The arrival of the dragon at Ondoladeshiron had not caused panic, since Andoreniel had sent messages ahead of time, but Ancaladar’s presence was an occasion of more curiosity than Kellen and Vestakia combined. When Kellen left Idalia’s tent, he realized that Jermayan wasn’t going to be that hard to find.
Jermayan and Ancaladar, making a virtue of the inevitable, had decided to put on a sort of aerial display for the encampment. Ancaladar was circling the Gathering Plain, flying low and slow enough for everyone to get a good look at him. Kellen could see the sunlight glint off the dragon’s black scales, and see the blue flash of Jermayan’s armor.
“Idalia—Vestakia—come look! Jermayan’s brought Ancaladar down low enough for everyone to watch!” Kellen called, and the others crowded out of Idalia’s tent to watch.
After a few minutes of circling, dragon and rider soared high into the sky— and there, to Kellen’s astonished delight, Ancaladar performed a series of acrobatics that reminded Kellen of nothing so much as a selkie after a particularly choice fish.
It came to Kellen that what he was watching, however entertaining it looked now, had a grim and entirely serious purpose. These were the battle moves for sky fighting, the forms that Ancaladar would have to use against flying enemies. Jermayan would have to not only remain in the saddle, but be able to cast spells while Ancaladar was performing these maneuvers.
“I hope Jermayan didn’t eat too much breakfast,” Vestakia said, sounding faintly worried as she stared into the sky.
Idalia laughed. “Oh, he wouldn’t make that mistake twice! This is hardly the first time they’ve done this. It’s really quite enjoyable.”
“I don’t think I’d care for it,” Vestakia said firmly.
Kellen glanced at Idalia curiously. She’d ridden Ancaladar? While he and Jermayan were doing something like that?
No, he didn’t want to know. There were some things a man was better off not knowing about his sister. About women in general, probably. Geas or no geas.
“I’m going to go out in the open and see if I can get them to land so I can talk to Jermayan,” Kellen said. “Wish me luck.”
—«♦»—
HE suspected that Ancaladar had seen and recognized him, because the dragon landed before Kellen had gotten very far away from the edge of the encampment.
Here there was nothing at all to break the force of the wind, and it cut like a knife of pure ice. Kellen was getting pretty tired of winter already, and Idalia said that there was more to come. Moonturns of it, in fact. No wonder it wasn’t allowed to really penetrate Armethalieh’s defenses against weather!
He bowed to Jermayan as Jermayan vaulted—with the ease of long practice—down from Ancaladar’s back.
“It would be interesting to know when you learned to fly like that,” Kellen said. “The display was most instructive. And I don’t think you’ll get Vestakia anywhere near Ancaladar, after that.”
“I would promise to be good,” the dragon said, sounding faintly hurt.
“I have been practicing,” Jermayan said, obviously pleased. “And it may someday be needful that she ride with us. She is the only one who can tell where the Shadowed Elves lair. If she can do it from the air…”
Then she could cover the ground very fast—faster than on horseback. And a lot more safely.
“You’re the one who’s going to have to convince her, not me,” Kellen said, grinning. “Or maybe you can talk Idalia into helping you. She seems to like flying.”
“Never will she forget that she once had wings of her own,” Jermayan said. “It is a hard loss to bear. I admit I had not thought our display might alarm Vestakia, but Ancaladar thought it best to present himself to everyone at once, so all might know him for what he is immediately. And it is a fine day for flying. The skies are clear, and the winds are relatively calm and steady.”
“And the sky is blue, and the ground is white, and it’s winter, and sooner or later it’s going to snow again,” Kellen agreed. “And as you know perfectly well, I didn’t come out here to talk about the weather, but to tell you how I spent my morning.”
Quickly and concisely, Kellen told Jermayan and Ancaladar about Wildmage Atroist, and the increasing frequency of the Demon raids in the Lost Lands.
“We knew they never stopped raiding there, but lately it’s been getting worse. Atroist says that if they send us any help, they risk stripping themselves of all protection. But we need all the help they can give us.”
“You have a plan,” Jermayan said, studying Kellen’s face. “Leaf and Star deliver us.”
Kellen shrugged. It had seemed like a simple plan when he’d come up with it back in Idalia’s tent, and frankly, he couldn’t see any other way of getting the Lost Lands Wildmages on their side. He took a deep breath.
“Atroist says that he can get them all to come—all the Herdsfolk, with their flocks and herds. If Andoreniel will grant them safe passage through the Elven Lands, they can settle on the other side—in human lands—where They don’t come. Then their Wildmages and fighters will be willing to leave them, knowing they’ll be safe.”
Jermayan took a deep breath, his whole body rigid with something beyond astonishment.
Ancaladar began to laugh.
Jermayan whirled and glared at his friend—Kellen could tell that much from his body language—but Ancaladar simply wouldn’t—or couldn’t—stop laughing. He shook his enormous head from side to side, scraping his chin in the snow, eyes tightly closed in mirth.
At last Jermayan’s shoulders relaxed. He walked over to the twitching dragon and kicked it—gently—in the ankle.
“Very well, my friend. I stand rebuked,” he said to Ancaladar. “Who am I, an Elven Mage, to bridle at the thought of humans within our lands when there are Shadowed Elves beneath them? If it will gain us help in an evil hour, it is foolish to cling to outmoded thoughts and old ways.”
He turned back to Kellen.
“You did not simply come to tell me this, of course,” he said.
“I need someone to go back to Sentarshadeen and ask Andoreniel for the safe conduct,” Kellen said. “You and Ancaladar would be fastest, and I think Andoreniel will listen to you. So I thought I’d come and see if you were willing to go.”
Ancaladar gave a last faint wail of mirth and raised his head from the snow. “Oh, yes. I am willing to go. I want to hear what he says.”
“I see it is settled, then,” Jermayan said. He sighed. “Kellen… I agree that we need their Wildmages. And no one could expect them to abandon their own people to Them. And it is equally true that the most direct route from the Lost Lands into human realms lies through Elven Lands. But I do wish you had found another way.”
With that Jermayan turned back to Ancaladar, stepped up into the saddle, and took off into the sky.
Kellen shook his head. There was something else he was missing here. Probably another ancient Elven tradition that he hadn’t had time to learn.
But Jermayan was right. They couldn’t cling to those now. They had to change.
Or die.
—«♦»—
JERMAYAN did not return that day, nor was he back by the following morning, when the full army was mustered together on the Gathering Plain, and Kellen saw General Redhelwar, and Rochinuviel, Viceroy of Ondoladeshiron, for the first time. Petariel had told him over morning tea that Redhelwar would be wanting to see both him and Idalia in his tent afterward, as the only ones who had actually seen the enemy up close, in order to plan the actual tactics of the campaign. But this was a purely ceremonial occasion.
Kellen had to admit that the army was an impressive sight. But the Elven destriers—and probably even the unicorns—would be of no use in the caves, and against a Demon attack in force, even this much of an army wouldn’t survive more than minutes. It would take more than physical might to defeat the Demons. And Kellen was coming to think—after what Atroist had told him— that it would take more than magic, too.
Some combination of both that he hadn’t figured out yet, he supposed. Or maybe it was just as simple—and as difficult—as keeping the Demons from getting their hands on whatever objective it was that they thought would guarantee them victory.
Whatever that might be.
—«♦»—
REDHELWAR was a grave and imposing figure in scarlet armor, mounted on a destrier whose coat was nearly the same color. Kellen saw him only from a distance, of course, since he stood with the Unicorn Knights. Kellen tried not to think about the fact that Redhelwar’s experience with real war was as theoretical as his own: the Elves had been at peace since the end of the Great War, and certainly for all of Redhelwar’s lifetime. But despite their heritage of peace, Kellen was coming to realize that the Elves were a warrior race, and he already knew they were master strategists. If they could only be weaned from so much love of Tradition!
But if Redhelwar did not approach the Unicorn Knights closely, to Kellen’s great surprise, Rochinuviel did.