“We?” queried Bera.

“These same Mountain Men attacked me and mine.” Darni folded shirtless arms over his broad chest, emphasizing the muscles in limbs thicker than my thigh. He looked nigh on a giant among these Folk, coarse black hair curling in the neck of his jerkin. “I’d say we have a common foe, don’t you?”

“You’re going nowhere until you’ve all had some rest.” Harile blocked Darni’s path, pinching his forearm. The skin held the imprint of the Forest man’s fingers, slow to sink. “You’re too big to go so long without drinking. Get yourselves fed and watered and then your wits will be all the sharper.”

The ring of Folk around us immediately broke up, but now the dead silence of the sheltered basin was lively with low-voiced conversations, even laughter, albeit hurriedly suppressed.

“I hope you know what you’re doing,” I murmured to Darni as I sat on the hard dry lip of the rock ledge.

“Once ’Sar scries them out, we can plan our attack.” He nodded with satisfaction.

“These folk’ll be slaughtered going up against chainmail and broadswords with no more than leather and skinning knives,” I objected with some heat.

Sorgrad leaned forward past me. “Skirmishers?”

“The usual.” Darni’s expression had all the savage glee of a feral cat. “Harry them, draw them out, bleed them dry.”

Sorgrad smiled broadly. “He knows what he’s doing.”

“Care to share the secret?” I asked with a touch of sarcasm.

“We can harry the enemy, cut down stragglers, and maybe make a few night attacks on their camps.” Darni’s voice was matter of fact. “We can’t deny them the ground, so we make it as costly to take as possible and then raise the price of holding it too high for them to bear.” He looked at the assembled Folk in the broad dell, expression thoughtful.

“That’s a long game to play.” I accepted a wooden bowl of thick and savory soup from the fat woman and ate hungrily. Even the flatbread was welcome, soaking up the last of the hot liquid as I scooped up shreds of meat and greenery with a battered spoon that Sorgrad produced from one of his pockets. A lad went past with what looked suspiciously like squirrels strung on a stick but I put the notion firmly from my mind. It was probably deer meat in the soup.

“That’s better.” Darni drained the last drops from his own bowl, wiping his matted beard with the back of one hand. I felt as filthy as he looked, my shirt sticky with sweat.

“We need to find the closest threat,” said Usara, talking more to himself than anyone else. “The ones that attacked Apak.”

“There must be at least three elements working their way in from the north,” ’Gren pointed out, face intense as he turned his thoughts to strategy and tactics.

“I’ll wager any money the assaults are being coordinated using Elietimm enchantment,” scowled Darni.

“That’s what I’d do,” nodded Sorgrad.

“So we need to come up with a plan to stop that,” I noted innocently.

“What kind of force do you reckon we can stitch together out of these people?” ’Gren looked around the basin, a predatory eagerness in his tone.

“Think how close Apak’s people were to Grynth when they were attacked. Bera’s were on the edge of the Lakeland.” Darni’s jaw jutted forward. “We have to do something or the whole of the Ferring Gap will be dragged into this. Come to that, they’ll have set the entire Forest alight before the end of the season. How’s Brakeswell going to react if the Great West Road is closed? What about Pastamar?”

“We mustn’t be hasty,” said Usara desperately. “First things first. I must bespeak the Archmage. Planir will know what to do.”

I sat silently and drank from a flagon of water. I wasn’t particularly concerned whether or not Planir knew what to do. I had plenty of ideas.

The Chamber of Planir the Black,

Archmage of Hadrumal,

6th of Aft-Summer

“So, you see, you must send help and quickly. If we do nothing, there will quite simply be chaos.” The urgency in Usara’s words rang through the shining mirror to strike faint echo from the goblet in Planir’s hand.

The Archmage took a reflective sip of his emerald green cordial. “I think you need to widen your focus here, ’Sar.”

“Is there a problem with the spell?” Usara frowned.

“Think through the consequences of what you are suggesting,” said Planir patiently. “For you and the Soluran to help these Forest Folk is one thing. For the wizards and Archmage of Hadrumal to engage in the fight would be quite another.”

“But these Mountain Men are backed by at least one enchanter from the Ice Islands,” protested Usara hotly. “They seem to have suborned these Sheltya. There’s no telling how powerful they might be!”

“You can counter their enchantments with your own sorcery,” Planir reassured him. “This is a dire threat and you must do everything in your power to halt this enchanter’s ambitions. But I am not prepared to raise the stakes in the greater game by having the mages of Hadrumal take on Elietimm enchanters who have set this landslide in motion.”

“They have stirred up the mountains with Misaen only knows what lies!” cried Usara. “Surely we must show them that we simply will not tolerate such deliberate malice?”

“What would the King of Solura feel, seeing mages waging war on behalf of the Forest Folk?” Planir demanded, face stern. “What would he think of the wildwood becoming the province of wizards with no ties or loyalty to his laws, rather than his realm’s age-old safeguard against Tormalin ambition?”

“We would leave once the situation was resolved,” objected Usara.

“And when would that be?” Planir queried with polite interest. “How long before we could be confident the Mountain Men would not simply storm down from their heights the instant the last mage returned to Hadrumal? How would you reassure the Forest Folk that they would be safe from further attack? Don’t you think they would want at least a few mages, if only to summon help if they are invaded again? Are we going to commit ourselves to supporting the Forest Folk, when they have proved to have no learning of any real worth? Do we want to make enemies of the Mountain peoples, when they have aetheric learning that we so desperately need?”

“I’m sure we could come to some compromise.” Usara sounded less certain.

“What would the great guilds of Selerima and Vanam have to say, the good burghers of Wrede or even of Grynth?” Planir set his glass aside and laced his fingers together, elbows resting on the arms of his chair. “Remember how fiercely these cities and lordlings prize their independence. It may be twenty generations or more since they threw off Tormalin domination, but the memory of the struggle lingers. How would they react to wizards in the Forest dominating the road to all the lucrative markets of Solura? We could have them expelling every mage within their boundaries, forbidding the cities to any wizard, reinstating the penalties for wielding magic that forced Trydek to bring his motley band of apprentices to Hadrumal in the first place.”

Usara made no reply, merely looking increasingly dejected.

“That’s on the one hand. On the other,” Planir suited gesture to his words, “we would find ourselves besieged with requests for help. What of the Ferring Gap? We’d have guild masters hot-footing it to the nearest philtre seller, demanding immediate aid on all manner of spurious grounds.”

“They’d be disappointed then,” said Usara tartly. “All parties in the Gap have given just as much offense as they have received injury.”

“How do you propose refusing help when you have just overturned generations of tradition by fighting in support of the Forest Folk?” inquired Planir.

“This isn’t mere competition for profit,” Usara objected. “These people are being slaughtered!”

“So it’s a matter of principle?” Planir raised a finger. “It’s principles that have kept the Lescari at each other’s throats for ten generations, isn’t it? The rights of a ruler to bequeath his sovereignty to his own blood as opposed to the rights of whoever feels strong enough to make a grab for the crown. If we use our powers to halt one slaughter of the blameless, how can we let that chaos go unchallenged?”