because its source was closer. In a flash, Iydahoe understood that whatever had made the noise was approaching them up this trail.
Urgently the warrior gestured for the boys to retreat back toward the village, though he didn't look around to see if they obeyed. Instead, he crouched, watching, among the branches, knowing that the whorls of his tatoos would make his face difficult to see for anyone who might come around the next bend of the trail.
The breeze, which had been listless all morning, suddenly picked up, carrying the unmistakable scent of horses to Iydahoe's nose. His hand tightened around his spear as the terrifying thought came: legionnaires! He stared at the trail with blazing intensity, but he saw nothing.
With a sick feeling in his stomach, he remembered the butchery worked against the Silvertrouts. Now, as he thought of the youths behind him, the girls at their tanning rack, and beautiful Moxilli, brushing her hair by the well, he almost groaned aloud.
He felt, rather than heard, the presence of Bakali close by and knew that they had to get back to the village, to carry the alarm. But an alarm of what? All he knew was that someone with horses and metallic equipment was creeping up the trail.
'Go back,' Iydahoe hissed, holding his lips a few inches from Bakall's ear. 'Tell the warriors there are horsemen coming up the stream trail. Now, go!'
Eyes wide, the young Kagonesti scrambled silently up the trail, urging the other youths before him. Iydahoe slipped off the path, ignoring the brambles that scratched his skin, and started to work his way downward, seeking a look at these intrusive horsemen. How could they have gotten so close to the village? Were all the sentries dead?
Within a few moments, he heard the sounds of hoof- beats, though the steps had a surreptitious quality-the riders were holding their steeds back in an effort at stealth. Peering from beneath a leafy fern, the Kagonesti looked down a straight stretch of trail. He saw branches moving, pushed aside by a solid presence-but it was a presence that Iydahoe couldn't see!
Hoofprints appeared in the dust of the trail, advancing steadily closer. The warrior stared, but he saw no horse, no rider-nothing! A faint shimmering obscured the trail, as more and more puffs of dust floated upward. But how-when there was still nothing to see? Yet something was undeniably there, advancing up the trail. Iydahoe caught the unmistakable smell of horses, and he knew that he couldn't be wrong.
But why couldn't he see? There was only that shimmering-like a cloudy presence, an essence of something that was solid but invisible.
Iydahoe stood, bursting upward from the concealment of the bush. He heard a horse whinny in alarm, a man's curse commanding obedience. The fishing spear seemed like a horribly flimsy weapon, but the warrior hurled it with all of his strength. The shaft flew outward, then struck something unseen and dropped to the ground.
The horse gave a shrill cry of pain, and more curses were added to the din. Iydahoe heard a sharp, powerful word cut through the chaos and, abruptly, the screening cloak was removed and a column of horses and riders blinked into sight. The lead mount had bucked off its rider, and now that skittish horse blocked the others from moving up the trail.
Second in line rode a strangely garbed man clad in long gray robes. That fellow pointed at the wild elf and shouted-'There he is! Kill him!'
Iydahoe recognized the voice, knew that this was the man who had spoken before, whose single powerful word had broken the screen of invisibility. With a shiver of apprehension, the warrior knew that he faced a wizard.
The first man struggled to remount, hampered because he had instinctively drawn his sword. Other riders pressed forward, tightly packed on the narrow trail. These Istarian legionnaires, wearing cloaks of red and breastplates of polished brass, formed a column so long that its tail was out of sight somewhere down the trail- enough soldiers to form a grave threat to the village.
Iydahoe slipped backward, rising to a crouch when he was out of sight of the trail. He raced through the underbrush toward the village. After two dozen paces he stepped back onto the trail, since the bends in the winding path would conceal him from the humans and the broad track would save him precious seconds on his race to warn the tribe.
Then sounds of violence rocked through the trees, and he knew he would be too late. Terrified screams rose from the unseen village, splitting the pastoral forest air, while hoarse shouts and the clash of steel against steel told him that there were more humans than just the party advancing up the trail behind him. Kagonesti war cries mingled with crude commands and grim shouts of triumph. Loud hoofbeats now pounded to the rear, and he knew that the horsemen had heard the sounds of battle and wasted no time as they raced to the fighting.
Iydahoe burst into the village clearing, his knife in his hand, a furious war cry shrieking from his lips. Yet his worst moments of bleak imagination could not have prepared him for the sight that met his eyes.
A line of legionnaires on foot, shields held across their chests, advanced from the forest across the village. Several braves leapt toward them, courageously attacking, but these wild elves fell quickly before the scythelike reaper of the close-packed footmen. Kawllaph, Iydahoe's proud, capable brother, raced to the attack and then fell immediately, his head all but slashed from his torso.
Other humans, carrying spears and swords, rushed into the village from the right, and, though Kagonesti warriors killed several of these, the others rushed headlong into the clusters of lodges, brutally cutting down those elves who tried to scramble out the low-arching doors. Ber- riama, she who was to marry Kawllaph, ran screaming toward the slain body of her beloved-then she, too, fell dead, pierced by a legionnaire horseman's lance.
Whooping madly, Tarrapin raised his sword and charged the line of footmen. His blade clanged off the armored shoulder of a human, and in the next instant the chief's body was pierced by numerous lstarian blades.
A number of elders sought shelter in the woods, but as the wild elves hobbled toward the trees many silvery missiles sparkled in the sun-steel-shafted arrows! A deadly volley slashed out, missiles ripping through many a frail and weathered body. A second volley rattled, and dozens of Kagonesti lay on the ground, dead or rapidly dying. More legionnaires charged from the trees there, and Iydahoe saw that they bore the crossbows that had launched the lethal volleys. Now the men slung the missile weapons over their shoulders, drew short swords, and charged with lusty yells. Iydahoe saw that many of them grinned broadly, relishing the prospects of close-in butchery.
Puiquill and a cluster of girls huddled behind the wreckage of their tanning racks, which had been knocked over in the chaos. Bakall and the boys of the fishing expedition charged in a knot, courageously raising their light, three- pronged spears. One fell to a legionnaire's sword, but the others knocked the man to the ground and pierced him.
'Bakall!' shouted Iydahoe, pointing toward the cowering elves at the tanning rack. 'There! Help the girls!'
Staring wildly, either from madness or shock, Bakall saw a legionnaire rushing toward the Kagonesti females. With a shrill cry, the boys flew at the man, bearing him to the ground, then ruthlessly piercing him with their spears. Bakall himself picked up the fellow's sword, holding it over his head with a whooping cry.
Iydahoe heard a scream and twisted to see Moxilli running from her lodge, where two bearded humans had just chopped down another elf and were busy casting glowing brands onto the loose thatch of the roof.
'This way!' the young brave shouted, and the terrified maiden met his eyes with a look of frantic pleading.
In the next instant he heard the sound of a heavy crossbow. The bolt caught the young Kagonesti woman in the side, tearing through her chest, the bloody tip erupting from her rib cage. Flung off her feet by the force of the shot, Moxilli was cast to the ground where she lay motionless in a growing pool of blood.
Iydahoe wailed his fury, striking down a nearby human with the keen edge of his knife. Villagers ran toward him, toward the path to the marsh, and he remembered the horsemen pounding up the trail behind him.
'Not here. More humans come from the marsh! Into the woods!' he cried, desperately waving his arms.
Abruptly horses surged into the village and Iydahoe was knocked to the ground by a blow to his head. Stunned, he tried to rise to his knees, watching the riders swirl through the dust and smoke while the phalanx of footmen continued to press the survivors into a small pack in the center. Despite pleas for mercy and the fact that many of the elves bore no weapons, the Kingpriest's killers continued to hack at the remaining members of the tribe.
Bleak with despair, his skull ringing from the force of the blow, Iydahoe lumbered groggily to his feet and
