“Perhaps we might. I know it’s reaching for a single rune but we should explore the caves further,” he urged, stifling his own qualms at the prospect of going still deeper under the earth. “We should start at once, widen some of the fissures and see where they take us. We know that at least one river travels through plunge pools as it comes down the gorge. If water made these caves, it must have found its way in somehow, and in some force. There could be a way right through the high ground, out to the far side, out of sight of these bastards. Then we could strike out for the new port, where the stockmen have been building these last seasons. They’ve seen no sign of the invaders, have they, Avila? You said so yourself.” Temar bit his lip in frustration and sat down again, seeing that his words were going unheeded as Den Fellaemion turned his attention to Vahil’s approach, a sheaf of crumpled parchments clutched desperately in the younger man’s hand.
“Our supplies are very limited, Messire, no more than will give short rations for a scant handful of days. We have bread enough for several meals, cheeses and the like that people managed to grab as they fled, but many came empty-handed. We managed to salvage some sacks of meal from the ships and some small store of vegetables, but no meat or wine to speak of, and there’s precious little means of cooking anything. It is far too dangerous to send people out for fuel or foraging.” Vahil’s normally robust voice was as colorless as his face. “With the attack coming at dawn like that, few were in a position to take more than themselves and their families, if they were to escape at all. A good number are still in their night-gowns or simply their linen. We have some blankets, but nowhere near enough, especially for the wounded. There are still twelve children separated from their parents,” Vahil reported bleakly and now his voice was raw with grief. “I think we have to assume they are lost, the parents that is.”
Temar closed his eyes on his own anguished remembrance, the sight of Messire Den Rannion lying in a welter of blood, guts spilled across the muddy ground, sword still clutched in the hand that had been hacked clean from his wrist as he fought frantically to protect his people. The gems of his rings had shone in the dawn light, a detail of memory that confused Temar until he realized that the invaders were too set on bloodshed to bother with looting their victims. Worse yet was the other hand Temar had seen reaching blindly for the fallen Den Rannion, that of the Maitresse, her white hair trampled bloody into the black earth, that shrewd and kindly face destroyed utterly by the pitiless boss of a shield sweeping her aside with vicious disdain, boot prints plain on the fabric of her night-gown where she had been trampled heedlessly underfoot.
“Avila, why don’t you take Vahil and get him something warm to drink?”
Temar opened his eyes at Guinalle’s soft words, forcing away the horrid image.
“No, there are others in greater need than I—” Vahil began to object uncertainly, but he followed Avila meekly enough when she took his hand, forcing a smile on to her own worn and tear-stained features.
Den Fellaemion looked up at Guinalle from his seat on a low rock ledge. In the dim light filtering through the greenery fringing the cave’s mouth, he looked almost as gray as the rocks around him. “What have you to tell me, my dear?”
The blend of love and grief in Guinalle’s eyes as she gazed at her uncle tore at Temar’s heart when he could not have imagined anymore emotion could have been wrung from him.
“We have tended the wounded as best we can, with Artifice and with what medicaments we were able to salvage.” Guinalle unconsciously pushed a blood-stained sleeve back above one elbow. “Most are settled and, Ostrin be thanked, most of the injuries are relatively minor. Still, there are a number whom we simply dare not move, not for some days, if we are not to send them straight to Saedrin’s mercy.”
“Have you determined how many of your Adepts escaped?” Temar wondered at the urgency in Den Fellaemion’s question.
“Nearly all.” Guinalle’s answer was bitter with irony. “We were so much better able to defend ourselves when the invaders started using that Artifice of their own.”
Temar’s urge to demand aid from Guinalle and her students in surveying the caves died on his lips as he was suddenly overwhelmed by remembrance of the horror of the previous sunrise. Waking from a contented sleep to the sound of screaming, pure terror ripping through the air, horrid shrieks rising to be cut off by merciless blades as black-liveried invaders poured from ships driven high on to the mud flats to fall upon the undefended colonists. Temar’s hand groped for empty air at the memory of grabbing his sword, rushing from his bed in Den Rannion’s steading, only to see fires raging all around, women and children fleeing in desperation from the flames only to die on the greedy tongues of swords flashing bright as the building inferno struck a false dawn from the glowering clouds.
Temar’s heart began to race, anguish twisting within him as he tried to think what he could have done different, how else he might have succeeded in rallying the men who appeared, whatever weapons they might find in hand, desperate to gather in some concerted defense of the frail wooden gate. Cold fingers gripped Temar’s heart, cold sweat beading on the back of his neck as he heard again the echo of their screams, flinching from his own memories of the evil Artifice that had robbed so many of their wits and will, leaving them standing dumbly like beasts awaiting the poleaxe to die under the black metal weapons of the invaders. A tear trickled unheeded down one cheek and he looked down to see his knuckles shining white in a very death grip on his sword.
“You had to flee when you did, Temar,” Den Fellaemion laid his own desiccated hand over the younger man’s. “Saedrin be thanked that you had some little Artifice of your own to defend you, or we would have lost you as well.”
Temar could not trust himself to speak but neither could he resist a guilty glance at Guinalle. He saw only understanding and sympathy in her eyes, and for an instant that made everything even worse.
“Who are these cursed people?” he demanded hoarsely. “Why are they doing this?”
“Since any attempt at a parley has ended with our envoys meeting a hail of missiles, it’s a little hard to tell.” Messire Den Fellaemion’s mirthless smile would not have looked out of place on a deathmask. “I can’t see us resolving this by negotiation.”
“I have some idea of where they might be from,” began Guinalle hesitantly.
“What?” Temar and Den Fellaemion demanded in the same breath. “How?”
“When I was repelling their attacks, I made an unexpected contact with someone imperfectly practiced in their Artifice.” Guinalle looked uncharacteristically defensive. “Last night, when I was sure the youth was asleep, I used that touch to look into his memories.”
“The risks—” Temar drew breath to remonstrate with her but subsided at the Messire’s warning glance.
“What can you tell us, my dear?”
“They come from a place far to the north of here, small, barren islands locked together in the heart of the ocean,” Guinalle’s eyes grew distant as she looked again on the images she had stolen. “It’s a cold place, pitiless, few trees and bleak, gray rocks all around. They have very little, and what they have they steal from each other, counting blood well spent for a few measures of land. Lives are renewed in due season but land ends at the water’s edge.” Her voice deepened and took on a harsher inflection. “Artifice is used to keep the priests as rulers of the people. They can sniff out disloyalty in the sleeping mind and kill with a thought. Unity is everything when both nature and culture surrounds you with perils, foes always armed against you.”