elf.'
'Lord Tyresian,' Porthios said warningly, and the commander turned and faced the nobles.
'It appears we have come to an impasse,' Tyresian called. 'We can cross this ravine and seek out the tylor that has been slaying elves and livestock across this section of Qualinesti. Or we can go back in disgrace.' He took his time surveying the elves, looking each noble full in the face and studying him for a few heartbeats. 'Who is willing to continue?'
The group was quiet for a time. Then Gilthanas spurred his roan forward, pounding past Tyresian and Porthios without a look to either side. With a running start, horse and rider jumped gracefully over the ravine, tracing a smooth arc in the air, and then landed with a spray of mud and gravel. Gilthanas wheeled and saluted.
Ulthen, Litanas, Miral, Porthios, and most of the other nobles quickly followed Gilthanas's lead and waited, milling, on the other side of the ravine. Soon only Tyresian, Tanis, Flint, and Xenoth were left. Tyresian reigned his nervous mount and cast the three an arrogant smile. 'Well?'
Xenoth spluttered. 'Lord Tyresian, you can't honestly be thinking of leaving us…'
'Then follow along.' The elf lord's voice was implacable. 'You were the one who wanted to ride Alliance, Xenoth. Certainly you are horseman enough to jump the ravine.'
'But this nag can't-'
'Try it!' Tyresian slapped Image's back with the flat of his sword. The horse leaped, Xenoth dropping the reins and clinging to its mane, then balked just feet short of the edge, dumping the Speaker's elderly adviser unceremoniously on the rocky ground. His silver robes in violent disarray, Xenoth struggled to his feet as Tyresian thundered by on Primordan and almost effortlessly took the ravine, scattering the riders on the other side. Then the elf lord led all but one of the riders on down the trail.
Only Porthios lingered at the ravine. Finally, he cupped his hands to his mouth and shouted, 'It's all right! Go back to the palace!' and followed the other volunteers.
'Tanis,' Flint said, 'Go with them. Lord Xenoth and I will go back, as he says.'
'What?' squawked the adviser, who had remounted. 'And leave me with a dwarf for a protector?'
Flint snorted. 'Protector, what?' the dwarf retorted. 'I'd sooner protect Fleetfoot here than you.' He patted the gray mule's neck. 'Tanis, Belthar can easily leap that gap. Go on.'
Tanis narrowed his eyes at the dwarf. 'We will not separate. Even Xenoth here could be of some use if we meet the tylor.'
The dwarf didn't meet Xenoth's eyes. 'Don't count on it,' Flint said. 'Unless you're thinking about using him as bait.' Flint examined the scrawny adviser. 'Even then…'
Xenoth wheeled and kicked Image into a canter down the rocky trail toward Qualinost. Flint and Tanis watched, wordlessly. Finally, as Xenoth was vanishing around a bend, Flint shouted, 'Don't get too far ahead! The tylor may cut you off!'
The adviser paused, his mottled brown mount tossing its head and dancing sideways in agitation. Tanis frowned. 'Something's wrong,' he said. 'Look at the horse. Image isn't normally nervous.'
The day had begun to turn dark, and an eerie, premature twilight was descending upon the forest. The surrounding woods were nearly impenetrable to the eye. No breeze moved the leaves in the aspens. The squirrels, the chipmunks had vanished; only moments before, they had been skittering through the underbrush and darting playfully along the trails that bordered the ravine.
'Flint…'
The dwarf already had his battle-axe at the ready. 'I know, lad. No birds. No animal noises. As though…' He scanned their surroundings and waved at Xenoth to return.
Tanis finished the sentence for him. 'As though the animals had all gone aground.'
A low booming echoed upon the air. Flint and Tanis exchanged glances. 'Thunder?' Tanis asked.
'I hope so,' Flint replied.
The storm hit when Xenoth was halfway back, with thirty or forty paces separating them.
But the storm took the form of a tylor.
'Reorx!' thundered the dwarf. The bushes to the left of Xenoth shuddered, and then, with a force that sent stray leaves and twigs fluttering upon the air, a gray-green blur burst from the undergrowth. The adviser shrieked, and Image crumpled beneath the ferocious beast, the mount's neck broken with one snap of the gaping maw. The adviser, thrown clear, landed hard on his back. He rolled over slowly, pain on his face, as the monster busied itself by tearing at the dead horse. A look of horror froze on Xenoth's face when he saw what the tylor was doing to the animal. He lunged to his feet and ran frantically to one side, away from Flint and Tanis, and into the underbrush.
'Xenoth!' Tanis cried. He jumped off Belthar's back, and Flint slid off Fleetfoot. The two mounts pounded down one of the paths, the mule leading the way by several lengths.
'Xenoth is safer there, lad,' Flint hollered, pulling Tanis behind the moldering trunk of a fallen oak. There was a scant six feet between the tree and the edge of the ravine.
The tylor dragged its horned body fully into the clearing, lifted its plated, pointed head, and roared a challenge. The animal then took a stance on the rocky earth, opened its mouth, and began to chant words of magic. Chief among the words was the name 'Xenoth.'
'By the gods!' The half-elf fell back against Flint. 'What is it doing?'
Flint didn't answer the question, but merely muttered, 'It's an intelligent creature.'
'Can we… Can we reason with it?'
Flint grabbed his arm. 'I wouldn't recommend that just now, lad.'
The creature roared again and continued chanting. '
'Flint, we've got to alert the others,' the half-elf said.
'I think the beast's already done that for us,' the dwarf commented, and he pointed back toward the other side of the ravine. Tyresian, Miral, and Litanas were clustered at the edge, seemingly at a loss about what to do. Jumping a horses across the gap would land mount and rider only ten feet from the monster, well within the range of its whipping, deadly tail. Already, the creature's nervous twitching had shredded the underbrush in a crescent behind the animal.
The three-foot horns on the creature's head were sharp and wicked-looking. Its eyes, half-shut, showed yellow as it chanted,
'Reorx!' the dwarf exclaimed again.
Xenoth, his gray eyes terrified and glassy, stepped out of the underbrush into the clearing. He approached the monster, seemingly unable to resist the creature's call. The chanting intensified. One of the nobles on the far side of the ravine cried out with the horror. Tanis stood. 'Xenoth!'
Tyresian shouted from across the ravine, 'Half-elf! Stay where you are!' But Tanis leaped over the log and nocked an arrow as he ran. Flint followed, swinging his battle-axe.
The creature, from its tail to its beaklike snout, was nearly sixty feet long, with scaly armor. Tanis kneeled within the huge curve of the beast's body, aiming for the tylor's head, off to the half-elf's right. He released the arrow just as the creature's thirty-foot tail whistled through the air, to Tanis's far left. The razor-sharp appendage slashed through an aspen sapling, then slammed into the adviser. Xenoth's scream died in a gurgle.
The words 'Tanis, don't move!' came crying from the opposite side of the ravine. The half-elf remained where he was but sent another arrow arcing toward the tylor.
Suddenly, hoofbeats crashed on the mud-splattered rocks near Tanis. Miral, crimson tunic vivid against his white and gray mare, hurtled toward the tylor, chanting as he rode. Lightning burst from his fingers and rocketed toward the animal even as the tylor began a new chant.
The ensuing explosion rocked the clearing, knocking Tanis and Flint into a heap. Dazed, they watched the rest of the hunters pour over the ravine and into the clearing.
The tylor's screams rent the clearing as its claws dug gashes in the rock-hard earth. It struggled to crawl into the underbrush, away from the arrows that now poured toward it from the phalanx of elven nobles. Tanis and Flint could only sit and watch.
Finally, the tylor was dead, scorch marks visible all along one side, arrows cutting into its hide and another
