The Forge in the Forest (11 page)

Water trickled suddenly down Elof s neck. He glanced up irritably; it was falling from an opening among the leaves, where a little patch of sky showed gray. Some great bird swooped and wheeled across it an instant with brief grace, and vanished. He pulled his pack off his saddle, and fumbled in it for his hood. Then he heard a soft crackle behind him, a sudden tang of smoke and the thin midge-song of damp wood steaming. He spun round, to find his townsmen heaping up twigs upon little tongues of leaping red; a thin thread of white was already blowing here and there among the branches above. Holvar squatted on the ground, happily clicking his flint and steel. "You thrice-damned idiots!" growled Elof.

"Listen, you may want to catch your death here, while my lord makes up his precious mind," said Tenvar thinly, "but we don't!" Elof moved to stamp out the fire; Tenvar and Bure barred him, and he thrust them staggering aside. Holvar sprang in front of the fire, and Elof, unwilling to start a fight, stooped for an armful of leaf-mold as a smother. Something sang across his head, and he heard a startled gasp from Holvar. But it ended in a gurgle, the tense legs buckled and Holvar sank to his knees. A wash of blood welled from his mouth and pattered onto the mold, flooding the arrow that transfixed his throat. Its black and white fletches turned scarlet, and Holvar toppled face down into his own fire.

Elof was no longer visible. At first sight of the arrow he had dropped, pulling Bure and Tenvar down with him. He hugged the ground, slinging the heavy pack over his back, and shouted, "Down! Down and to cover!
Ekwesh
!"

A sinister wind whistled among the branches, the leaves jerked and whipped as black streaks hissed among them. But the stunned company had that moment's warning, and ere the next arrow could land they were flinging themselves from their saddles, diving wildly behind trees or into bushes. Yells and shouts mingled with the thud of the arrows striking. A high scream froze Elof s blood; one of the baggage ponies bucked and toppled, breaking its reins, and lay kicking. The others, with arrows thudding into loads and saddles, plunged and bolted as one, whinnying with terror. There was a sudden eruption in the wood ahead as dark-clad figures sprang up to escape the threshing hooves. "So that's where they lurk!" growled Gise, and loosed two swift shots of his own; one shape leaped high and fell. Bushes crashed behind them, and he whirled round with a curse. But it was Kermorvan, still mounted, ducking past lashing branches as he spurred his pony forward. "Up, Westmen, on your feet, and rally! They come!
Morvan! Morvan morlanhal
!"

Elof and Roc sprang up as he passed, running at his heels, and behind them Tenvar and Bure, faces ashen, tear-streaked but murderous. Ermahal was up, bellowing to Maille and the corsairs. Ahead of them Kasse whipped up an arbalest and fired. A shriek told of a mark found, and then the dimness was flickering with shapes, crashing this way and that. An impact almost yanked Elof from his feet; the jagged limb of a fallen tree, hidden by brush, had snagged his belt and all but jarred the wind out of him. He snatched at his sword, found it entangled in thorny twigs. A shadow loomed up before him, a spear glinted from behind a painted shield; he ducked, swung the pack from his shoulder and dashed it at the shield. The shield cracked, the spear flew up, its tall wielder staggered back and a gray-gold blade crashed down on his head; he toppled beneath the hooves of Kermorvan's mount. It stumbled as a warhorse would not have, and Kermorvan fell heavily from the saddle. A copper-skinned warrior rushed forward with spear raised, and took Roc's mace full in the face. Elof struggled to free himself, till a dull gleam caught his eye among the spilled pack at his feet. It was the great hammer. He had not replaced it in his tool-pack; even scoured clean many times, some taint of death still seemed to cling to it, clouding the identity the true smith must feel with his instruments, and he had feared lest somehow it contaminate the rest. Now it seemed to blaze before his eyes, and there was no denying its power.

"So be it!" he cried. "Smite metal no longer! Come, and temper men!" It felt almost as if the hammer leaped into his hand; through branch and brush it smashed, and barely in time he was free. Three shapes closed in, two spears crashed where he had been; he felt hot fire sting his leg and it leaped to his head. With a yell of sheer anger he caught the hammer in both hands and swung a great scything arc, whirling on his feet with the impetus of it. Momentarily the world became a smashing, shrieking blur, and then he was bounding clear and striving to get his bearing among the sudden skirmishes that erupted through the dense thickets.

Then it was as if time stopped. A new sound rang through the clamor of the wood, a discordant, blaring cry of menace in the near distance. Heads turned, blows fal-

tered on both sides; it seemed to Elof that neither side knew what to make of it.

From behind him came a bloodcurdling yell. Maille the bosun rushed madly past, whirling his cutlass about his head, and fell upon an Ekwesh warrior as huge as himself, who stooped and thrust with his spear in one serpentine lunge. Maille's jerkin burst asunder, and the spearhead leaped out between his shoulder blades. But the force of the corsair's rush bore him down the shaft, his heavy blade chopped once, convulsively, downward, and the warrior's head sprang from his shoulders. They tumbled together among the moss. Another Ekwesh poised his spear, and Ermahal leaped to catch it. For an instant they swayed, struggling, then the captain's massive shoulders flexed once and turned the Ekwesh spear down into its wielder's body. More Ekwesh rushed on him, then flew apart like windblown leaves as Kermorvan surged out of the bushes. Elof stared, astounded, at what followed; well as he knew Kermorvan's skill, he had never seen the like of this.

Into the thick of the foe Kermorvan plunged, hewing to left and right of him, cutting, thrusting, bounding, twisting, whirling around to counter some new blow, always that trace faster yet minutely precise, never still yet wasting no movement. It might have been a dance, a dance of death, for spear and shield splintered where he struck and his sword trailed scarlet streamers in the air, which seemed to float on an unfelt wind. This was slaying made a craft, a discipline and art deeper than mere strength, speed or valor. All those the tall Ekwesh had, yet Kermorvan passed unscathed among them and all who stood against him bowed like reeds to the sickle. Terrible in its energy, it was more so in its eerie grace and most of all because it could not last. If the Ekwesh did not break, it could have only one end.

And even now a huge white-haired warrior, a chieftain evidently, ran up with one of the bowmen, pointing frantically at Kermorvan. Elof gathered his wits and sprang to aid his friend. The archer took swift aim, but even more swiftly Elof whirled the hammer and flung it. The archer whipped round and fell, bow and breastbone shattered as one, and the chieftain, taken aback, sprang away. Elof caught up the hammer and thrust it into his belt as he ran, ripping twigs from Gorthawer's hilt. At last the black sword sang loud and deep from the scabbard.

It was as if it found answer. Once more that jarring call rang among the trees, much nearer now. The Ekwesh heard it, heads turned and they fell back. With three quick strides Kermorvan was through their ranks and away among the trees, crying out, "
To me! To me, Westmen! Rally and we'll hold them
!" He turned to Elof, who pounded up beside him, and added, "If we can! These are no mere foragers, there must be nigh on a hundred! And they were lying in wait!"

"But how?" gasped Elof. "And where are the others? Maille's dead—"

"I know!" snapped Kermorvan, spitting blood from a split lip. "And the rest scattered, with the Ekwesh hunting us down! We must gather—"

A wall of painted shields swept out from behind the trees. Elof swung Gorthawer high in a spray of severed leaves to hew down at the shield before him. Then it dropped and he saw the taut feral grin, the spear poised at his unguarded breast. But suddenly it was as if a swift cloud rippled across the scarred face; the Ekwesh, startled, clutched at his eyes, and Gorthawer smashed straight down upon the line of its own black shadow. They fell flailing into the undergrowth, but only Elof scrambled up. There was crashing and shouting in the trees all around, but he could not see Kermorvan anywhere. A twig snapped, and he whirled about. Eyes and teeth glittered in the gloom, he heard a fierce hissing breath and swung up Gorthawer, but too late; the heavy shield slammed into him, his feet skidded in the mold and he fell. A Thornbush raked Gorthawer from his hand, and he crashed upon his back, winded. He had a brief glimpse, too fast for fear, of the huge white-haired chieftain above him, a great steel-fanged club descending, slowly as it seemed, relentless, unstoppable.

Then the stroke flew wide, the Ekwesh leaped and cartwheeled over him, hurled by the force of the spear in his back. And all around him the trees shook with the cry, a hundred warhorns snarling in fierce insistent rhythm. Feet drummed among the mold, figures loomed up in the twilight, sprang over him without a pause and were gone. There were shouts, a brief clashing of metal; he rolled over and struggled up, bruised and wheezing, and scrabbled
to
retrieve Gorthawer from the churned mire. The cloudy patterns in the hilt glimmered if anything more clearly in the tree-gloom, yet shadow seemed to drip from the blade. There was power in that talisman yet. He looked around sharply, expecting some new peril. But the uproar was hidden by the line of trees before him, and moving still further away. Save for the chieftain's corpse he was alone.

A sick fear gripped him for his friends, and he hobbled after the noise, hacking furiously at the undergrowth that barred his way. When he made out a clearing ahead, he set his sword before him, and with laboring lungs he burst through the last screen of brush.

Armored figures stood there, leaning upon spear and axe, but none made a move against him. He stopped, half crouching, and then he could have laughed aloud with his relief and delight. He gazed upon the squat forms, the stern faces more lined and gnarled than the tree bark around them, with something like love. He lowered his sword and gasped for his poor stock of duergar words, but they simply gestured to him to pass. He nodded, still breathless, and strode through their ranks; he saw now they were a guard, watching a flank of the wood for any Ekwesh who might seek escape that way. Beyond them opened a narrow avenue of trees; looking down it he saw faces he knew, faces of the company, and he began to run again, waving and shouting. Tenvar sprang up from the ground, and across from him Arvhes and Bure. But into his path sprang a small solid figure, so close they could not but collide. Strong arms seized him in embrace, and all but swung him from the ground.

"Ugh! You've grown heavy!" gasped Ils, and she laughed and wept all at once. Elof whooped with delight, crushed her to him and kissed her so hard the light helm she wore tumbled from her dark curls. Then he stopped, looked up and around in renewed concern.

"Ils! How… But Kermorvan, Roc…"

"Still hard on the hunt, with my folk! Most of your company is safe, I think. They… we feared you might have been taken…"

"No. The fight passed over me, that was all." He hugged her again. "But how by the Powers came you and your folk here, at the moment we needed you most?"

She snorted, and jabbed a mailed fist into his stomach, none too gently. "You're as bad as those Ice-worshiping man-eaters! Never give the mountain folk credit for being able to look downward now and again! We count these lands between mountain and river ours, though it's seldom now we fare abroad in them, save to seek wood. I came this way homeward and found the land alive with Ekwesh, a huge force of them hurrying south, combing all the lands west of the river, setting pickets on every path an east-bound traveler might take. There was hard doing then, I can tell you! I was driven well out of my way southward, but I reached the mountains at last. Our gate garrisons thought the Ekwesh too strong to challenge without good reason, but I guessed you poor fools might try these passes. So I had them set a special watch in the hills and sent word to Ansker."

Elof rumpled her hair. "And your watchers saw the fight, here in the deep woods? Sharp eyes the duergar have gained, this last year…"

"No, loon. Our sentries saw an Ekwesh band enter the trees, as if to set a picket. The watch were only awaiting the dark to come down off the hills and deal with them. But the sentries saw your company approaching, and summoned the garrison in haste. Did you not hear our horns, as we hurried down the track? We knew we might be too late, so Ansker ordered them blown in the hope of scaring the savages off."

"Ansker? Your father? He's here?"

"Indeed I am, journeyman," said a deep voice.

Elof released Ils and whirled round; he seized the hard calloused hand held out to him and sank to one knee, wondering. "My master! Again you step in to save us!" The hard planes of Ansker's face were as stern and intense as ever; but the smile playing about his thin lips and his dark wise eyes hinted at the depths of kindness beneath. Behind him, flanked by grim-faced duergar, others of the company came straggling out of the trees—Kermorvan, Roc, Ermahal, Kasse… the greater part of the company, alive. Ansker had indeed saved them, and their quest. "But you should not have risked yourself in war!"

The great duergh laughed, and raised him up. "I would hate to see my good schooling go to waste!" He rubbed his shaven upper lip, as if to suppress a sly smile. "In any event, it was my duty. I fear we may soon face these new-come men in our northern passes. As well the lord of the duergar should learn something of how they fight."