully as it wended northwesterly and into the reaches of the Rimmen Mountains.

As they rode, Bekki fell back alongside Loric. "You speak Chakur." His words were a statement and not a question.

"Aye," replied Loric. "The result of a shipwreck long past, where the only other survivor was a Dwarf named Kelek. He taught me Chakur; I taught him Sylva."

"He must have trusted you well."

"71 Ere the wreck we had traveled together for a number of years, and often we fought back to back. He saved my life many a time."

Bekki looked at Loric intently, as if to gauge something deep within. "Og at da haun ve vain efil dat? "

Loric laughed. "We saved each other so many times we lost count."

"How did you get off the island?" asked Tipperton.

"Ha, now there's a tale:

"The island though moderately large was limited, with little wood, and we spent most of our time foraging in the sea for food: spearing in tidal pools or netting in surf that which we would eat-nets which I made from rock-beaten fiber of a thorny island weed. Birds, too, we netted, and on the high rocky cliffs we raided their nests. Kelek was a splendid climber, and did most of the fetching of eggs. And there was a side-walking blue crab we favored, yet it was a treat most rare.

"One day in the deepest of the pools we came across a trapped shark, and it provided us with meat for many a meal, though shark jerky is not the best of food.

"Yet it was the skin which we prized the most, for if we could fetch several more like it, we could use the hide to make a boat, could we find something with which to make the frame.

"And luck was with us, for no sooner did we see our need than within a moon or two, we found beached on one end of the island the remains of what the Fjordlanders call a 'nahvalr.' "

"A what?" asked Tipperton.

"A nahvalr: 'tis a kind of whale, with a spotted pelt and each male has long, spiral-twisted tusk jutting out from the left side of its head. They live in the icy brine of the far north. What this one was doing in the waters of the Bright Sea, I cannot say, yet there it was, what remained of it, that is, rolling in the surf."

"Oh," said Tip. "-Was this one a male?"

"Aye, for its tusk jutted out like that of a horned horse, only longer, much longer."

Tipperton's eyes widened. "Horned hor-?"

"Hush, Waeran," growled Bekki as the wind swirled 'round. "Let him finish."

Tipperton cocked an eye at Bekki, but held his tongue.

"As to what had slain this nahvalr, I cannot say, for the evidence was gone, there being little left but ivory bones and shreds of rotted meat. -The fish and the crabs had done much of their work, though there was yet some to do.

" 'There is our boat,' I said to Kelek, and down to the skeleton we ran. The stench was quite noisome, yet gulping our breaths we dragged it well up out of the water and into the grasses above. I couldn't have done so by myself, but Kelek was strong beyond his stature.

"For the next several days we dined on crab meat, for they couldn't resist the redolent reek on the air… and neither could the birds. And we let them finish the task of stripping the remains to the bone.

"It took another year altogether to lure enough sharks one by one into the deep tidal pool and slay them for their skins, though the meat was not wasted.

"Finally, with nahvalr bones for our frame, bound together with thongs of sharkhide, and with sewn-together shark skins stretched over all and lashed onto the frame, and with a caulk made of bird guano and fish oil and fiber, we were at last ready to set sail, rainwater and jerky and a few live crabs and an egg or two as our supplies.

"No sooner had we shoved off than the craft began to leak badly, but bailing with frond cups and rowing with weed-woven oars, and with Kelek cursing at the top of his lungs in Chakur, we paddled our sinking, shark-skinned, whale-boned boat below the bird cliffs and 'round the headland only to find Aravan's great ship, the swift Eroean, anchored in the small inlet on the southern end of the isle."

Loric burst into gales of laughter, Tipperton joining in. Bekki looked at them for some moments, and then burst into laughter as well. Riding in the lead, Prince Loden looked over his shoulder, and Tain at his side put his fingers to his lips in a shushing motion and snapped, "Do you want to bring the Spawn down on us? They can hear you all the way to Mineholt North."

This only caused Bekki to laugh all the harder, Loric and Tipperton as well.

It was some time ere they got control of themselves, and even then they broke out into suppressed chortles.

"So the boat did you absolutely no good, eh?" asked Tip after a while.

"Oh, no, to the contrary, Tipperton, it did us a wealth of good: not only did it keep us busy for a year or so, it also proved to be quite profitable, for when Aravan hauled us aboard, 'Nahvalr ivory,' he said upon seeing the necklace Kelek had made of the teeth. 'Have you the tusk as well?' And when we showed it to him, he marveled at its length and perfection, and told us the horn and the remainder of the ivory would bring a small fortune in the city of Jan-jong, there on the Jinga Sea, his next port of call, it seems.

"And so, rather than rowing across the Bright Sea in a leaky, sinking boat, we sailed with Aravan and his forty men and forty Dwarves, the crew of the Eroean.

"In Janjong, Kelek signed on with Aravan as a member of the Drimmen warband, but I went my separate way. In the succeeding seasons he rose to be second in command, I believe."

"Did you ever see him again?"

Loric sighed. "Nay. He remained with Aravan and sailed on the Eroean's last voyage. It was in the time of the destruction of Rwn, and Kelek acquitted himself most honorably in the final battle, though he did not survive to reach his beloved Red Hills again. There at the place of his death, they set a great pyre burning, and he and his other fallen comrades were sung up to the sky."

They rode onward in silence, the laughter of moments before lost on the swirling wind.

Gradually the land turned to stone, and crags jutted up all 'round. And they came to an opening between two bluffs, and here Loden signed for all to stop and he whistled as would a meadow lark; there came a call in return, and Loden spurred forward, the others following, and they rode through a short canyon to emerge on a wide slope. Up the slope Loden led them, and they came to a broad plateau ringed 'round by mountains, where they found the seven hundred armed and armored Daelsmen ensconced in a fire-less camp.

Near midmorn, as he fared in the vanguard, Beau saw three riders approaching from the north. And as they drew nigh, he could see that one was Vail, one was Arylin, and the other someone unknown.

With his heart thudding, "Oh, my," he said to Melor at hand, "Tip's not with her and neither is Loric. What do you suppose has gone wrong?"

"Mayhap nought," said Melor.

"Mayhap everything," replied Beau, his knuckles white 'gainst the reins, and he turned to make certain his medical satchel was affixed to his rear cantle.

And Melor said, "Seek not to see through muddy waters, my friend, but wait until the bourne runs clear."

"What?"

"I merely advise that we not-"

"Oh, I see," said Beau. "As my Aunt Rose always said, 'a bridge is easiest trod when underfoot.' "

Melor smiled. "Aye."

Beau shaded his eyes with a hand and peered northward at the three oncoming riders. "Can't their horses go any faster?"

Again Melor smiled, but worry brooded deep within his gaze as well.

Vail swung out wide and 'round, the others following, until all paced alongside Ruar. "My Coron, may I present Lord Brandt, son of King Enrik of Riamon, and emissary of his brother, Lord Loden, Prince of Dael." Now she turned to the man. "Lord Brandt, I present Coron Ruar of Darda Erynian. Too, I present Lord Gara, Chieftain of the Baeron of" the Great Greenhall."

Beau looked at the youth dressed in light chain, a sword at his side, his coppery hair cut short.

"We bring good news, my Coron," continued Vail. "Thirty-five score warriors of Dael wait to join us to free Mineholt North."

Beau's eyes widened. Thirty-five score? Seven hundred men? Oh, my, that is good news indeed. And here I thought something gone wrong-Tip lying wounded or worse.

"Kala!" declared Ruar, his face breaking into a smile. "And welcome, Lord Brandt, son of Enrik, the help you bring most welcome as well."

Loric and Tipperton spent the remainder of the morning telling what news they held, and of Tipperton's mission to King Agron, and Loden and Bekki traded their news in return:

The Foul Folk, it seemed, had come into the ring of the Rimmen Mountains through the wide breech at Bridgeton, there on the southeastern quadrant of the circular mountain range.

Loden glanced over at Tip and Loric. "Though they bypassed Bridgeton, 'tis apparent now by your account that some marched on to Rimmen Gape, where they razed Brae-ton, while others came to set siege to Mineholt North."

"What of the town of Dael, did they do no harm there?"

Loden shook his head. "They marched right past, as if it held no interest whatsoever."

Loric frowned. "Hmm. 'Tis not like Modru to leave such in his wake. Something foul is afoot, I ween. Mayhap he hopes to draw ye out of the town, and when it lies defenseless, then he will strike."

Again Loden shook his head. "My sire and other brothers yet command an army within that walled city. It is well protected."

"What of Trolls?"

"Flames await them should they come. Caltrops too."

Loric nodded. Oil fires was one defense against the behemoths. The spikes another.

"Say," said Tip, looking at his sheaves of hand-drawn maps, "if they came through at Bridgeton, that means they came into the ring from the east."

"Aye," said Loric. "They would not approach from the west, for there Darda Erynian lies, and they think it a bane."

"No, no, that's not what I was getting at, Loric. Instead it is this: if they came down from the Grimwall and in from the east, that means they swarmed through Aven."

Bekki turned up a hand. "And…?"

Tip let out an exasperated breath. "Oh, Bekki, it's Dendor in Aven where I am bound, and if it's full of maggot-folk…"

Bekki leaned over and touched a finger to Tipperton's sketch. "They could have come from the Skarpal Mountains instead-east and south of the ring."

"Adon," growled Tipperton, "down from the north or up from the south, how are we to know?"

Tip looked across at Loric and Loden, and Elf and man both shrugged, but Bekki said, "Waldan, you will discover whether or not the Grg are in Aven when you finally go there to deliver the coin."

"But there's nothing that way except mountains," said Arylin.

"Not so, my Lady," replied Brandt. "Beyond that craggy uplift is a passage through, one the wagons can manage. And though we will swing back nigh a league, it will save half a day overall."

Arylin glanced at Vail and then Ruar, but it was Gara who said, "Lead on, Lord Brandt. The wagons will follow you." Gara turned to a Baeran at hand. "Durul, ride back to the train and tell Wagonleader Bwen we follow this man."

Durul shook his head and grinned. "Oh, but won't we learn new words from Bwen, words hot enough to blister a hide when she discovers we need curl back a league to reach this passage."

Nigh eventide, Bekki and Loden came to Tipperton and Loric, and Loden said, "I would have you accompany us to see the foe. Then you can both advise the Dylvana Coron and Chieftain of the Baeron whenever they come."

Tip set aside his lute. "When do we go?"

"Now," rasped Bekki, clapping his plain black-iron helm onto his head.

Tip reached for the lute bags. "I'll have my pony saddled in a trice."

"We go afoot, Waldan," said Loden.

Tip nodded as he cinched tight the velvet bag.

"We go armed and armored as well," added Bekki, hefting a war hammer, its poll face blunt, its peen a spike, and a thick blade in front for stabbing.

Moments later, they headed easterly up the slope of the flanking mountain.

It was twilight when the last of the wagons finally emerged from the long canyon, and Beau sighed in relief, for it had been nothing but a long trap should the Foul Folk have fallen upon them.

Yet both Ruar and Gara had sent scouts through, some up on the flanks above; Brandt had said they could ride atop the walls, though in places it would be somewhat perilous. But he assured all that he had hunted ahorse up there, and indeed it could be ridden… and so it was.

And now as the wagons trundled out and to a camp in the valley, where pickets warded all 'round, a crisp breeze sprang up and swirled Beau's cloak, and he shivered in the chill air.

It was nigh midnight with a quarter moon rising among scudding clouds, when Tipperton and Loric and Loden and Bekki came through a scattering of pines and to the top of the last rough ridge, while all 'round a cold wind twined.

"There," growled Bekki, pointing at the dale below. Yet his words were unneeded, for hundreds of fires burned in the lowland. "The Grg."

Tipperton could smell smoke from the campfires clinging to the curling air, and now and again when the breeze blew just right he could hear the beat of drums.

"A full Horde," gritted Loden, "in Riamon."

"Where is the mineholt?" asked Tipperton.

"Leftward, at the root of the vale," said Bekki, pointing again.

Tip's gaze followed Bekki's outstretched arm. Against the stone of the mountain he saw-"That dull gleam, what is it? The mineholt?"

"Aye," replied Bekki. "The shut gates cast back the light of their fires."

"Tell me, Bekki," said Tipperton, "just how did you come to be outside when all your kindred are shut within? I mean-"

"Hist!" shushed Loric, and he cocked his head this way and that in the twisting wind, drums now and then sounding. "Down!"

Along with the others, Tipperton dropped to the rugged ground where moonshadows lay. His heart in his throat, he listened intently, but heard nought but the wreathing air and the sound of his own pulsing blood. He turned to Loric and breathed, "What is it?"

"Rupt," replied Loric, pointing down the ridge, "a patrol, and they come this way."

Tipperton looked rightward, and just topping a rise no more than thirty paces off and advancing toward them came trodding an armed squad of Spawn-a dozen altogether.

Down beside Tipperton, Bekki growled and hefted his war hammer, and Loric and Loden drew swords. With trembling fingers Tip fumbled for an arrow as the maggot-folk came tramping on.