edge he pointed dramatically to the green water below.
“We dropped the body off here,” he said.
“You threw the general’s body in the river?”
“We had to. We were besieged, and the remains were corrupting. He died valiantly, but he was not himself.”
He let that veiled reference hang in the air. Artyrith looked down at the river.
“When did he die?” he said.
“Yesterday, about sundown.”
“I’ll have to search the river and both banks,” Artyrith said. “The Great Speaker would expect nothing less.”
He turned away irritably in a swirl of silk. Mathi queried the captain with an upraised eyebrow, but Lofotan ignored her, falling in step behind his one-time underling.
When they returned to the hillside, a large contingent of the Silvanesti army was mustered there. The nomads were fleeing, the officers reported. Artyrith ordered them pursued.
“Harry them out of the country,” he said. “Whatever goods or chattels they abandon are to be taken and made the property of the Speaker. Any camps or settlements you find must be burned to the ground. This is the will of Silvanos Golden-Eye, Speaker of the Stars.”
The officers scattered to their companies to carry out the severe orders. While Artyrith conferred with the other griffon riders about what areas to patrol, Mathi sidled up to Lofotan.
“What really happened to Balif?” she whispered.
“He’s gone. What more do you need to know?”
Lofotan explained another reason why Artyrith had come. The Speaker had learned from Artyrith that the general had been transformed into a beast by Vedvedsica’s curse. Silvanesti law did not differentiate between those who willingly trafficked in sorcery and those who were accursed. On the pretext of protecting elven society from the abomination Balif had become, Silvanos had ordered the arrest of Balif. Trial, imprisonment, and death would surely follow.
Silvanos had a long memory. He could never forget a good number of his subjects had once preferred Balif as their ruler to him. Silvanos had made it his duty to remove the accursed Balif from respectable society. His popular rival would disappear forever.
“Surely the Speaker is not so ruthless?” Mathi said, aghast.
“I credit him for being merciful,” Lofotan replied. “If he were truly ruthless, he would put the general on display in a public square in Silvanost, chained to a post. That would ruin the name of Balif forever.”
Lofotan walked away, mixing into the crowd of kender until he was eventually lost from sight. Mathi, shaken by the hard rules of elven society, watched him go and pondered her next move. Her mission was over, finished. Her brethren, wherever they were, had nothing left to avenge. When the time was right, she would slip away and join them. The children of Vedvedsica still had secret enclaves in the western forest. There, with vigilance and luck, they might pass their lives hidden from Silvanesti persecution.
One problem remained. She should not have cared, but it mattered to her was where Balif had gone. The general’s disappearance was still a mystery. In the space of a few thoughts Mathi decided she was not leaving until she discovered Balif’s true fate.
Someone cleared their throat decorously behind her. Mathi turned. There a fresh-faced elf, wearing the finest silk robes and a circlet of ivy on his head, held a polished silver tray out to the scribe. On it lay a gilded card.
Mathi understood the card was for her. She picked it up. At once crimson letters appeared, hovering a hair’s breadth off the otherwise blank rectangle. Judging by its weight, the card was solid gold.
“You are summoned to the August Presence,” he replied. “Two hours past sundown.”
“Whose presence?”
“The name of a great person is not idly spoken before foreigners and savages.”
It sounded stuffy, if intriguing. “All right. Where will I go?”
The messenger stepped aside. “You will come with me now.”
Mathi pointed skyward. “It’s a long time till sunset. Are we going so far?”
“The journey is not far, but you must be prepared if you are to enter the presence of a very August Person. Come, if you please.”
Mathi had the distinct feeling it would be very bad indeed to refuse the invitation. With an entire army to back it up, such an invitation was a command, not a request.
She preceeded the messenger. All the time her mind was racing ahead. Who was she going to see? Some high lord of Silvanost? A high priest? Or could it be the Speaker of the Stars himself?
CHAPTER 20
Mathi was led to the shore of the Thon-Haddaras. A white boat lay anchored in the stream. The hull gleamed white and smooth, with a high prow and a round stern. A light pole mast was bare of sail, but a dozen long sweeps poked through the gunwales. Running from the deck down to the muddy bank was a narrow white gangplank. It seemed too narrow to ascend, but the elf messenger went up heel to toe without breaking stride. Mathi followed more deliberately, holding out her arms to keep her balance.
When she reached the deck the plank was drawn back on board and the rowers backed off the mud. In the shadow of the prow she was startled to see Treskan. The scribe had his writing equipment and bags of documents heaped around his feet. From his expression it was clear he was as surprised to see Mathi as she was to see him. Further aft, the coxswain held an elegantly carved tiller. At his command the boat swung in a half circle and rowed smoothly downstream.
As they traveled, Mathi and Treskan heard how Artyrith’s army of forty thousand had entered the eastern province from the sea, marching up the east and west banks of the Thon-Haddaras, while another twenty-five thousand followed their route overland to Free Winds to cut the nomads’ road. It was hard to imagine so many elves had passed that way. The dense, low-lying woods were undisturbed, but that was the elves’ way. Treskan said one hundred thousand elves could pass through a forest and cause less disruption to the surroundings that fifty humans. The human way was to push through obstacles. Elves slipped by, doing less damage than a summer rain.
After describing the arrival of the army, the Silvanesti messenger fell silent. They rowed downstream a long time without a word being spoken. Late in the afternoon the lazy green stream changed into blue sea as the river abruptly widened into a fine deepwater bay. Ahead lay a great fleet of ships, arrayed in a crescent formation. Aside from a few lighters crawling across the sea, the ships were all at rest, sails furled and oars run in.
A strong onshore breeze hit the little boat, almost bringing it to a stop. The rowers dug in, pulling for the largest ship in the center of the formation. Most of the vessels were round-bellied argosies that had borne troops and supplies from Silvanost. A few swift galleots, bristling with warriors, ringed the slow sailing ships. In the center of the flotilla was a large, boxy vessel with a gleaming white hull. Gilded banners fluttered from the masts. Mathi and Treskan’s boat made unerringly for the flagship, coasting to a stop alongside amidships. Mathi expected a ladder to be lowered-the flagship’s deck was a good ten feet above them-but instead the rowers shipped their oars and everyone waited. A squeaking, bumping sound drew Mathi’s attention overhead. Creeping over the side of the flagship came a heavy wooden boom. Bright bronze chains dangled from the tip. When they were close enough, the coxswain and the messenger secured the hooks at the end of each length of chain to massive rings affixed to the boat’s deck.
Mathi stared at the boom. Surely they were not going to-
“Haul away!” called the coxswain. These were the first words Mathi had heard him say since coming aboard.
