Elvenbane

Chapter 24

THAT WAS ODD, Keman thought, as he flew over the enemy campsite, trusting to the moonless night to keep him invisible. That was very odd...

Although fires were burning in every fire-pit, and torches flared beside the tents of the commanders, there was no movement in the camp. None whatsoever. And as Keman had come to learn, there was always some movement in a sleeping camp. Sentries and messengers came and went...men needed to relieve themselves...horses stirred in their sleep.

He took a deep breath and tested the air. Woodsmoke. Nothing more. It didn't smell right, either. There should have been other odors; cooking, horses, the sweat of humans.

He swooped in lower for a better look.

No sentries. That was the first thing he noticed. Of course, they could be hidden, but why bother? He cast a sharp glance at the bivouacked troops. There were bundles lying beside the fires, but they weren't moving either. Men did not just lie like logs when they slept, they twisted and tossed...

Lie like logs ... He sharpened his eyes and focused in on those bundles. Those were logs! Logs, bundles of brush, grass... Where were the fighters?

He drove himself upward with strong wing-beats, and hovered, checking the forest beneath, changing his eyes again, so that they could see the heat of warm, living bodies...

And found what he was looking for, traveling in dark and silence through the forest, somehow able to see despite the moonless night and the stygian dark under the trees. The entire enemy army, moving on a line that pointed straight at the Citadel.

For a moment, his heart stopped beating.

Fire and Rain...

His wing-beats faltered...then, as shock gave way to panic, he drove himself upward in frantic haste.

:Shana!: he called, reaching as hard as he could.

Please, please let her hear me, let her answer. ...

He drove himself higher, then turned his drive into a flat-out, high-speed run to the Citadel.

:Shana!:

Ordinarily Keman transformed as he landed, to avoid frightening people, but when he had reached Shana and sounded the alert, she had asked him to stay in draconic shape when he arrived. The only entrance large enough for him in that shape was the main one...and he saw as he landed that the illusion cloaking it was gone and it was lit as bright as day by hundreds of lamps and torches.

He heard children crying and being shushed; from within the cave, heard the echoing voices of people shouting directions. The smoke that swirled pale and gray from the cavern mouth tasted of other things than wood and oil.

There was a thin but steady stream of people heading northwards from the entrance...groups of two and three children and one adult, all carrying packs. He squeezed by a little knot of them, and they never even looked up at him as they passed, even though most of the children had only seen him once or twice, and at a distance. The children stumbled under their burdens, sleepy, heavy-eyed, and confused; the adults were awake enough, but grim- faced and frightened.

The Citadel itself buzzed with activity, with most of the adult and near-adult wizards rushing about, carrying things; the confusion looked random and chaotic at first, but after watching for a bit, Keman could see there was purpose behind it.

Some of them were carrying small brown bundles into the tunnels, and returning empty-handed. Some were taking larger packages into the Citadel, and returning with the small brown bundles. Some were going off down the tunnels and coming back laden...

Some were feeding the fires with papers and books.

Shana came running up, pack on her back, and her face white with strain and fear, hair tumbled all awry.

'Can you fly more tonight?' she asked, and at his nod, she reached for the back of his neck and grabbed his spinal crest, hauling herself up into place in front of his wings with practiced ease. In less time than it took to breathe, she had settled herself on his back.

'Where are we going?' he asked in Kin tongue, trotting back towards the mouth of the cavern, his mouth dry with anxiety, his stomach in one big knot. But he still couldn't help thinking that if the conditions had been pleasant instead of panicked, he'd have purred a little...under the fear, the anxiety...it felt good to have Shana with him again. Good, and right.

'They're never going to get everyone out in time, so we're going to play rear guard,' she replied, as they passed another little group of children, slipped through the entrance, and reached the clearing outside. And at his start of surprise, she added, 'We're going to pull off a delaying action, but not by ourselves. Remember that herd of one-horns we found?'

'Biggest herd I'd ever seen,' he responded absently. 'I didn't know any of them were sociable enough to make a herd that size. They must be some variant on the breed. Hold on...'

He made a short run and launched himself strongly into the air, pumping his wings as hard as he could to make up for the lack of updrafts, noting as he gained altitude how Shana moved with him, and how she felt like a part of him...unlike Valyn, who'd felt inert and lifeless, like a sack of grain. And by the time he had breath to continue the conversation he knew what she wanted.

'You are the only creature I've ever heard of who can control those monsters,' he said over his shoulder. 'But do you think you can control an entire herd?'

'Well,' she shouted back against the wind of his passage, 'that's what we're going to find out.'

They did.

She could.

Without his night-sight to guide them, they would never have found the herd of one-horns, but once they located it, Shana didn't need much time to wake them and bring them under her control. Keman wished Shana could see the herd as he did...the faint starlight gleaming on ivory and ebony coats, shining on the long, slender, pointed horns...

You could almost forget the fangs and the claws, and that they could kill even snatchers with that horn.

And of course, from here the mad, orange-red eyes were impossible to see.

Keman had to hover as rock-steady as he could, because all of Shana's concentration was taken up with making sure that the herd followed her orders...that none of them turned maverick and broke away, because as soon as one broke, they all would. The herd moved along steadily, as docile as a herd of two-horns...and they needed to keep it that way. He kept his mind as silent as possible, knowing that the least little distraction on his part could ruin everything...

But everything went as perfectly as if it had been planned and practiced. Right up until the moment that the herd got downwind of the army.

Below him, Keman saw first one, then a dozen, throw up their heads and sniff the air suspiciously. The whole herd stopped dead in its tracks, and the lead stallion pawed the ground and snorted.

Then started to turn...

Oh no...Shana was losing them...

The rest of the herd pranced restively as the stallion hesitated, started forward, backed a pace, lowered his head, and squealed angrily; protesting, and rebelling against Shana's unspoken commands.

Keman searched his memory desperately for everything he knew and had learned about one-horns...and dared a thought of his own, aimed at the stallion.

Not a thought, really...an image. The image of the two-leggers taking his mares. His mates.