"Leaf and Star deliver us," Belepheriel said softly. "One of the Nine is gone."
"Believe me, I share your grief," Kerleu of the High Reaches said, "but before I came to this council I spoke over distance with my home village. My wife tells me there is sickness there as well perhaps of the same sort that has stricken your cities and in the other villages nearby. She says that the Forest Wife has warned her that sickness will soon come to the plants of the forest as well, and the Huntsman warns that the monsters our cousins of the Lost Lands have long feared and fought are now moving into our domain."
"They can be fought," Feyrt said simply. "But your losses will be heavy. The story-songs tell us that the first year the Dark Folk came to ravage us, after we had gone to live in the Lost Lands, half of all the Folk died before we learned how to fight them and win."
"That is no comfort," Kerleu snapped, "when we have snipped the High Reaches of her Wildmages and fighting folk to come here and die in Elven Lands! We'd meant to draw the Enemy to us, but instead They seem to be everywhere but here in our homes, and at our children's throats!"
"What are we to do?" Redhelwar said aloud, as if he were alone in the tent.
Everyone, including Redhelwar, looked toward Kellen.
When he had first ridden off to war it seemed like a century ago now! Kellen had been the only one who knew it really was a war, and that Shadow Mountain was as serious about destroying them in the here-and-now as it had been a thousand years ago. Then, he had realized that the only way to get the Elves to believe him and to follow a battlefield strategy that had any hope of winning was to teach them to trust, not Kellen-the-teenager, but Kellen-the-Knight-Mage.
Apparently he'd succeeded.
He took a deep breath.
"They want us to scatter our forces," he said, beginning with what they all knew. "They want us to try to hold the whole of the Elven Border against Them, and it can't be done. They are trying to pull us in every direction at once. Warning Armethalieh has to be our highest priority not because it was once my home, and still is Cilarnen's, and not because it is the largest human city, but because if They take it They will become too powerful to be stopped. If warning Armethalieh won't work, we have to keep Them from taking it by some other way."
The others regarded him intently, the humans and Centaurs nodding but still not yet convinced, the Elves gazing at him alertly.
"As for the Frost Giants… "
Kellen took a deep breath.
"Lerkelpoldara is gone. That can't be changed. Evacuate Windalorianan and Deskethomaynel as well. Bring the inhabitants here to help hold Ysterialpoerin perhaps the sickness Jermayan mentions will decrease once the inhabitants arrive here, and if not, Ysterialpoerin has fine healers.
"I know travel is hard in winter, especially this winter, but those who can should travel farther into the south. Ondoladeshiron, Realthataladon, Thultafoniseen, Valwendigorean, and Sentarshadeen are all to the south and west of here, and as yet they are some distance from the encroachments. It should be spring before they are in real danger, and many of the Enemy's creatures will simply retreat into the north in the warm seasons."
"So you would simply abandon the east to our enemy," Redhelwar said, and his voice was so inflectionless it did not even hold a question.
"I think these attacks are a feint," Kellen answered. "If we do not take their bait, they will withdraw, and concentrate their forces elsewhere. But whether they do or not, we cannot hold all the Elven Lands with the forces we have. Your cities are small and widely scattered. The Endarkened use that against you, concentrating their forces against each city one at a time and destroying it before moving on to. the next. And I think that once they see that we don't mean to turn our forces east to fight them, they'll stop provoking us there and move on to another attack point." Probably in the west, Kellen thought bleakly.
"Concentrating their forces in the High Reaches, where they only dally with us now," Kerleu said, echoing Kellen's unspoken thought.
"It's possible," Kellen said, keeping his voice even. "You all know: We are almost certainly outnumbered by the Enemy. They have resources we don't know about. They are more mobile than we are, and they have more power. Without a doubt we will take losses, and heavy ones, before this is over.
"But remember this as well: If the Enemy did not think we had a good chance of defeating them, they would not be wasting so much time on us. We know what they need in order to win, and what they're doing to get it. Stop them, and this becomes a different war entirely."
"Brave words for the long view," Kearn said. "But how does that help the High Reaches now?"
"From what we saw in Kindolhinadetil's Mirror, Anigrel expects to get the High Mages to turn control of Armethalieh over to Them willingly, as Allies, by convincing them that we the Elves and the Wildmages are the true threat to their safety, not Them. What I believe that means is that They will have to work hard to disguise Their true nature from the High Mages, to aid in that masquerade. Since the High Reaches trades with Armethalieh, and the Mountainfolk have right of passage through Armethaliehan lands, I don't think They will dare risk making as much trouble in the High Reaches, where the High Mages are likely to notice and ask questions."
"You don't think," Wirance said.
"I know they remember the De Them in Armethalieh," Cilarnen said. "It's true that most people only think of Them as a nursery tale, but I'm sure the Mage Council knows that they're real. I've been doing a lot of reading lately, and I'm pretty sure that if they saw anything that looked like Them around, all the High Mages would ride out in a body to attack it even if it meant leaving Armethalieh."
Kellen flashed Cilarnen a grateful look. Cilarnen shrugged and smiled faintly.
Now came the crux of the matter, and the part Kellen was pretty sure the Elves wouldn't like. He'd hoped to have had word from Andoreniel before going into this, but it was something that had to be dealt with. Kerleu, Wirance, and Kearn could no more make the gathered Mountainfolk do something or not do it than they could influence the path of the wind. They were here because of treaties between their people and the Elves, but it was, as it had always been, a fragile alliance, and they would resent seeing their families left unprotected.
Feyrt and Atroist ruled the Lostlanders more decisively, nor were the people they had left behind in danger yet. The Lostlanders had been settled among the Centaurs and humans of the Wild Lands, which the Lostlanders thought even in winter was a very pleasant place in comparison to their own harsh homeland. But the High Reaches were the road to the Wild Lands, and no one could doubt that the farmers, Herdingfolk, and Centaurs of the Wild Lands would be next in the Endarkened's plans.
Kreylmedd, Siust, and Truanolm knew it as well they had all taken the Siege of Stonehearth to heart, when only one of Them had nearly destroyed an entire Centaur village in just a few moments. Centaurs had no magic at all to protect them; they were incapable of using it. And while more than half their fighting strength was still at home, to arrive in the spring (if any of them, Kellen amended mentally, were still here in the spring) even the fact that their villages were currently well-defended would not protect them from the sort of threats they would face.
Kellen only hoped that the Elves' trust in him was as great as he thought it was.
"You know that Andoreniel has offered the protection of the Fortress of the Crowned Horns to the pregnant women and children of all who fight beside us. But even if there were any way to get all of them there, there's no point in pretending there's room for all of them."
Redhelwar cleared his throat meaningfully. Adaerion, Kellen's direct superior in line-of-command, had developed a rapt interest in the carpet. Of all the Elves, only Belepheriel, who had conferred upon him the third degree of Knighthood, and Riasen were watching him with interest and confidence.
"But the Elven Lands themselves will offer slightly more protection than either the High Reaches or the Wild Lands, so we'd better find someplace in the southwest for the noncombatants to stay."
"You don't do anything by halves, do you, brother mine?" Idalia muttered, low enough that Kellen was fairly sure he was the only one meant to hear.
"Bring them here?" Redhelwar asked, stunned, direct to the point of rudeness.
"It is what Andoreniel meant to do, after all," Belepheriel pointed out inarguably. "Save that this is more practical than attempting to barrack them all in a fortress where they will not fit. Where will you put them? In the Elven Lands, yes, but not among us. That will not serve."
"Nor would we wish it to," Kerleu said. "Fight beside you, gladly. Live among you? A man would cut his throat in a week. I say this as fact, not insult."
"Fact or insult," Kreylmedd said, "the question stands: Where? Not that there isn't plenty of time to argue about it, as nobody can stir a stump until spring, and I expect there will be plenty to do to get whatever place you choose ready."
"A cave would suit all of your purposes," Rulorwen said suddenly.
For a moment Kellen thought the Master of Engineers was joking so far they'd found nothing but incredible danger in caves, as well as plenty of Shadowed Elves but searching the Elf's solemn face he realized that Rulorwen was perfectly serious.
"It would be good to know what lies behind your thoughts," Kellen said, falling into the everyday form of Elven politeness entirely without thinking.
"What is in my mind, Kellen Knight-Mage, is this: The Caverns of Halacira are near Sentarshadeen, which is near our southeastern border, which has so far been safe. They are extensive, and fairly well explored: We mine many of our gemstones there, and as a result of that work, many of the cavern spaces have been finished into rooms. It would be easier than many other places to convert into a defensible stronghold: simply seal off all but one or two entrances. Best of all, the Jeweled Caverns have a constant source of water in Angarussa the Undying, which flows through the caverns."
The name was vaguely familiar, and suddenly Kellen remembered. He'd ridden past Angarussa the Undying or more precisely, over it on his second day out from Sentarshadeen, when he and Jermayan had been riding in search of the Black Cairn.
"It would be good to know that it would fulfill all the requirements of the situation," Kellen suggested.
"Anyone who has seen the Jeweled Caverns of Halacira would be easy in his mind upon that matter," Rulorwen said, "for he would know that the caverns are quite vast, and should the finished areas be insufficient to the necessity before us, further areas could be finished and put to use."
"I am instructed," Kellen said, borrowing one of the favored phrases from the House of Sword and Shield. "Good. We'll use that, then. A nice homey cave."
Idalia kicked him under the table, her face studiously blank.
Of course that was not the end of the matter, but after an hour and more of debate, no one not Lostlanders, not Wildlanders, not Centaurs, not even the Elves themselves, could find something to truly object to in the proposal. The caves could be made safe and comfortable. That they were located within the borders of the Elven Lands was the best hope of protection that the Elves could offer to their Allies.
Kellen remembered the horror with which Jermayan had once reacted to the suggestion that humans even cross the Elven Lands. The war was changing everything. He only hoped that even if they won, enough of the good things survived.
"I shall send to inform Andoreniel of your decision," Redhelwar said, with only the faintest of ironies in his voice. "Meanwhile, you may take a force to Halacira, to scout and secure the caves, as well as blazoning our line of march as far south as Ondoladeshiron, should word come from Andoreniel that we be permitted to withdraw to the Gathering Plain."