'We've got a pretty good idea,' Stryke said.
'No, you haven't. Not their real power, and what they represent. What you've seen so far is just a fraction of their true potential.'
'All the more reason not to hand them over to the first bunch of strangers who come begging.'
'We're not begging, we're asking.'
'The answer's no,' Haskeer told her. 'Now fuck off.'
She ignored that. 'The instrumentalities pose a terrible threat. Our task is to make sure they don't fall into the wrong hands.'
'And yours are the right hands, are they?' Stryke came back. 'I don't buy that.'
'In the name of reason, consider what I'm telling you. If you knew what you were meddling in — '
'So tell us.'
Pelli faltered. 'As I said, some things must rest on trust.'
'Not good enough. You want something from orcs, you've got to take it. If you can.'
Her tone became more conciliatory. 'The ferocity of the orcs, and their bravery, are well known, for all that so many malign you. I know of your tenacity and of your valour. But you can't hope to prevail against us.'
Stryke looked to the rest of her group, now at a standstill a short arrow's flight away. 'In our time we've killed many from just about all the races in your ranks. Nothing I see makes me think you'd be any different.'
'Don't judge us by your past experience, Stryke. Your instinct is to fight, I understand that. It's your birthright. But you don't have to surrender to that impulse this time. Rather than lift your blades against us, try thinking instead.'
'You saying we can't think?' Haskeer rumbled.
'I'm saying that in the end you have no choice but to surrender the instrumentalities.'
'Surrender's a word we don't grant,' Stryke replied icily.
'Don't see it as surrender, but rather as a triumph of good sense.'
'And if we don't?'
'Then I have to demand that you turn over the artefacts. Now.'
'We don't take demands either.'
'This is pissing me off,' Haskeer fumed. 'You're pissing me off, elf!'
'That's your final word?' Pelli asked.
Stryke nodded. 'Any other parleying gets done with blades.'
'I'm sorry we couldn't reach an agreement.'
'What you going to do about it?'
'Reflect, and consult with my companions.' She turned her mount and began to leave.
'You reflect away!' Haskeer shouted after her. 'And all the fucking good it'll do you!'
In common with others in the band, several of the new intake had nocked arrows when the strange group appeared. Now one of them, raw and jumpy, accidentally let loose his string. The arrow shot past the retreating elf's head so close she felt the air it displaced.
Pelli Madayar swung about to look their way.
Stryke started to shout. He wanted to say that it was an accident. That the band would fight to the last drop of blood and without mercy, but had no need to put an arrow in the back of anybody under a truce. He didn't get the chance.
The elf pointed her hand their way, then swept it left to right, rapidly. A wave of energy, red-tinged, flew at the band as fast as thought. It hit them with the force of a tempest. All of them. The entire company went down, knocked off their feet as surely as if they'd been struck with mallets. With it, the wave brought pain that coursed through their bodies for a good couple of seconds.
'Gods,' Coilla groaned as she struggled to get up.
' Stay low! ' Stryke hissed. 'All of you: head for the tree line. But keep down!'
They scurried for the trees, bent double, trying to zigzag and make themselves harder targets. Halfway there, the air above them lit up with intense, multicoloured beams of light. Rays crackling all around them, they put on a burst of speed and made it into the tiny wood.
'Anybody hit?' Stryke panted.
Miraculously, it seemed no one had been.
'Who the fuck are this bunch?' Haskeer said.
'Doesn't matter. Main thing is getting out of the way of their magic.'
'A frontal assault's not on then?' Coilla ventured.
'What do you think? Magic that strong, we'd be lucky to get ten paces.'
'They're coming!' Dallog warned.
The bizarre multispecies company was approaching, riding in a line, steadily.
'We'll get to safer ground and figure out how to fight this,' Stryke decided.
Jup, who with a couple of scouts had penetrated the wood farther than the others, came dashing back. He was breathing heavily. 'Not that way. Jennesta's troops.'
'Shit,' Coilla cursed. 'They must have picked up on the racket.'
'Great,' Haskeer grumbled. 'Jennesta and a couple of hundred humans that way, the freak circus over here, and us in the middle.'
'What do we do, Stryke?' Pepperdyne badgered.
'Depends how you want to die.'
Coilla shook her head. 'No, Stryke. There's one other course.'
He didn't have to be told what that was. But he hesitated.
They could hear Jennesta's army now, tramping through the wood and making no effort at furtiveness. The riders were much nearer, too.
'Hurry up, Stryke!' Coilla pleaded.
He reached for the pouch where he kept the stars.
Standeven stared, open-mouthed. 'Surely you're not going to — '
' Shut it,' Stryke told him as he began pulling out the artefacts. His other hand went to the amulet at his throat.
'There's no time!' Coilla yelled.
The Gateway Corps had reached the tree line. In the other direction, the foremost of Jennesta's troops could be seen moving through the wood, a spit away.
Stryke let go of the amulet and concentrated on the stars, quickly slotting them together in a random pattern.
The whole band instinctively gathered about him.
Standeven started to shout. The words were unintelligible and slick with panic. It almost drowned out the noise Wheam was making.
Stryke took one last look at the comet through the branches overhead. It shone like a nighttime sun.
Then he clicked the final instrumentality into place.
13
The bottom had dropped out of the universe.
They were living sparks, sucked through an endless, serpentine tunnel of light. On its supple walls flashed endless images of other realities, moving so fast they were almost a blur. And beyond, outside that terrible shaft, an even more breathtaking actuality: a limitless canopy smothered in countless billions of stars.
The band's only sensation was of helplessly falling. A ceaseless and unremitting plunge into the black maw of the unknown.
Then, after an eternity, they dropped towards a particular chasm, a whirlpool of sallow, churning light.
It swallowed them.
They landed hard. The collision with what seemed to be solid ground was bone-shaking. But they had no
