James Barclay - Beyond the Mists of Katura

Auum dragged Tilman back to his feet. The first Xeteskian crested the rise, saw the pair and shouted.

‘Move!’ said Auum. ‘You’re going to have to use that foot — it’s faster that way. Brace yourself.’

‘Three,’ said Tilman putting his ruined ankle down and gasping at the pain.

Auum smiled. ‘Good on you, young human.’

Even the fleeting weight Tilman could put on his left leg was enough to almost double their speed. They made it around the scree slope and Auum saw a sharp climb before him, up to a narrow pass between two hills. The last elves were just passing through, disappearing from sight some two hundred yards away. One stood there, looking back down the pass.

Seeing them, he started to run back down the slope. Auum waved him to go back.

‘Ulysan, no! Get the rest of them away!’ he shouted.

Ulysan wasn’t hearing him. Auum and Tilman made their best speed towards him, the young human beginning to struggle as the pain from his ankle spread up his leg and through his back. Auum could feel his body tightening with every step. Tilman stumbled more than he trotted, and Auum shouldered more and more of his weight as his strength failed.

More spells detonated behind them, cracking off the shale slopes and showering them with dust and splinters of stone. Ulysan was still running down the slope but he was looking beyond Auum, who saw his eyes widen.

‘Move faster!’ called the big TaiGethen.

‘Only so fast we can go,’ said Auum, practically lifting Tilman off the ground. ‘He’s not as light as he looks.’

‘Sorry,’ mumbled Tilman.

Arrows rattled into the stone around them and the slope behind. Auum hunched again.

‘That was too close. Ulysan, how far away are they?’

‘Not far enough,’ said Ulysan running up to him and taking Tilman’s other arm around his shoulder, the boot still held in a death grip in the youth’s hand. ‘Run.’

They ran up the steep slope towards temporary safety. Spells smashed into the ground not ten feet behind them, the shock waves throwing them all forward to sprawl on the ground. More arrows fizzed in, one clipping Ulysan’s ear and drawing blood.

Auum rolled back onto his feet and spared a glance downslope. The sky seemed full of mages, elven and human, dodging around one another, the ground covered with humans, less than fifty yards distant.

‘We’re in trouble,’ he said.

‘You noticed,’ said Ulysan. ‘Let’s get him up.’

And then Stein was hovering above them with another mage.

‘Get out of here, we’ve got him,’ he said.

With that, he and the elven flier swooped, grabbed Tilman by the arms and lifted him clear and fast into the sky. Auum and Ulysan looked at one another in relief.

‘Speed,’ said Auum.

By the time they reached the lower slopes of the mountains they had put a good distance between themselves and the chasing pack but the race was not yet won. Auum looked at what lay before them and took a deep breath.

The incline of flat granite they were moving up grew steadily steeper over the course of about three hundred yards before rearing into the sky, a wall of bleak stone broken by cracks, outcrops and occasional narrow ledges. Clumps of vegetation clung on here and there and gliding birds climbed tall thermal updraughts, their cries echoing on the wind blowing across the base of the climb.

Grafyrre, Merrat, Merke and Marack were in a group pointing out potential routes up the wall. Auum sighed, awed by the sheer scale of it. Comparing this rock face to the cliffs at Verendii Tual was like comparing a banyan to a balsa tree.

Stein and the elven mage had lain Tilman against the mountainside and the elf was assessing his injury and preparing a casting. Auum trotted up with Ulysan to crouch beside him.

‘Still with us?’

Tilman managed a vague smile. His face was covered in sweat and his colour was a sick-looking grey.

‘Thank you,’ he said.

‘You may be a fool, but you are a courageous fool,’ said Auum. ‘What can you do for him?’

The elven mage laid his hands on Tilman’s ankle and cast. Tilman relaxed and his breathing became more regular, some colour returning to his cheeks.

‘I can take the pain away,’ said the mage. ‘But until we have time to probe the extent of the damage, I don’t know. It’s not horrible in there, but without magical assistance he isn’t going to be walking for fifteen to twenty days.’

‘We’re about to climb a mountain,’ said Auum. ‘And we aren’t leaving him here.’

‘We’ll take him up,’ said Stein. ‘Look, Auum, what you did for him. . a human. . it means a huge amount, and, um. .’

‘I think he’s trying to ask you why you risked your life to save a mere human rather than leave him to become cinders and an archery target,’ said Ulysan.

‘Thanks, Ulysan. Where would I be without your insight?’

‘Lost and alone, skipper.’

‘Sometimes an attractive prospect,’ said Auum. He turned to Stein. ‘I would do the same for anyone who would lay down his life for an elf. It’s the TaiGethen way.’

Oryaal was running up the slope towards them, the veteran warrior indicating behind him.

‘They’re on to us. Spotter mages have got close enough to identify our position, and the mages and archers are moving up. There’s a good ambush point-’

‘No more fighting,’ said Auum. ‘How long before they are in range?’

‘They’re moving slowly because they know we’ve stopped, and that makes them nervous, but they can be on us in a quarter-hour or less once they know we’re climbing.’

Auum hissed a breath over his teeth. With this many elves unused to climbing that was too short a time.

‘Then we’ve rested here for too long. Ulysan, let’s get our best climbers on the face now. We need six routes, if we can find them. I’ll speak to the Il-Aryn. All Julatsan elves should be in the air, helping the climbers. Stein, you have your first charge already. Have your mages try and identify the likely fallers and help them however you can. How high is the first rest point?’

Stein grimaced. ‘A long way. Three hundred yards at least, but once we’re there the incline is dramatically shallower and we’ll be able to walk. It’s a narrow edge but doable, taking us far past the snow line.’

‘All right. We’ve got a few little ledges on the way up if we’re desperate. Let’s go.’

Ulysan moved off, calling for Merrat, Grafyrre, Merke, Marack, Thrynn and Hohan. Auum trotted to the gathered and nervous-looking Il-Aryn.

‘None of you will fall,’ said Auum when he had their attention, ‘because the TaiGethen will not let you. Follow your leader. Use the same hand- and footholds they do. Be afraid because that will make you careful. Stretch your bodies when you must and grip hard; jam your feet into those cracks hard. Know you can do this. You are all fit and strong because that is the way Takaar made you.

‘If you are struggling, cry out and we will help. The Julatsan elves will be around you. Have faith in Yniss, faith in yourselves and faith in all of us. I believe in you, or you wouldn’t be here now. Let’s go. Ulysan will assign you to your teams of TaiGethen.’

Auum watched them go and prayed to Yniss that none of them slipped. And so the climb began. Marack and Merke moved smoothly up the first thirty feet or so to a point where they could assess the next segment. The going was a little harder for Grafyrre and Merrat, who were climbing to either side of the first pair. Hohan and Thrynn were to Merrat’s right and moving well enough.