Initiates were scattered there even now, hiding within the boughs.
Waiting.
Already there was a smudge at the horizon, dark and rippling with movement as a great host moved forward. There was no sound, not yet, but there would be.
Grimult had tried to prepare her, tried to tell her of the blood that would soon be spilled, sights and smells that would come when death met untouched fields, and she wondered how he might know.
Perhaps the instructors knew more than she had thought, that their books and lessons centred on truth rather than merely fiction, of battles won and others lost.
What accompanied a slaughter.
The smudge took shape into individual peoples. Some on the great beasts she remembered, spears and curved blades held tightly at the perimeter as they circled in perfect counterbalance to those moving steadily onward. The gaits of those shepherded in the centre were slower, and some were of statures hardly befitting warriors. Had they brought children to do battle?
She swallowed, feeling an unease settle through her at the thought. She did not want a massacre. Did not want to imagine the open field cluttered with bodies, whether they proved seasoned warriors or worse, wingless children brought along with their parents for a goal they surely did not truly comprehend.
Her stomach roiled further when she pictured the alternative, of winged folk felled and murdered, cast into the seas to drown as they plunged into the depths. Fledglings screaming out in fear, a people wholly unprepared in their own defence.
Only a few were trained.
And they were here.
And would have to be enough.
Others had come with them. Brothers and fathers who would not be parted, bearing farming tools and fishhooks rather than the swords they had no experience in wielding. Her heart ached to see them, full of determination, the need to defend against a foe they had never seen with their own eyes.
Until now.
She bit her lip, looking anxiously down at the land below.
She was stationed in a sentry tower, with orders to remain there, and she had not even felt the need to remind Grimult that she would be utterly unable to descend on her own. It was higher still than the stilted dwellings, built up higher than even the tree line, so sages might man the post and check for miles about them that all was calm and none had trespassed.
But where were they now?
She pulled her arms more tightly about herself. There was a knife at her hip, buckled there at her husband’s insistence. She knew it troubled him greatly to leave her, but he was needed elsewhere. Needed to be with his fellows.
Not worrying for her.
Although she could not deny that he was surely feeling it all the same.
Just as she was for him.
The persistent trudge forward produced an eerie rasp through the grasses, and Penryn pulled her cloak tighter about herself.
To see the approaching multitude from her vantage point, their numbers spanning such a great distance, their people seemed far greater than she had remembered.
Surprise was on their side, but not for long, and there was no pretending they would not all soon be overwhelmed.
Her skin itched and she rubbed at her hands, her arms as her anxiety grew.
This could not end well. Regardless of the outcome, there would be too many deaths.
The horde moved closer. Voices wafted upward, even as they attempted to keep them low. But there were simply too many as they mingled and mixed, the meaning obscured as Penryn strained to listen and tried to understand.
The halt was abrupt, the silence a stark contrast as riders hissed, the fur on their beasts bristling as low growls emitted.
They were not as close as they should have been. There was to have been no warning before the initial attack came.
Yet they halted.
Eyes searching for any sign of movement, mostly directed to the skies.
Some leaned down, whispering to their beasts in inaudible hisses, and they broke free of the rest of the horde, circling and pulling it tighter together as the warriors pushed outward.
Protecting.
Shielding.
From an enemy they could not yet see, but evidently, knew to be there.
Penryn’s heart raced, and she wondered how long it might last before the foray began.
Who might be the first to draw blood.
There were no whistles from the Mihr, scattered as they were amongst the other initiates. Nothing to betray their location.
Or in truth, that they were there at all.
She kept herself low, dared only the scantest breath lest some part of her be seen even at such a steep angle.
They moved closer still.
Cautious.
Wary.
And still, the initiates did not engage.
She wondered what stayed them. Perhaps they were waiting for the warriors to relax their stances, to lower their weapons and leave more vulnerable parts of themselves open to brutal attacks and killing blows, but the waiting was nearly unbearable.
A horn blast, long and low.
Heads whirled, and Penryn was uncertain of the blast’s origin, as the horde was suddenly shouting warnings to each other, pulling even more tightly together, eyes darting every which way.
Another blast, and this time Penryn turned her head as well, not watching for the coming onslaught, but for the source.
There. In the distance...
She squinted, but did not dare lean her head further forward lest her position be noticed.
Crimson.
A great deal of it, not the dark, earthen colours that the horde wore, but a steady stream of it from the opposing horizon.
And they made no effort at concealment, instead heralding their approach.
Her heart, already beating a rapid staccato, now felt as if it was attempting to break free from her chest.
The horde stopped all movement forward. They were exposed in the openness of the plain, and they seemed well aware of it. Their confidence had clearly been that their approach would remain unseen until they were prepared for battle, but they could not watch the whole of the skies. Not all the time.
And there were so many.
If the number of their enemies was that of a horde, the sages were a multitude of their own. Perhaps not a
