The Forest of Peldain

Pale ghosts, a dozen seaborne warriors spread across the terrace, picking their targets. The first Peldainians to die did so silently, scarcely knowing it. The next gave a muffled yell. Alerted, the remainder turned, looked startled, gasped, drew their swords—Vorduthe was surprised to see it took them little longer than if they had worn shoulder-scabbards—and made shift to defend themselves.

One did not even get his blade free before he was cut down. The others got barely any better chance to show their worth. In seconds no watchman was left alive.

Vorduthe moved to the parapet. These were the first Peldainians he had seen apart from Octrago, and one after the other he studied the dead faces intently. The racial resemblance was clear for the most part: skin white as limestone, high cheekbones. He pulled back a cowl and saw pale hair which in sunlight might well have been as yellow as Octrago’s own.

Grinning in triumph, a trooper pawed at the jerkin of the man he had just killed. “I could do with some of this warm clothing!” he announced. “Hm. It’s not cloth. Some animal’s skin, I’ll be bound.”

Vorduthe touched the material worn by the man he was examining and rubbed it between his fingers. It had a velvety feel, but somehow it was unlike either cloth or any animal pelt he knew of. It was hard to say what it was.

The Peldainian’s unblooded sword lay nearby. Picking it up, he ran his eye along its edge. The workmanship was fair, but not impressive by Arelian standards.

The hilt, though… it fitted his hand snugly, but had a grained feel, like tree bark. He inspected it, and could have sworn its surface was tree bark, had it not been so perfectly formed.…

Laying it down, he cuffed the trooper who was now in the act of pulling the jerkin from his victim. “Later. You can’t loot and fight at the same time.”

Lord Korbar reported seeing a timber door on his side of the stronghold too. “Good,” Vorduthe said. “Most likely it also gives access to the interior. Take your contingent and attack from that quarter, Korbar—if you find no way through then return to aid us. King Askon, perhaps you would be good enough to accompany Lord Korbar.” If they should fail to meet up within the fortress he would worry less about the stolid Korbar with Octrago along to advise him.

Stealthily Vorduthe led his own party through the timber door, then groped his way to the inner door and opened it a chink. Through the crack he saw only what appeared to be a stone-walled passage lit by a guttering bracket torch. But voices and subdued laughter floated up from somewhere.

For a few moments he waited, to allow Korbar and his group to get into position should the room opposite have a different layout. Behind him the warriors were stumbling, cursing and jostling in the darkness; he opened the door a trifle wider to give them light.

At his elbow was one of the four surviving troop leaders, a man named Wirro Kana-Kem. “Be ready, Kana-Kem,” Vorduthe whispered. “We go through now.”

The troop leader hissed instructions to those behind him. Vorduthe pushed the door open and stepped through.

To his left the stone passage proceeded to what he guessed was the rear of the blockhouse, where it turned through a right angle. To the right, one wall ended a few paces along and the corridor became a gallery.

Striding cautiously to the start of this gallery, Vorduthe saw what it overlooked: a large common room. At a broad but curiously gnarled table, laden with platters of food and jugs of drink, some fifty men were seated, eating and talking. They all wore garments of the same design: hip-length white surplices on the chests of which were stitched an emblem he could not make out from this distance, and sleek green knee-britches. Piled against the farther wall of the common room, nearest the front of the fortress, were weapons, helmets, and other fighting garb.

The air was stale and smelled strongly of the smoky torches used for lighting. Vorduthe tried to estimate what the chances might be of cutting off the weapons stack before the Peldainians could get to it—it would save a lot of bloodshed and he could not afford to lose many men. Only one stairway connected the gallery with the floor and that was at the nearer end. Men might run the gallery’s length and lower themselves or even leap to the floor, but it was a fair drop.

Then Korbar appeared on the parallel gallery that overlooked the other side of the hall, and almost at the same instant someone down below glanced up and spotted the intruders. The Peldainian looked incredulous, then gave a shout of alarm.

Vorduthe grabbed Troop Leader Kana-Kem and thrust him forward. “Four men to the far end, down onto the floor and stop them getting those weapons—quick!”

Kana-Kem in turn grabbed behind him, snapping orders. As he and the men he had detailed raced along the gallery Vorduthe flourished to Korbar and rushed with a howl down the stairs.