Rulers of the Darkness

"Go on, then," Obilot said. "You haven't got time to waste." Garivald nodded and plunged on through the woods.

He got challenged once more before reaching the clearing: Munderic was not about to be taken by surprise. The other irregular also passed him through after only a few words. Raniero's troopers hadn't come into the forest in force for quite a while.

When he trotted, panting, into the clearing, he wanted to shout out his warning. He didn't, not knowing how far behind him the Grelzer troopers were, he didn't want to risk their hearing a wild cry of alarm. Instead, he called out the news urgently but without panic or excitement in his voice.

That did what wanted doing. The irregulars came boiling out of their makeshift shelters, almost all of them clutching sticks. "What do we do?" Garivald asked Munderic. "Do we fight them, or do we try to get away?"

Munderic gnawed on his lower lip. "I don't know," he answered. "I just don't know. What kind of soldiers are they? That's the rub. If they just go forward till they bump into something and then run away, that's one thing. But if they're like that bunch we ran into on the way to the ley line…" He scowled and shook his head. "Those whoresons meant it, powers below eat them."

"Let's fight 'em!" Sadoc boomed. If the makeshift mage favored fighting, that in itself was to Garivald a strong argument against it.

Munderic had more confidence in Sadoc's sorcerous abilities than Garivald thought wise. Any confidence in Sadoc's sorcerous abilities was more than Garivald thought wise. But the leader of the irregulars never had believed Sadoc made much of a general. Munderic said, "No, I think we'd do better to pick the fight ourselves and not let those bastards do it for us. Let's slide into the woods off to the west and see if we can't give 'em the slip."

Another irregular hurried into the clearing with word of the advancing Grelzers. That seemed to decide the men and the handful of women there against arguing with Munderic. They left the clearing by ones and twos, slipping deeper into the woods. Munderic gestured to Garivald, who nodded. They hurried out together.

"We've played these games before," Munderic said. "Remember the fun we had when the Algarvians tried to chase us out of here?"

"Oh, aye," Garivald answered. "I'm not likely to forget- I was part of it, after all."

But befooling the Algarvians in summer, when trees in full leaf gave extra cover and when dirt didn't hold tracks so well, was a business different from confusing Grelzer soldiers here in winter, where the trees were bare and when snow on the ground told trackers too much. Maybe Munderic didn't want to think about that. Maybe he just didn't believe the irregulars could make a standup fight. And maybe he was right not to believe that, too.

If he was, though, what did that say about how much good the irregulars were doing in their fight against Algarve and her puppets? Maybe Garivald didn't want to think about that.

Munderic pointed to a snow-covered boulder. "Shall we flop down behind that and pot ourselves a couple of those Grelzer traitors if they try and come after us?"

"Aye. Why not?" Garivald said. "I wondered if you intended to do any fighting."

"Oh, I'll fight… now and again," Munderic answered, not much put out. "I'll fight when I can hurt the enemy and he can't do much to hurt me. Or I'll fight when I haven't got any other choice. Otherwise, I'll run like a rabbit. I'm not doing this for the glory of it."

There he sounded very much like an Unkerlanter peasant- or perhaps like a soldier who'd been in enough fights to realize he didn't want to be in a whole lot more. Garivald stretched out behind the boulder. Munderic had certainly been in enough fights to know good cover when he saw it. Garivald barely had to lift his head to have a perfect view of the route by which the pursuers would likely come- and they would have a demon of a time spotting him.

By the happy grunt Munderic let out from the other side of the boulder, his position was just as good. "We'll sting them here, so we will," he said.

"You could have Sadoc make a great magic and sweep the Grelzers to destruction," Garivald said, unable to resist the gibe.

"Oh, shut up," the leader of the irregulars muttered. He turned his head to glare at Garivald. "All right, curse you, I'll admit it: he's a menace when he tries to do magecraft. There. Are you happy?"

"Happier, anyhow." But Garivald didn't have long to celebrate his tiny triumph- he spied motion through the dancing snow and flattened himself behind the rock. "They're coming."

"Aye." Munderic must have seen it, too: his voice dropped to a thin thread of whisper. "We'll make them pay."