Элейн Каннингем - Silver Shadows

Jill leaned out of the carriage and took the slumbering elf woman from Arilyn’s arms. The Harper snatched up a cloak, draped it over herself, and then climbed onto the box beside Kendel. She took the reins from his hands and shook them briskly over the horses’ back.

The dwarf, meanwhile, had deposited Zoastria gently onto the carriage seat and extended a brawny hand to Ferret. The wild elf hesitated only a moment, then grasped the offered wrist as the carriage lurched off. Jill tugged the wild elf inside with an ease that nearly pulled her arm from her shoulders, and brought her tumbling into his lap.

“Well, now,” the dwarf said happily. “I knowed you’d come around to my way of thinking sooner or later!”

They were an odd company, these six travelers to the Forest of Tethir. There was a priest of Gond, who was a bit grumpy over having been persuaded to abandon his traditional yellow tunic for the more practical browns and greens of forest garb. There was a moon elven male, who walked as silent as a shadow, and a dwarf whose small boots thumped and cracked with every step. Then there were two elven females, one of the forest folk and one of the moon people, and the slumbering elven hero whom they carried between them on a litter.

Four days’ travel lay between them and Talltrees, and Arilyn made good use of the time laying plans for the battle to come. All had a part to play, even the dwarf. Arilyn was past worrying what the forest elves would make of such strange allies. All that mattered was winning freedom—for them, and also for Danilo. How she would accomplish both these goals was not yet clear to the Harper, and these thoughts weighed heavily on her as they made their way eastward.

At last they neared the elven settlement. Arilyn and Ferret placed the litter on the ground to rest for a moment, but Ferret stopped in midstretch and let out a strangled cry. She set out for the settlement at a run.

“Stay here,” Arilyn informed the others, and then she sprinted off after the frantic elf.

It was not long before she saw what the green elf had envisioned. Where the elven community had been was only a barren, blasted circle, too eerily precise to be anything but the result of a wizard’s fire. The destruction had been swift and terrible. Although most of the circle had been reduced to gray ash, here and there bits of charred trees and the remnants of elven dwellings lay in tumbled piles, little more than glowing coals that Arilyn knew could not be quenched until they had burned all they touched into oblivion. Here and there wisps of smoke still rose from the rubble as the wizard’s fire completed its grim work.

Talltrees was no more.

For several anguished moments the elven females regarded the smoking ruins of the forest stronghold

“They are not all dead, my clan,” Ferret said in a dazed voice. “Somehow most of them escaped, and they are even now nearby.”

Arilyn did not need to ask how she knew. In times of great stress, even those elves who were not joined in special mystic bonds sensed things that their eyes and ears could not possibly have told them.

The green elf lifted her hands to her mouth and sent a high, ringing call out into the ruined forest.

The survivors of the Talltrees clan came quickly, but their eyes were glazed with the pain of their loss, and they moved as if their limbs were heavy and numbed by grief and exhaustion.

Ferret ran to her brother and fell into his arms. Rhothomir enfolded her to him, but he looked over her head, his eyes seeking out Arilyn.

“How did this happen? How did the humans find this place?” he demanded.

The answer came to Arilyn quickly, painfully, like the stab of a knife. “Probably they had a cleric,” she admitted. “Some priests can force the spirit of the slain to answer questions. Hawkwing fell near the human fortress; we could not bring her back into the forest. All that she knew, they now know.”

The elves stared at Arilyn in horrified silence. What she described was an unspeakable abomination. No elf would willingly disturb the course of another’s afterlife.

“You have brought this violation upon Hawkwing, and this loss upon us all,” one of the females said in a low voice.

“You led Hawkwing and the other elves from the forest,” added another. “If you had not, this would not have occurred.”

Dark murmurs rippled through the elven assemblage. Arilyn could not fault them. The forest folk were battered and beleaguered, and in times of peril they would naturally fall back into old ways. As an outsider, a moon elf, she was an object of suspicion. Arilyn wondered, briefly, what they would think when they met Jill and Tinkersdam.

“We followed your plans; we listened to your words,” the Speaker said solemnly. “And in doing so, we have suffered. You must leave this forest at once and never return.”

“You would let her go?” one of the elves demanded incredulously. “What is to keep her from leading still more humans to us? She must not leave; she must not live! The time has come for the clan to protect our own!”

“The time has come,” announced a ringing voice, “for the children of Tethir to unite, and to fight. You will not harm Arilyn Moonblade.”

The elves turned as one toward the source of this pronouncement. At the edge of the blasted clearing stood Ganamede, his silvery fur nearly the shade of the ash that drifted through the air. Even now, in their grief and loss and anger, the sight of one of the elusive lythari cast a spell of wonder over the forest elves.

As soon as all eyes were upon him, the lythari lifted his silver muzzle and sent a long, undulating call into the forest. Then he walked to Arilyn’s side. His wolflike body shimmered briefly with silvery light as he shifted into his elven form.

As if from one throat, a gasp of wonder and astonishment rose from the elven clan. None of them had ever seen a lythari in elven form. Ganamede stood tall and proud at Arilyn’s side, one hand resting on her shoulder in a gesture of friendship and support. In his other hand he held an elven bow. His silver hair was bound back, his angular face painted for battle in the custom of the forest elves.

One marvel followed another. In swift response to his call, a dozen enormous silvery wolves slipped into the clearing and formed a semicircle around the moon elf and her lythari protector. These did not transform, but their strange blue eyes met those of the forest elves with firm purpose. The message was clear: no one would move against Arilyn unless they were willing first to fight the silver shadows.

“I have come from the Suldusk lands,” Ganamede said, speaking into a deep and profound silence. “Their settlement has also been destroyed, but they did not fare as well as you. Those elves that yet live are wretched captives, held in cages at the edges of the ravaged forest. Beyond that, near the banks of the river, is the human camp.” He turned to Arilyn. “You know the ways of humans better than any among us. If you will lead us, we will follow, and we will attack.”

“The Elmanesse have troubles enough of our own,” Rhothomir protested angrily. “We cannot be expected to go to the aid of the Suldusk!”

Ganamede turned a steady gaze upon the Speaker. After a moment, Rhothomir dropped his eyes, visibly shamed. If the lythari were willing to leave the forest to aid the Suldusk, how could they do less?

“There is more,” the lythari said. “The humans have been cutting the ancient trees, burning large sections of the forest lands. This threatens all the children of Tethir. Once before our tribes united to stop a great evil. This we must do again.”

Ferret came to the center of the blasted clearing, her eyes blazing with fervor. “And so we shall! Some of our elders remember the battle of which this lythari speaks. They must also remember Soora Thea, who led us to victory! Today will legend be given life. Come, all of you, and see the hero who has returned.”