Narm and Shandril exchanged glances, then hurried after the dwarf toward the ravine he'd indicated. Only after they had reached cover did any of them speak again.
'What are they?' Narm's voice was low. He'd never seen such ugly things before-huge, fat, scaled things with bat wings, claws, and horselike heads that ended in two probing, twisting snouts. Each snout held sharp jaws; even down here Narm could smell the rotting reek of their breath.
'Foulwings,' Delg said. 'Well named, aye?'
Narm watched the heavy, ungainly things flap over them, wheel, and dart this way and that, searching along the road and the edges of the forest for signs of a maid, her man, and a dwarf. He shivered as a foulwing turned overhead, and the head of the robed and hooded rider pivoted, scanning the forest. For a moment it seemed that the foulwing rider looked right at him. Fear rose in Narm. Frantically he searched his mind for some spell that wouldn't reveal their location to the foes above.
And then the foulwing wheeled in the air, belching and snorting angrily as its rider struck it cruelly with a metal goad. In the man's other hand, a wand glinted for a moment before he flew onward, out of sight. His companions, some ten or twelve others, followed afterward.
'Who rides foulwings?' he asked, trying to sound calm. 'Evil folk,' Delg said brightly. When Narm looked at him in disgust, the dwarf added a savage grin. Narm folded his arms and waited for further explanation.
Delg rumbled, 'If you must know, lad: the Zhents; the Cult of the Dragon; I've heard the Red Wizards of Thay do, too; I saw the private army of a lich riding 'em once, in the Vilhon-and the tavern-talk in Suzail, when last I was there, had some lord or other of Westgate using them, in league with a pirate. For all I know, half the rich merchants in Sembia keep 'em as pets.'
'If they're as common as all that, why've I never heard of them before?' Narm protested.
Delg rolled his eyes. 'D'you know how many folk I've heard say that down the years, lad? Most of 'em had been adventuring longer than you have, too-and the things they hadn't met with before killed 'em just as dead as if they'd been old friends. Had you seen or heard of spellfire before you met with your lady? D'you think I could stand in the midst of it, protesting I'd never heard of it before, and thereby escape being burned?'
Narm opened his mouth to reply, but another voice spoke first: Shandril could move very quietly when she wanted to. They'd left her lying silent and still under spread cloaks in the ravine-but neither Narm or Delg was surprised to find her beside them on their perch on a low, gnarled bough of an old phandar tree. Her eyes smoldered a little as she asked softly, 'Could these foulwing riders be the darker, greater foes Elminster warned us about back in Shadowdale, do you think?'
Narm spread his hands. 'He never said enough about 'Those Who Watch' to tell us how to recognize them.' Delg shrugged, and added, 'I'd rather not call those bat-horses down to ask.' He squinted up at them and asked, 'Does it matter? Whoever they are, they're bold enough to fly openly into Cormyr in broad daylight. Just one of those foulwings could tear all of us apart if it catches Shan by surprise, with no spellfire ready. It's the forest for us, from now on.'
And so it was that the only known wielder of spellfire and her companions turned off the road into the vast and deep Hullack Forest. They rested after several hours of struggling through thick stands of duskwood. While they sat, Shandril managed to eat some cheese, preceded by some rather old milk, and followed by some rather winestrong broth. Delg insisted on doing all the cooking. '1'd probably starve if I left the food to you or your husband there' was the gentle way he put it when she'd protested. Shandril was just as glad not to handle their provisions — too much had been salvaged from the ruin of Thundarlun, bringing memories of its slaughter back into her mind. She was growing tired of the killing-and of seeing fear in the eyes of folk she was fighting for, or alongside, when they looked at her.
None of the three wore smiles this day. None had been eager to enter the dark, tangled forest. It stretched on for miles, sprawling over most of eastern Cormyr, a wild and forbidding place. Foresters and hunters seldom ventured far into its dim depths. Long before night stole up to cast its cloak over Cormyr, the three had come to the end of the last, fading forest trail-and plunged on into the trackless, shady depths of the heart of Hullack Forest.
'We can't see far enough or move fast enough for my liking,' Delg said, axe in hand. He glared at the trees all around them in the gathering gloom. 'I'm beginning to hold the opinion that we'd have done better to have stayed on the road and faced whatever your enemies had left to hurl at us.'
'I'm beginning to hold the opinion,' Narm replied in a low voice, 'that your words are wiser now than when you led us off the road.'
'Belt up, lad' Delg put little anger behind his words; he peered tensely around them as if expecting an immediate attack.
'Wherever wisdom lies,' Shandril said softly, 'we can't find our way back now. We must go on. Night comes swiftly-we daren't travel blindly about in it, for I've heard of boars and worse hunted here. We must find a place to rest, before dark.'
'Aye. A safe place,' Delg grunted. 'A place one of us can defend while the others sleep. A place with rock at our backs is best.'
'Assuredly,' Narm agreed. 'I'm sure I've several such places just lying about here, somewhere… now where did I leave them, I wonder? Cou-'
'You,' Shandril told him severely, 'have been listening to the nimble tongue of Torm too much of late. Let's hurry, ere the light fails entirely: we must seek high ground and hope we find a cliff, or perhaps a cave.'
'One without a bear,' Delg added, hastening on in the gathering darkness. They could hear him puffing as they hurried on over leaves and tangles of fallen, mossy logs. More than once he slipped or stumbled and broke branches underfoot with dull cracking sounds. 'I never liked forests,' he added gloomily on the heels of a particularly hard fall.
Shandril and Narm both chuckled. They were climbing a tree-clad slope toward a place of slightly greater brightness in the deepening twilight; a glade, perhaps, or rocky height where trees grew more thinly. The forest around them was coming alive with mysterious rustlings and eerie, far-off hoots and baying calls. The three hurried onward and upward over tumbled stones, racing to find a refuge before nightfall caught up with them.
The trees thinned, and then the weary travelers came to an open space. Looking up, Narm saw stars winking overhead in the gathering night. A huge shadowtop tree had toppled here, perhaps a season ago, its vast trunk smashing aside smaller saplings to clear a little space in the thick, tangled forest. The three wanderers looked around for a moment, met each other's eyes, and nodded in unison. This place would have to do.
Delg caught Narm's elbow. 'Gather firewood,' he said. 'You and me. One each side of her, while Shan unpacks. Don't make noise you don't have to.'
'A fire?' Narm said. 'Won't that draw anyone who's searching-'
'They've magic, lad,' Delg told him dryly. -They could find us if we stuffed leaves in our hair and stood like trees 'til morning. The big beasts, too — an' the smaller ones'll come to look, but not dare approach too near. We may as well have some comfort.'
'Dear, dear,' Gathlarue said, not very far away, as she looked into her softly glowing crystal, where three tiny shapes moved and spoke. Her slim lips crooked in a little smile. 'I was so looking forward to seeing you stuff leaves into your mouth, Sir Dwarf. Now I'll have to stare at your fire-and looking into dancing flames always makes me sleepy'
'Wine, Lady?' Gathlarue's older apprentice stood over her, a dark shape against the trees that rose all around them. The slim, raven-haired girl held a silver-harnessed crystal decanter in her hands.
Gathlarue looked up at her, smiled, and took the goblet she offered. 'My thanks, precious one. You know my needs so well.'
Mairara twisted her mouth in a wordless, affectionate reply, bent to kiss her, and glided softly away. Gathlarue grinned faintly into her scrying globe; the blood-spell she had woven long ago let her listen to the thoughts of both her apprentices whenever she chose, unbeknownst to them. For all her kisses and kindnesses, Mairara meant to work her a painful death one day soon.
Before that day came, Gathlarue meant to use her well. To rise in the ranks of the Zhentarim would take more magic than Gathlarue could wield alone. A few days back, while in Zhentil Keep, she'd seen afresh all the cruel striving that would oppose her. The magelings had been gathered to hear Manshoon, and so much cruelty and aroused magic had hung barely in check in that room that the smell of it had almost made her afraid.
