“It would honor me did you choose to ride with me,” Isinwen said, trotting up beside Kellen on Cheska.
“Thanks,” Kellen said. He took Isinwen’s hand, and pulled himself into the saddle behind him.
They rode back toward the camp—more slowly now, following their own hoofprints in the snow. The horses were tired, and Kellen sensed no need for haste. The fight back at the camp was certainly over by now. And if they’d stayed to fight it, Ysterialpoerin would already be burning.
He didn’t want to be alone with his thoughts just now. They kept returning to Mindaerel. He knew that a good general had to use the people and materials available to him to win—use them up as often as not. He wondered if Redhelwar regretted every death of those under his command.
Suddenly Kellen found himself hoping so—fiercely. So far he’d been lucky. His people had been wounded, some gravely, but no one had died. But when they attacked this new set of caverns, some surely would die. He would not only send them to death, he would lead them to it, just as he had led Mindaerel. And afterward he would mourn them, just as he mourned her now, but he would know—he knew now—that it was something he did open-eyed, and would do again the next time there was need.
What was he becoming?
A leader. A commander. Someone who can face Shadow Mountain—stand against the Demons—and not flinch.
Nobody said it was going to be fun.
He wondered if this was how a sword felt while it was being forged.
But right now he needed something to take him outside his thoughts, if only for a little while.
“You’re good at that,” Kellen said to Isinwen as they rode. “Talking to the sentry. They’re very… formal… here.”
“Yes. I was born here,” Isinwen said blandly. Kellen stiffened in surprise. If it had been Jermayan, Kellen would be sure he was being set up for one of the elaborate and obscure Elven jokes, but he didn’t know Isinwen well enough to be sure.
Isinwen chuckled. “One does not forget the ways of Ysterialpoerin easily.”
Kellen was only glad he was riding behind Isinwen, so the Elf could not see his expression, but apparently it wasn’t hard for Isinwen to guess by the way Kellen twitched. He hoped desperately that he hadn’t offended Isinwen, though he was pretty sure by now that Isinwen was amused—by something, at any rate.
“I did leave,” the Elf added. Perhaps it was supposed to mean something to Kellen, but he wasn’t sure what to say. After a moment, Isinwen spoke again.
“One hears that the human city is punctilious in its ways, and everything must be done just so,” Isinwen said in his most neutral “discussing the weather” tones. “And some cannot bear it, and leave. Perhaps, then, you would understand that when I went to the House of Sword and Shield to train as a Knight, I knew I could never bear to return to Ysterialpoerin. In Sentarshadeen, in Ondoladeshiron, in the eastern cities, life is… different.”
Different? That was something that stretched Kellen’s imagination. He’d gotten used to thinking of all of the Elves as being as alike as they looked. So the Elves had the equivalent of Armethalieh? And this was it? That was something he’d never thought of. Except that their “Armethalieh” didn’t have High Mages, of course—and they could leave any time they wanted to, and go somewhere they liked better. Or go to Ysterialpoerin, if that was what they wanted. It occurred to him that for every Elf like Isinwen, who couldn’t stand the place, there probably was one who found that it was their heart’s desire.
So… everybody who was in Ysterialpoerin wanted to be there.
What if Armethalieh could be like that? What if people could not only choose, but actually know what they were choosing?
“You give me much to consider,” Kellen said.
“A proper Elven answer,” Isinwen said, “yet brief, as they are on the Borders.”
“And consider me as grateful as whatever you like that you were there to speak for me,” Kellen said, “since I don’t think it would serve Redhelwar’s purposes if I insulted everyone in the city with what was taken for unpardonable rudeness. And… if it’s anything like Armethalieh”—he hesitated, not wanting to insult anyone, even in absentia—“it would suit some very well, and perhaps not others.”
“We will not be here long, by the grace of Leaf and Star,” Isinwen said, “nor should you have need to go among the folk of Ysterialpoerin, called the great city of the forest’s heart, as they would say, again. Yet should there be need, I will teach you some simple forms that should serve you. I memorized them all, in the days of my youth, for I am no poet, and that, Kellen, is among the greatest of the reasons why I left!”
By now they approached the camp, and as they passed the sentries, they met groups of Elves bringing bodies into the forest in wagons. In the distance, Kellen could see the lights of the camp.
Rulorwen was with the groups carrying off the dead, and Kellen hailed him.
“I See you, Rulorwen. It would please me to know what you may tell,” Kellen said automatically. The awkward circumlocution seemed almost second-nature by now. Even if it was “brief, as they are on the Borders.”
“I See you, Kellen. It is good to know that you live,” Rulorwen answered, with the same intonation as if they had met in a garden. “The day was ours, by the grace of Leaf and Star. Vestakia and Idalia Wildmage are well: I have seen them. Adaerion lives, and will wish to know that you live also.”
That was the equivalent of being told report at once. “I go in haste,” Kellen said.
“Take Cheska,” Isinwen said, swinging down from the saddle. “There’s work here.”
Kellen slid forward and gathered up the reins while Isinwen had a quiet word with his mount. He looked over his shoulder.
“Sihemand, Rhuifai, come with me. The rest of you, look to Rulorwen.”
He rode down into the camp. Sihemand and Rhuifai—who were carrying the jugs of metalfire and the Shadowed Elf weapons—followed.
The camp was still disorderly in the aftermath of the battle, but there were no bodies to be seen. The fires had been put out, though the smell of burning and the rank stench of poison still hung in the air, making Cheska shake his head and snort. Soon, though, Kellen knew, it would be as if the attack had never occurred.
Kellen reached Adaerion’s pavilion, but before he could dismount, Kharren stepped outside.
“He is with Redhelwar,” she said without preamble. “Go there.”
Kellen turned Cheska’s head toward the great scarlet pavilion at the center of camp. When he got closer, he saw that it had not escaped the night’s battle unscathed. The front was nearly charred away, and a network of ropes—obviously new and hastily added—held the structure upright.
Kellen dismounted, motioning for the others to do so as well, and stopped before the wide-open front of Redhelwar’s tent, where Dionan stood guard. Adaerion, Redhelwar, and several others were inside.
“Bring the jars, and the weapons. Then go. Find Ciltesse, and tell him what has happened. Take his orders. If you cannot find him”—If he is dead—“return to Isinwen.”
Sihemand and Rhuifai bowed, a brief acknowledgment.
“Be welcome,” Dionan said gravely.
Kellen and the two Elves entered. His men set down the heavy stone jugs, the bows, and the quivers of iron arrows just inside where the doorway would have been, bowed again, and departed. They mounted their horses, and led Cheska away with them.
Kellen waited, and as he did so, the last of his energy seemed to drain away. Redhelwar was behind the others, speaking with someone he couldn’t see. At last the general finished and came over to Kellen.
Kellen bowed very low, since he knew in his bones that this was the only thing in the way of proper Elven formality that he’d be able to manage tonight.
Reaction was setting in. Only the knowledge that they had saved Ysterialpoerin from burning was keeping him going now.
“I See you, Redhelwar, Army’s General,” he said wearily.
“I See you, Kellen, alakomentai, Knight-Mage. One observes that you do not ride Mindaerel this night,” Redhelwar said.
“She’s dead,” Kellen said. He took a deep breath, and held back another sudden burst of sorrow. “The Shadowed Elves killed her.”
“May her spirit run free in the Fields of Vardirvoshan,” Redhelwar said sympathetically. “I have had grave news this night, and I would have your counsel.”
“With all respect, I do not think what I have to say can wait. And for my brevity I beg pardon,” Kellen said. “The attack on the army was a feint. The Shadowed Elves went to burn Ysterialpoerin. They had new weapons. I think it would have worked.”