moving with a rolling corkscrew gait that brought different limbs to the ground at different times. Three golden orbs projected from its blunt, bulbous head, if it was a head. Behind the monster came a pair of hulking, snakelike monstrosities, pale worms whose beaked maws were surrounded by four strong, barbed tentacles. Araevin couldn’t say what gave him the impression, given the startling alieness of all three creatures, but something in the motions of the corkscrew monster suggested purpose and intelligence.
“What do we do?” Ilsevele asked.
“Let’s see if it will pass by. I’ll watch, and you be ready to rouse the others.”
The creatures’ progress had brought them from Ilsevele’s side over to Araevin’s, and he had a good view of all three. Carefully he eased his lightning wand into his hand, and reviewed the spells held in his mind just in case.
The sinister creatures continued on their way, the forest silent around them, but then the dark corkscrew creature halted, right at the spot where Araevin and his comrades had left the path to set up their camp off the trail. It seemed to feel around, groping like a caterpillar seeking the next place to set its feet, and it gave voice to a strange, shrill whistling sound. It began to sway and weave its limbs in a strange, coiling motion.
Araevin peered closer, trying to discern what it was up to-and he saw the magic at work.
Corellon preserve us, he thought in horror, it’s casting a spell! The thing is a sorcerer of some kind.
“What is it, Araevin? What’s going on?” Ilsevele hissed.
“Ready your bow,” he said. “When I give the word, you must shoot the dark one.”
He couldn’t see it, but he felt her nod of assent. She moved softly behind him, drawing an arrow and laying it across her bowstring.
Has it found my spell wards? he wondered.
He watched for ten terrible heartbeats as the monster sniffed at and studied the concealing spells he’d woven around the camp, and for one moment he felt certain that the thing had detected his illusions-but then it whistled again, and curled itself away, resuming its serpentine progress along the forest path. The large pale tentacled things snuffled and followed, undulating after the first one. In a few moments, they disappeared from view, and Araevin breathed a sigh of relief.
“You can relax,” he said to Ilsevele. “They’re gone now.”
“What were those things?” Ilsevele sighed and leaned around the tree to meet his eyes.
“I have no idea,” Araevin said. “Whatever they were, they were intelligent, and one at least could wield magic.” He stared off into the gloom after the monsters, still trying to make sense of the whole scene. “Let’s give the others another hour of sleep if we can then get moving. I don’t like the idea of waiting here for those creatures to return.”
Three days of swift marching put Mistledale and Galath’s Roost nearly eighty miles behind the Army of Evermeet, as Seiveril and Starbrow led their host westward toward Shadowdale. Seiveril rode at the head of his troops, his spirits lifting as they left the Sembians and Hillsfarians behind. Regardless of what might come, the days of indecision had passed, and the shadow of disaster in his divinations had retreated for a time. His course was not without risk-he weighed that much every day with his auguries and prayers-but events were once again in motion, and Seiveril was content with that for the time.
Despite the fact that he knew better than to divide his forces in the face of more numerous enemies, Seiveril had decided to leave a strong force behind him in Mistledale. Six full companies of infantry remained near Ashabenford, under the command of Vesilde Gaerth and a small contingent of the Knights of the Golden Star-two companies from Seiveril’s own Silver Guard, one from Evereska, and three companies of the volunteers who had mustered at Elion and had been forged into real fighting units by the furious battles at Evereska and the Lonely Moor. Seiveril did not expect Vesilde to repel the Sembians or Hillsfarians if they moved on Mistledale in strength, but he hoped that the elven infantry would deter the Sembians from attempting to follow his main body to the west, and perhaps convince them that Mistledale would not be yielded without a fight. If matters came down to it, Vesilde was to retreat southwest down the Dale, covering the Dalesfolk as best he could and giving up land rather than meeting a stronger enemy in battle-but Seiveril hoped that the Sembians and Hillsfarians would be slow to attack a resisting Dale outright.
The army’s track followed a human-cut footpath along the river’s north bank that linked Ashabenford and Shadowdale-town. In other times it might have been a picturesque journey, with the broad, shallow ribbon of the river close to Seiveril’s left hand, its waters often swift and boulder-studded, so that the river’s voice filled the forest nearby. But Seiveril urged his captains to march long and quickly each day, exhorting his host for more speed. The warriors who followed him responded with swiftness that no human army could hope to match, often trotting for hours at a time to make better speed. Seiveril was not sure if he could reach the northern borders of the dale before the Zhentilar, but forty miles lay between Shadowdale’s northern border and the Twisted Tower. He was certain that he’d have his army waiting in the village of Shadowdale for the invaders if he failed to meet the Zhents before they entered the dale.
Seiveril rode at the head of the army among the Silver Guard, the cavalry who had served House Miritar in Evermeet. The Silver Guard was the largest body of mounted soldiers in Seiveril’s host, three full squadrons of lightly-armored knights who rode under the banner of Edraele Muirreste. Edraele was a young and slightly built moon elf, so small that it seemed ludicrous that she should have taken up the sword. Edraele might have been young for her command, but she was also the single finest equestrian that Seiveril had seen in his four hundred years, and she possessed a fiery charisma that her warriors adored. He’d placed her in command of the vanguard on leaving Galath’s Roost, and she and her Silver Guard had vigorously patrolled ahead of the army, searching for any sign of the enemy.
In the evening of the march’s third day, they fought their first skirmish against the Zhentarim’s soldiers.
The track broke out of the forest Cormanthor proper, crossing a narrow neck of open land along the southern border of the Dale, less than twenty miles from the town of Shadowdale. As the glittering elven cavalry rode between fields of chest-high grain straight and still in the calm hour before sunset, a pair of scouts appeared from behind a stone farmhouse, riding hard for the banner.
“What is this?” muttered Captain Edraele from beside Seiveril.
She stood up in her stirrups and cantered forward to meet the scouts. Seiveril restrained his impulse to go and see what news the scouts brought, and made himself wait. He didn’t want Edraele to think he lacked confidence in her.
As it turned out, he did not have long to wonder. Edraele wheeled away at once and spurred back to the company of Golden Star knights and Silver Guard officers who rode by Seiveril.
“Zhentarim cavalry!” she snarled as she pulled up abreast of Seiveril and Starbrow. “A large company, about a mile off on our right front. They’re chasing after a scouting party of our own warriors.”
“The Zhents are here already?” Seiveril said.
He glanced back at the twilight woods behind him, thinking of the miles-long column of marching elves who followed behind the cavalry. The forest wouldn’t stop him from deploying from the march into a line of battle, but still… he’d thought he would have two days more, at least.
Starbrow read the concern in his face, and shook his head. “It won’t be the main body, Seiveril. The Zhentarim likely have bands of marauders and scouts ranging all over the open dale, looking for us and causing trouble where they can. It’s what I would do in their place.”
Edraele pranced her horse around, and looked to Seiveril. “They likely don’t have any idea that we’ve got the vanguard of the army at our backs, Lord Seiveril,” she said. “Unless you object, I’ll take the Silver Guard and drive them off.”
“I agree,” Starbrow said. “I don’t see any reason why we shouldn’t teach them a hard lesson about getting too close to us.”
Seiveril hesitated. Somehow, he found that he had been hoping that it would not prove necessary to meet Zhentil Keep in battle. He felt Starbrow and Edraele waiting on his words, and frowned. Regardless of his wishes, the Zhentarim had picked a fight, and the fact that they were willing to employ orc, gnoll, and ogre mercenaries spoke volumes about the sort of realm they would raise over northern Cormanthor if he avoided battle.
“Very well,” Seiveril answered. “Drive them off, but be wary of ambushes, Edraele.”
Edraele did not wait an instant longer. She plucked the standard from her bearer’s stirrup-rest and waved the banner in a fluttering circle.
“Silver Guards, follow me!” she cried, and she dashed off into the dusk. All around, the Silver Guards spurred
