The Forest King

by Paul B. Thompson

  Everyone was awakened later by gentle prods. Mathi was surprised that she had slept. It had not been her intention, but slumber crept up on her before she knew it.

  It was a clear night, with strong starlight and no moons yet risen. The wind moved to and fro, changing directions in little puffs this way and that. They were dangerous conditions, Balif observed. Starlight could reveal them even to human eyes. The deceptive wind could mask important scents or send theirs wafting in unfriendly directions.

  “Shall we stay here?” asked Lofotan. Balif said no.

  Before they left, Lofotan had his commander sit with a sturdy myrtle sapling between his knees. Balif put his arms around the trunk. Lofotan wound chain around his wrists and ankles, securing the ends with twists of wire.

  Plainly unhappy with having to truss up his revered commander, Lofotan put a skin of water on Balif’s lap. Even chained, he could reach it. He gave Treskan a sword, warning him not to clank or clatter as they approached the nomad camp. The scribe, very unmilitary with the weapons in his hands, swore he would not.

  After apologizing to his commander for the fourth time, Lofotan took Mathi by the elbow and propelled her into the darkness. Rufe gave Balif a wink and sat down beside the general. He launched into a tale of his wanderings. It promised to be very long and very strange.

  Lofotan, Treskan, and Mathi soon were swallowed by the night. Beyond, the eastern horizon was alive with the glow of a mighty campfire in the same spot they had earlier seen the smoke.

  CHAPTER 12

  Hunters

  Mathi, Treskan, and Lofotan walked parallel a while, wading through knee-high scrub toward the fire-lit hill. The old warrior moved like a cloud, hardly stirring the leaves as he passed. Mathi slipped along, trying to match the elf’s deftness. Treskan had a harder time. If Mathi hadn’t already known he was a human in disguise, she would have figured it out. His progress was labored and noisy.

  The route wasn’t easy. Roots tripped their toes, thorny branches ripped their elbows, and insects swarmed around their faces. The ground was a hazard covered with fallen tree limbs. She avoided them all, but Treskan stepped down on an unseen burrow. The turf broke loudly, and the scribe sprawled on his hands and knees. By the time he got up, Lofotan was standing over him.

  “Give our position away once more, scribbler, and I’ll take you back and chain you to our lord!” he hissed. Treskan swallowed hard and swore he would be more careful.

  They began to hear voices. Without warning, Lofotan angled toward some good-sized trees off to the left. They were dogwoods, very old and gnarled. He climbed the twisted trunk. Casting around, Mathi and Treskan saw others and hauled themselves up as well.

  Two nomads appeared, laughing and talking loudly. Each carried a large canvas bucket. They passed right under Mathi.

  “—he said he could do it, so I said try. He strung his bow and zzup! Put an arrow in the buck’s brisket. The crazy thing kept boundin’, and we ended up chasing it another mile!”

  “Daxas never was a good bowman,” said the other.

  They stopped on either side of a freshly dug hole in the turf. Dumping out the buckets, they retraced their path and disappeared in the cleft between the hills.

  They swung down. Treskan clamped a hand over his nose. “What was in the hole?” he asked through gritted teeth.

  “Offal,” Mathi whispered. The humans had butchered a deer and disposed of the parts they didn’t want. The smell of blood made Mathi tingle in ways she had not experienced in a very long time. She found herself staring at the noisome pit until Lofotan called her away.

  Rather than follow the two nomads, Lofotan went up the dark side of the hill to the summit. With great care, Mathi and Treskan shadowed him, trying to step in the same spots as their leader. They arrived at the top soundlessly. They found the old warrior crouched by a boulder. Below, a broad hollow lay spread out before them. Lofotan pointed down at the fire-lit expanse.

  The camp was large indeed. It filled the hollow from end to end. Surrounding the sprawl of rude tents was a palisade of spears driven butt-first into the ground. Nomad spears had metal or stone end caps that allowed them to be driven in like stakes. Inside that fence lay tents, pens, and corrals, laid out in disorganized fashion. Lofotan said nomads shared their tents with up to five comrades. Counting the shelters, he reckoned they were looking at a camp of more than one thousand. They could not see any children or elders. That meant one thing: it was a war party.

  Lofotan spotted odd pens in the camp. Tied to stakes inside one pen were eight centaurs, heads bowed and legs folded. Beside them was another pen with a top made of lashed saplings. Something stirred within the dark confines of the makeshift cage: more captives, obviously smaller than centaurs.

  Lofotan signed for them to follow. He had seen enough. Sliding backward on his belly, he eased back into the darkness. Mathi was about to join him when she heard a sound that made her blood turn cold.

  Dogs were baying inside the camp. Mathi froze. They hadn’t counted on dogs. Sure enough, a pack of ten hounds came springing through the lanes between the tents, each one baying to be first after their prey. Nomads left their bowls and cups when they heard the animals’ commotion.

  “No time for stealth,” Lofotan said, rising to his feet. “Run!”

  Mathi and Treskan tried. She fled down the hill, kicking high to avoid branches and burrows. In an instant she lost sight of her companions. She didn’t have any time to wonder where they had gone before the pack was at her heels. More than a dozen deerhounds with long, thin legs; white teeth; and tails like whips came bounding after her. They spilled right and left, seeking to cut her off. Running downhill helped, but Mathi soon saw flashes of gray and brown ahead of her. The dogs had her ringed in. She dragged at the sword Lofotan had foisted on her, trying to draw it as she ran. Heavy tramping in the grass to her left turned out to be Treskan, running for his life.

  The animals in front of her halted with fangs bared. She ran right at the closest one, sword upraised. It was a brave beast and stood its ground. Mathi sent its head flying with a single swing. A dog behind her bit at her leg but got only the hem of her gown. Mathi shortened it by a head as well. Treskan swung wildly at the hounds swarming around him. They darted in after each swing, got between his legs, and brought him down in the high grass.

  The pack was closing in on Mathi too. Where was Lofotan? Torches appeared at the top of the hill. The nomads were coming. Where was Lofotan?

  She waited for the comforting snap of a bowstring and the flicker of deadly arrows foiling her pursuit. None came. With horror Mathi remembered it was Artyrith who was the superb archer.

  A lean, muscular hound leaped at her, catching her sword hand in its jaws. The dog’s weight spun her around, and two more jumped on her, catching hold of her cloak. She staggered as they tugged hard in all directions. Mathi couldn’t raise her sword with the dog on her arm. The hand guard saved her hand from being mangled, but it also gave the hound something to hold on to. A fourth animal clamped on to her dress. With a cry, Mathi went down.

  She expected to be savaged. Deep in her soul she had flashes of such a fight—hounds surrounding her, yellow teeth snapping, the baying of the pack as it closed in. It was night then too, and Mathi had drowned the lead dogs one by one when they tried to seize her in the midst of a swift-running stream. There was no water there, only stars and bloodthirsty hounds and the smell of smoke.

  Whistles split the night air, and the dogs kept tight hold of her, but they didn’t tear her flesh. The torches grew brighter. She smelled pine burning. A band of nomads, their faces black against the sky, stood around her.

  “What is it? A brace of rabbits?”

  “A couple of those little thieves, damn them!”

  Fire was thrust in her face.

  “No! The elder kind! And female!”

  “This one too!”

  More whistles in short, sharp blasts made the dog pack back off. Hard hands took hold of Tre
skan and Mathi and dragged them to their feet.

  “Who is you?” asked one of the nomads in poor Elvish. “Why you here is?”

  “My name is Mathani Arborelinex,” she replied in their own tongue. One of the benefits of living on the fringes of elf society was that she had come into contact with many races. Mathi understood a good part of eight tongues, including Ogrish.

  “Hey, Vollman, two of your dogs are dead,” called out another human.

  One of the nomads holding Treskan’s arms gave the limb a wrench. The scribe yelped. “Kill my boys, will you? Maybe I’ll take an eye or a finger for each one you slew!” The one called Vollman jerked a long-bladed dagger from his belt.

  Treskan struggled in the grip of two brawny nomads. Mathi fought hard until a similar weapon was pressed against her throat. She felt her heart contract to a small, hard knot.

  “Be still or be dead!”

  “Stop it, Vollman. They will answer questions for the chief first. Then we’ll decide what to do with them.”

  With buffets to the head and kicks in the backside, Mathi and Treskan were marched to the nomads’ camp. Glancing left and right, she saw that her captors were fiercely tattooed men with light-colored hair worn in tight braids. They wore deerskins beaded with bold designs. Metal was a mark of status, she guessed. The leader of the party that caught her wore a crescent-shaped strip of brass around his neck and had yellow metal plugs through his earlobes.

  In camp, a crowd of nomads had gathered to see the night’s catch. A few were women, warriors too, but most of them were men of fighting age. Mathi and the scribe were driven like wild stags to the door of a large, dome-shaped tent.

  The gorget-wearer called out, “Chief! Come out! We caught us something!”

  The chief came out. He was the tallest man Mathi had ever seen, nearly seven feet tall. He was darkly tanned, but in the torchlight his eyes were slate gray. His head was shaved except for a single long lock on the back of his head, which he wore thickly braided and pulled forward over his shoulder.

  “What’s this?” His voice was as big as his frame.

  “We found these elder kind hiding in the bushes,” said the man called Vollman. “She speaks our tongue good.”

  “Oh?” said the giant, advancing a step until he towered over Mathi. “I never met a big-ears who could speak our language well. Maybe you’ve spent some time around people, yes?”

  Mathi didn’t answer. She wasn’t being sullen or stalwart; she was just scared. The chief took her silence for resistance. He backhanded Mathi so hard that she fell backward into the arms of the surrounding nomads. Laughing, they boosted her back on her feet. Mathi tasted blood.

  “Where do you come from?” the chief bellowed at Treskan. His mumbled “Silvanost” was the wrong answer.

  “Spying on us, yes? How many elder kind have we seen on our journey, Nurna?”

  A muscular young nomad said, “Three, four, chief. Always on hilltops far away, watching us.”

  “Collecting news for their king, yes?” To the men holding the captives, he barked, “Search them!”

  They did with brutal thoroughness. Her gown was torn in several places. She did not scream, and the violation did not go any further. They found the secret mark of the brethren under her right arm. The blue tattoo surprised the nomads. They had never seen an elf with marks before. There was some excitement when they found Treskan’s stylus—it was metal and nicely turned—and the talisman Rufe had taken and Mathi had returned. The jeweled gold ornament got everyone’s attention.

  Vollman claimed the talisman against the loss of his two deerhounds. There were a few protests, but the lofty chief awarded the trinket to Vollman. Mathi had nothing of the tiniest value on her: a few scraps of parchment purloined from Treskan, some charred wood to write with, a few beads, and a wooden amulet carved in the image of Quenesti Pah, part of her disguise as a former resident of the Haven of the Lost.

  The chief examined the small harvest taken from the prisoners. Aside from Treskan’s talisman, there was nothing very rich or revealing about any of it.

  To Mathi he said in passable Elvish, “Is this all you got?”

  “I am just a poor traveler,” Mathi replied in the same language.

  The chief threw the trinkets on the ground. “They know more than they’re telling. Tie them to the cage.”

  They dragged them to the roofed-in box in the center of the camp they’d seen earlier, the one made of lashed-together saplings. Mathi was shoved face-first against the rails. Her wrists and ankles were tied with thongs. Treskan was slammed into place beside her.

  From within the dark cage, a pair of eyes met hers. Mathi could not tell whom she was seeing, but she heard a whisper say, “Tell them what they want to know. They’ll lash you to death if you don’t.”

  Nurna appeared with a rawhide whip. Mathi felt her knees give way. She had not bargained for such treatment. Where was Lofotan? How could he leave her to the savages?

  Nurna nodded and two nomads tore the cloth from Mathi’s and Treskan’s backs. She clenched her eyes shut and braced herself for the sting of the lash. It didn’t come. Trembling, she opened her eyes. Twisting her head around, she saw Nurna and others speaking together with hushed urgency. One nomad ran off. Nurna came closer, coiling the whip in his hand.

  “Too bad,” he said. “May the great gods pity you.”

  Before she had the slightest understanding of what was happening, Mathi and Treskan were cut loose and thrown into the cage. They crouched on their knees—the roof was too low to allow her to stand—and watched in amazement as the nomads dispersed.

  “Merciful gods,” he muttered. What stayed their hand? Mathi had no idea.

  “You heard the man,” said their unseen companion. “They pity you.”

  “Who’s there?” Mathi said sharply, drawing closer to Treskan.

  “A brother.”

  Their fellow prisoner crawled out of the shadows on his hands and knees. Treskan drew in a loud breath. The stranger’s hands and forearms were covered in short, stiff fur. Where a man or elf had nails, their companion had curving, yellow claws. His face emerged from the deeper darkness. Mathi must have stared too hard, for the creature halted his advance.

  “Forgive me. As another mistake, I thought you one of us,” he said. His Elvish was excellent, and his accent urban. If an elf closed his eyes, he would think he was speaking to an articulate resident of Silvanost.

  “I am one of you—one of us! Who are you?”

  “Taius.” The name rhymed with bias.

  “I am Mathani Arborelinex. This is Treskan.”

  Taius laughed or coughed. It was hard to tell through the fangs and fur. “He’s not what he seems either, is he?” Neither of them answered. Taius said, “You still use a Silvanesti name?”

  “Why not? You do,” Mathi replied.

  Taius withdrew into the shadows again. “I no longer claim Silvanesti as my race.” He chuckled, an unnervingly beastly sound. “Do you know your mother and father?”

  “No, but I know my creator.”

  Taius’s eyes glittered in the dark. “Say not the name.”

  She tried to remember if they had ever met. The children of Vedvedsica’s art had been scattered, by design, all over the kingdom. Mathi lived in the western woodland, not far from the provincial town of Woodbec. Judging by his accent, Taius had dwelt in the city.

  “But why did they spare us the lash?” Treskan said.

  “When they tore open your clothes, they saw the truth.”

  “Truth?”

  It struck Mathi like a thunderbolt. Her elf form was her greatest advantage. Among all her brethren, she was chosen for the mission because her appearance was the most perfect. One by one, the others had begun reverting to their original beastly shapes. When she left the brethren’s hidden camp for Silvanost, she was outwardly as elflike as Balif or Artyrith. But the change was affecting her too. Her characteristic fur was slowly returning. The nomads saw she had elf
features but with body hair. Treskan was in the same condition but for different reasons. His elf image was wearing thin in the wilderness. The nomads assumed the two of them were—

  “Half-breeds,” said the voice.

  Mathi was so relieved to escape the flogging that she didn’t care about her degeneration beginning. Being mistaken by the nomads for a half-elf was an unforeseen benefit. Hating and distrusting elves themselves, they had a certain sympathy for half-elves, who were despised by the Silvanesti and officially persecuted by them.

  “What about him?” Taius said.

  Treskan replied, “I am a scholar, trying to broaden my knowledge of the elves.”

  “You’re a long way from a library.”

  “You must help us escape!” she said urgently. “I am on an urgent mission for our brethren!”

  Taius sprang at her, alighting scant inches from the crouching Mathi. Long teeth bared in a fierce snarl, his hot breath played on her face like flame.

  “To the abyss with the brethren and all our kind!”

  Mathi pushed her face closer until their noses almost touched. “I thought we are all kindred.”

  “The brethren abandoned us in the city. So did the Creator. He gave us, his children, to the Silvanesti. They hunted us down like—” Had he intended to say animals? Whatever his intent, Taius thought better of it. “They hunted us, killing all who resisted. The rest were spirited away to oblivion.”

  “So too our creator,” Mathi said.

  “You lie! For his betrayal of his children, the Nameless One was spared!”

  Mathi told Taius what she had been able to glean from Balif about Vedvedsica’s trial and condemnation. She went so far as to tell him about Balif’s voluntary exile from Silvanost on the pretext of scouting the eastern province for information about nonelf invaders. Though he had no knowledge of what Vedvedsica was doing, Balif had provided help to the magician. After Vedvedsica’s fall, Balif offered to take full blame for the scandal, but Silvanos would not allow it. How could he tarnish the name of Silvanesti’s greatest hero with such horrible pollution?