The second day proved uneventful. They crossed the borders of Pefland and Weklia without incident. When they stopped for the evening, Farrell felt the effects of two days of near-constant riding. Even the smooth, even gait of a unicorn couldn’t prevent soreness when he rode all day. Penelope and Peter showed similar signs of discomfort.
Shortly before noon on their third day, the road they’d followed turned into a dirt path. A few miles later, they passed a pair of square stone pillars that marked the eastern edge of Weklia and western boundary of the unclaimed savannah that covered much of central Lourdria. Without a sovereign to maintain the road, the hard-packed dirt path devolved into a thin track.
Rather than slow down, Klissmor increased their pace. The unicorns preferred the waist-high grass of the prairie over the cobblestone road they used for the first two days of their journey. They rushed past clumps of short scrub trees and bushes that dotted the landscape. When they spotted a small grove of trees on the horizon, they decided to break for lunch under the shade.
They followed their now-usual routine, and Farrell saw to the unicorns while everyone else made a small camp. He’d just set out food and water for Nerti and the others when he saw movement to his left. With a spell at the ready, he turned to find a large herd of giraffes coming toward them.
“Amazing,” he whispered.
“Would you like to meet them?” Nerti asked.
Farrell turned away from the approaching animals and nodded. “They’ll let me get close?”
“Unicorns are charged by Lenore with protecting all her creatures,” Klissmor said as he moved next to Nerti. “They know that we would allow no harm to come to them.”
Farrell waited patiently as the eight giraffes approached; five adult females, two young females, and what looked like a young male. As they walked, Farrell noticed the male limped. The herd came to a stop about twenty feet from Nerti and Klissmor.
One at a time, the majestic creatures came closer, bowed, and backed away. When the young male moved up for his turn, Farrell saw he had a deep wound to his right hindquarter. Without thinking, Farrell extended his sense and felt the wave of pain coming from the giraffe. Despite the agony from his injury, the male bowed and started to back away. When he stumbled, Farrell moved forward.
The animal looked at him suspiciously, but Farrell projected soothing thoughts to keep him calm. He raised his hands and avoided any sudden movements. For good measure, Farrell raised his shields in case he spooked the animal and it attacked.
“Farrell, what are you doing?” Nerti asked.
“Trying to examine his wound. I’m certain I can heal it.”
“As could I, but it is not the way of things.”
“I disagree with a natural order that allows the wounded to needlessly die.” He knew he couldn’t save every sick or wounded animal or person, but he refused to let one suffer in his presence.
Up close, Farrell confirmed the male was still an adolescent. As he inched closer, Farrell felt a wave of reassurance wash over his consciousness. He’d felt the aura many times and knew Nerti had taken a hand to help him calm the large animal.
Taking a leap of faith, he lowered his shield and pushed healing energy to his hands. He placed his glowing fingers above and beside the wound. This close he realized the injury would likely have incapacitated most men, yet the giraffe still limped his way with his herd. Perhaps he believed it to be his final act, but since Farrell couldn’t read the animal’s thoughts, he’d never know.
The jagged, infected wound had three distinct cuts. The middle one was the deepest and the source of infection. Left unattended, the festering flesh would kill the animal in a few days’ time, assuming a predator didn’t kill him first.
Working inside out, he cleaned the wound of all infection and sealed the torn flesh. The only remaining signs of injury were three pinkish lines. Since bed rest would be impossible for the giraffe, he pushed energy from himself into the animal to ensure he’d have the stamina to keep up with his herd.
Satisfied the wound would not hinder the giraffe, he looked up and found himself staring into the animal’s enormous eyes. A large, pink tongue licked him once before the male stepped back. When he rejoined the others, the entire herd bowed to Farrell before they turned and ran off in their gangly yet graceful way. The male looked back twice before they were too far away to be seen.
With a tinge of regret, Farrell turned to rejoin the others and eat his lunch. Nerti stepped in front of him before he’d walked three paces.
“I’m proud of you, Little One. That was an act worthy of Lenore’s Chosen. You honor the Holy Mother with your deed.” She touched the tip of her horn to his cheek and held it there. A warm feeling radiated from his face and coursed throughout his body. When she withdrew her horn, she turned away and went back to her meal.
Farrell raised his hand and touched his cheek. He no longer felt drained from the healing, and when he took a step, he realized the soreness from the ride had disappeared. He stared at Nerti for a few moments before his stomach rumbled. There would be time to talk to her when they resumed their journey. Right then, he needed to eat.
Agloth sat on the eastern edge of the desert, and they’d decided to skirt the burning sands rather than run through them. The detour added a day to their journey, but no one wanted to spend two days and nights in the desert. Klissmor had kept them on a slightly northeast track since they’d reached the savannah. On the morning of the fourth day, he shifted their direction slightly to the north after consulting with Nerti and Penelope. They ran all day with minimal breaks and only stopped when the light proved too dim to see by.
Their lunch break on the fifth day had nearly ended when Farrell felt magic brush against the protective shields he deployed to hide them whenever they stopped. He sent Penelope a questioning glance, but she showed no signs she’d detected anything.
“Did you feel that?” Farrell asked.
Penelope closed her eyes, and the muscles in her face twitched. When she opened her eyes, she looked at Farrell. “Feel what?”
“Seeking magic made contact with my cloaking shield.” He paused to check if the spell had lingered. “It’s gone, but someone’s looking for us.”
“Why do you think someone is looking for us?”
“Aside from the fact I don’t believe in coincidence, we’re four unicorns and two peregrines running toward Agloth.” He cast his senses out again with no results. “I didn’t really think the cover story would hold up.”
Penelope sighed. “And yet you agreed to the plan.”
“No, I didn’t. This was forced on me. I wanted to go alone.”
“Whatever you wanted, Seritia had other ideas, and you were forced to adapt,” Nerti said as she, the other unicorns, and Grohl and Takala moved closer. “This is still the best plan given the requirements from the Holy Mother. We should be focused on what to do next, not the wisdom of something already decided.”
“For starters, we need to keep going,” Miceral said. “For Seritia to get involved means we need to get to Agloth.”
“Agreed,” Nerti said. “But how do we get there safely?”
All eyes turned toward Farrell, and he had to struggle not to shake his head. He hadn’t wanted to have all these people with him for just this reason, and now they all expected him to do what he didn’t think could be done—hide their presence for a thousand miles.
“We mount up and continue as we planned.”
“That’s it?” Grohl asked. “Just keep doing it as we’ve been? What kind of magic is that?”
“The only kind we have,” Penelope said. “You’re talking about shielding and hiding a moving party. That would be difficult in its own right given how fast we are moving, but to do it for ten hours or more a day for five more days? I’m not sure it can be done.”
“It can be done.” Farrell shrugged. “As you said, it won’t be easy, and it will drain us so that if a fight comes to us we’ll be exhausted, but it can be done
. The impossible part is how to hide two peregrines flying above us.”
“Are you suggesting we should go home, brother?” Takala’s words had an obvious challenge in them, and the feathers on his neck bristled.
“No, but since I can’t hide you two easily, I suggest we keep going as planned.” He turned toward Penelope, and she nodded once. Her approval made him feel better. “Penelope and I will keep alert for signs we’re about to be attacked.”
When no one voiced an objection, he stood up and put their supplies away. He didn’t relish the idea of trying to hide four moving unicorns for five days, but maybe they could squeeze another day or two of anonymity before he had to undertake that task.
Taking extra care to be “quiet,” Farrell dissolved his spells around the camp and prepared to leave. The savannah was vast, but if they knew what they were looking for, even a half-trained wizard could find his party with the right spell. Before they left, he surrounded the group with an enchantment that would make them look like grass to anyone making a sweeping search. It wouldn’t stand up to a focused investigation, but it would make finding them harder for someone trying to hone in on them.
The real danger was his brothers. Their presence overhead acted like a flare to anyone looking. They agreed to split up and spread apart, but that only helped a little. Anyone who saw them would be able to narrow their search to several hundred miles instead of thousands. But it couldn’t be helped.
Away from cultivated lands, they abandoned the pretense of guarding the princess. Klissmor still took the lead, but Nerti rode just a pace behind him now. Farrell kept his senses open, hoping to feel the spell before it could locate them. The constant state of alert proved mentally taxing, but he planned to talk to Penelope that night about sharing the duty.
An hour into their ride, he caught a whiff of something. It was so faint it almost went unnoticed. He jerked up out of reflex, but he’d lost the link.
“Is something wrong?” Nerti asked.
“I felt a presence. It’s not close, but it was there.” He included Miceral and the other unicorns in his answer.
“Should we recall your brothers?” Klissmor said even as he stepped up their pace.
“I’m not sure if—”
“Harpies!” Grohl’s scream made him wince. “Hundreds of them coming fast from the northwest!”
Farrell swore and Nerti lurched ahead, moving faster than he’d ever felt. “We can’t outrun them, Nerti. We need to find a defensive location.”
“Agreed, but until we do I intend to put as much distance between them and us as we can.”
Grenda, Klissmor, and Nordric stretched out into a line behind Nerti and matched her pace.
Farrell scanned the skies for his brothers and noticed they were angling toward each other and gaining altitude. “Brothers, you’re too high.
You need to move lower so I can shield you.”
“On the ground we would be useless in the battle,” Grohl said with more than a hint of glee. “Peregrines fight in the air.”
“Harpies are no match for a peregrine, let alone the sons of Rothdin.” Takala matched his brother’s enthusiasm.
“You will be outnumbered several hundred to two.” Farrell knew he’d have better luck convincing a pair of stones not to sink in water.
“Our victory will be a tale worthy of an epic ballad,” Grohl said.
“Honorus’s balls!” Farrell considered pulling them down with magic but didn’t want to have that fight right now. “Their plan is to engage the entire swarm of harpies so the bards will sing about them for the next few centuries.”
Miceral laughed. “That sounds like those two.”
“This is not funny, Ral.” He enhanced his vision and swept the landscape with his gaze, hoping to find someplace safe nearby. As he feared, he found nothing. “They’re so outnumbered they’ll be mauled in minutes.”
“Foolish peregrines.” Nerti’s anger matched Farrell’s. “Unless they come close enough for Farrell to protect them, they’ll end up dead.”
Turning his heightened sense skyward, Farrell focused on the approaching enemy. The harpies were steadily closing the gap between the two parties. Grohl and Takala could easily outfly the smaller creatures, but the unicorns, even at their top speed, would eventually be caught.
“I need to speak to Penelope,” he told Nerti.
“Speak and she will hear.”
Without asking how Nerti would accomplish his request while running all-out, he did as instructed. “Penelope?”
“How—?”
“Nerti is relaying my thoughts.” He pulled energy from his stores directly into his body. “I need you to enclose us in as strong a shield as you can and be ready to assist if one of my brothers falls from the sky.”
“What are you planning?” Despite her question Penelope raised a powerful shield around the group.
“I need to get to my brothers.” He channeled some of the energy into a new shield. The power glowed orange around him. “Nerti, you and the others need to be as compact as possible. It will make it easier for Penelope to shield you all.”
“Farrell!” Miceral broke into the conversation. “What are you up to?”
“I need to convince those thick-skulled raptors they can’t handle this fight by themselves.”
Before Miceral could protest, Farrell launched himself skyward. He disliked that leaving the group would upset Miceral, but not going meant Grohl and Takala would die needlessly. With a flick of his hand, he had his battle staff off his back and sped toward the point he estimated his brothers would meet.
“Farrell, what in Honorus’s name do you think you’re doing?” Miceral’s mental scream wrenched Farrell’s gut.
“Making sure we’re still ten when this threat has passed. I’m sorry, Ral, but this is the only option.”
“Klissmor said to trust you, and I will, but when you get back, we need to talk.”
The calm, measured answer concerned him more than an anxious appeal to return. He pushed those thoughts aside. If he intended to try what he planned, he needed to concentrate fully. “I understand. Keep running and look for a defensive position. When you find one, secure yourselves as best you can and prepare for our arrival.”
Soaring higher, Farrell twisted to watch his brothers converge on his position. Behind them, off in the distance but closing fast, he noted the enemy. Like a dense swarm of insects, the flock of harpies formed a fastmoving cloud of swirling blackness.
“Brother! You’ve come to join us!” Takala’s exuberance made Farrell feel a bit guilty about what he had to do next.
“No, I came to tell you that this is the last time you will ignore me when I give you an order. If you defy me again, I’ll send you home and tell Father to send me two more mature peregrines who know how to follow orders.”
His brothers were close enough for Farrell to see their feathers flare up around their heads. Too bad if his words angered them. Better they be mad at him than become meals for the harpies.
“No one addresses us in that tone, brother, not even you,” Takala said.
“Silence!” he yelled into their minds. “I’m in charge, not either of you. If you can’t or won’t listen to me, you can go home. Do you understand?”
Farrell felt more than heard their affirmative responses. So long as they understood he could and would send them home in disgrace, he didn’t need to threaten them any further.
“Good.” Farrell floated higher and allowed his brothers to glide in a circle around him. “One of you needs to go back and help the others find a defensible location to make a stand. The other shall stay with me.”
“So we are going to fight back!” Grohl sounded thrilled with the prospect of battle.
Farrell’s lips curved upward before he could stop them. Smiling that Grohl was anxious at the prospect of fighting near overwhelming odds made him almost worse than his brothers. Almost. “It would be a shame to waste the effort it took to fly up here to speak to
you. Besides, I know a few tricks we can do to trim their ranks before they reach the others.”
“Why can’t we both stay?” Takala asked.
“Because I can only protect one of you. But more importantly, someone needs to help the others.” He waited, expecting a protest. When none came he added, “Even if what I hope to do succeeds, more than a few will get past us and will attack the others. They’ll need all the help they can get.”
Farrell hoped the prospect of combat no matter which task they chose would mollify his brothers.
“I will stay,” Takala said. His words held a note of challenge. “I must redeem myself for my failure at Northhelm.”
His brother’s reckless course now made sense. Their stupid code of honor said it was better to die a hero than to live as a failure. But now that he knew what they wanted, he decided to play into it.
“I shall see to it that you do so on an epic scale, brother.”
“Are you certain I must leave the battle?” Grohl asked.
Sometimes Farrell wished he understood peregrines better. “Yes, they need your help. Who else can protect their flank if any get past us?”
“No one else can guard them like I shall.” Grohl immediately began a downward dive toward their quickly retreating friends. “Good hunting, brothers, but save a few for me.”
Shaking his head, Farrell watched his brother speed toward Nerti and the others. “I hope he won’t be too angry if we don’t let any get past us. If what I plan works, there may not be any left for Grohl to deal with.”
“He will get over his disappointment.”
The sibling rivalry between his adopted brothers amused him. Unfortunately, to “make up” for Takala’s glory, Grohl would likely undertake some ill-advised move just to “even the score.”
Leaving that issue for after the crisis, Farrell moved himself higher until he floated above Takala. “Do you trust me totally?”
“You need even ask? Every day I have is a gift from you. If you asked me to bare my neck so you could kill me now, I would not deny you. Tell me what you need, and it shall be yours.”
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