When Penrys woke in the dim light before the sun’s rising, for a moment she thought she was still hiding in the stand of bushes, abandoned by Dzantig, until the differences in the birdsong registered. Country birds, not town ones.
Her shield still held. Is that a permanent improvement, or can I thank whatever contribution Vladzan made to the chain’s power? I wonder how long the stolen power lasts?
She dressed quickly, settling Tak Tuzap’s gifts on her belt. She’d ended up using a cord around the breeches and cutting down the belt for the tunic with his knife, and when she’d made to give it back to him, he’d pressed it on her, with its sheath.
“You’ll be needing this more than me, minochi. And this, too—I brought it for you.”
He’d taken off his own belt, and revealed the weapon that had been dangling from it—a leather-sheathed ax, for throwing or one-handed fighting. Engraved whirlwinds decorated the freshly-sharpened blade, and the bison-horn grips were well-worn.
“That’s my da’s grandsire’s parkap, from off my uncle’s wall. Hasn’t seen war for a while, so I thought now would be a good time.”
“You were going to carry that for yourself,” she’d accused.
“This is better. You take it.”
She hadn’t told him she’d bring it back—she didn’t want to raise that hope—so she’d just bowed her head to him and slipped it onto her cut-down belt.
Now she adjusted both knife and ax until they hung comfortably with her smallest water bottle and a small pouch for food. She’d practiced drawing the ax until she was satisfied. The grip was a bit large in her hand, but not unusably so.
With her pack ready on the ground beside her, she sat cross-legged to search.
The road had forked the night before, one branch following the river to the southwest through the farms, toward Linit Kungzet at the border, and the other running along the base of the Craggies straight west. She’d gambled that a need for water would make the river route more appealing to the Voice, and if she was wrong about him coming east, it would also be the road he would take west into Nagthari. She’d made her camp accordingly in the woods just south of the river road, a couple of miles past the fork, hoping for more range in the morning to help her make a decision.
Now she reached first southeast toward Kunchik. Today she could faintly feel it, several miles away, the concentrated mind-glows making a dim background for the nearer minds she found as she started to swing more to the east, familiar minds—the Rasesni wizards from the temple school. She touched them only briefly, wary of revealing herself.
They must be on horseback to have traveled so far this early in the morning. Can’t be but a mile or so off, on the river road past the fork.
When she turned her attention directly to the east, she found a fainter cluster of mind-glows, with a feel that reminder her of Chang’s squadron. I bet that’s Tlobsung’s men. Must be on foot, what, an hour away? Less? Not at the fork yet.
This means they both think the Voice is coming this way and they’re going to try and coordinate. Must have been traveling since well before dawn.
She searched to the west for the Voice’s people, cautiously. And there they were, close enough that she would have felt them last night, without the drug’s inhibition. She would hear them, too, in a little while, close as they were. She peered through the trees that lined the far side of the road and tried without success to penetrate the morning mist from the warm river over the cold ground, hoping for a glimpse of them. They were in the fields a couple of miles away, between the two roads. This quiet spot was shaping up to be a battlefield today.
To her mind, what lay to the west was a complex cluster of people, hundreds of them. A thin layer in front, and then a large group of dulled minds. I wonder if that’s the horde.
Behind the horde and around the whole body were more like the ones in front, by far the largest of the groups. That must be the Khrebesni—they have the feel of Pyalshrog to them.
There was a group on the inside, that seemed like they might be wizards, but the feel of them was weak. Where’s the Voice? In the center with his wizards, where he is best protected?
No one’s mounted, anyway. The horses are all in the rear, with cattle.
If Zandaril was alive he would be there, she hoped, but she didn’t dare try to probe more obviously. She was closer to the Voice now than she had been when he first detected her. Is my shield that much better, or is he just ignoring me for now? If I get too close my chain will feel his—surely it works the other way, too.
The Rasesni wizards are going to ride right past him on this road, if they don’t stop now. Should I tell them?
The subject of long-range searching hadn’t come up while she was with them. Was it possible they didn’t know?
And why should she tell them?
While she watched and debated with herself, the approaching formation out in the fields shifted. The surrounding tribesmen peeled off at a trot and turned into the woods north of the upper road, heading east, while the rest halted. In a little while, she heard the rustle of their passing across the further road for several minutes, and was grateful her camp was hidden well out of sight on the road they didn’t take.
When they reached the portion of the upper road parallel to the lower one where the wizards were riding, she felt the glee on the one side from the running warriors, and the alarm on the other as the wizards heard the noise. They stopped and shielded themselves, but the Khrebesni continued on past them north of both roads, headed for the fork.
What good did the wizards think their shields were going to do anyway, thirty-odd against hundreds of warriors?
The decision about warning them had been taken out of her hands. The one who needed warning now was Tlobsung, and there was no one in his column she could reach, even if she wanted to.
To the west, the horde resumed its march, with the captive wizards behind it, at an angle aimed at intersecting the group from Kunchik on their present course.
And those wizards were still milling about in confusion at the passage of the tribesmen.
I’ll give them credit, at least they’ll try an attack on the Voice, looks like. It’s not going to work, though, not if he sics the horde on them. What a waste.
Well, I can’t let him suck up thirty more wizards, now can I?
She abandoned her pack and took to the air, east and low along the road, below the treetops, shielded and trying to keep out of sight of the horde in the fields. Was there anyplace they could take a defensive position, before the horde was upon them? Tlobsung would have his own hands full and they couldn’t count on him.
She found them on their horses just a mile or so away, arguing about what to do next. They had two wagons with them, stopped in the middle of the road. When she flared up and landed, it shocked them into stopping their dispute. As soon as they had recovered, shouts of “traitor” and “murderer” rose from some of the riders. A few even tried mind assaults that failed to penetrate her shield.
She caught the eye of Veneshjug and smiled at him, a rigid, fixed smile, as full of promise as she could make it, then turned to the rest of them. “Who wants to attack me first and defend the honor of your Mage Council?”
That puzzled them into relative silence, and she raised her voice to carry over them all.
“That sound you heard was hundreds of Khrebesni headed off to set an ambush for Tlobsung, I expect.”
They settled down and listened. Only the creak of their leather gear intruded. “Why aren’t you with them?” she asked.
Zongchas told her, nervously keeping his horse at some distance. “We got ahead of them.”
“Don’t you read anything other than mage books?” She shook her head. “Who’s going to protect you, now that Tlobsung’s about to be tied up?”
An outraged voice cried, “We brought devices.”
“Oh, yes? Planning to throw them at the horde out there while they attack? That might buy you thirty seconds. You’re idiots—you needed the infantry for support against the enemy. Didn’t you know that? Didn’t Tlobsung tell you?”
One look at Dhumkedbhod’s shocked face gave her pause. Maybe they’ve never united like this before, never fought with an army. Did they even coordinate with Tlobsung?
She stood there on the road and looked up at all of them on their horses, trying to make them understand. “I can’t find the Voice. He might be with the tribesmen that passed by or with them out there in the field.” She hooked her thumb at the horde coming their way. “They’re coming at you, right now. If you’re quiet, you’ll hear them.”
In the silence, they all heard an eerie swishing noise, not the tramp of marching men, but the chaotic push of a hundred or more sweeping through an unharvested field.
“You’ve got horses, you can probably get away and link up with Tlobsung if you hurry.”
She could hear a bitter argument start up among the Mage Council members, and she took a moment to glance around the riders. Too few were bearing weapons—swords, mostly, belted awkwardly over their robes.
The decision was taking too long. She turned to the two wagon drivers. “Get those wagons emptied, right now. We’re going to turn them into barricades—upend them on the south side of the road, wheels out, and take refuge in the trees back of them. Tie the horses behind you.”
While the Mage Council sputtered objections, Penrys’s one-time students stripped the wagons bare and freed the horses. She scanned the sacks as they carried them and detected devices and loose power-stones among them. Others led the horses into the trees and returned.
The noise of the wagons overturning with a crash almost drowned out the horde’s measured, inexorable approach. As the mist began to burn off in the warmth of the morning, Penrys could see the first of them in the gaps between the trees across the road. Their faces were blank and tired, not eager like men going willingly to a fight.
Their weapons were primitive, wooden sticks and rocks, but it was more than some of the wizards had. She’d been teaching her students how to attack other wizards, not mundane people, controlled by the Voice.
Can I break that control? How is he doing it?
She called to wizards sheltering behind the wagons. *Shield with me. Don’t shield us, you fools—them. Put a shield around them.*
It was a mess of confusion. Oh, Zandaril, if you were only here to put them into some sort of order.
Some of them even broke off to prepare small devices that they threw into the horde, cheering when they exploded, like the charms Veneshjug had prepared for Chang’s camp. The trees across the road blunted some of the force, and their unskilled aim reduced the effect of the rest. The men coming didn’t swerve or hesitate, and the first of them set foot on the road.