We left together, making for a space no effort to hide Our going, but rather leaving plain tracks of three who traveled in company. After a time we began to conceal our trail, so that to any human tracker it would seem we had vanished into thin air.
Dawn found us in a dell where a spring bubbled. There were rocks among which we sheltered. My companions dozed, as did I, but we could wake in an instant to anything which was not ordinary. We were well to the east of the camp and, as nearly as I could tell, somewhere along the way Maelen must use on her return. But how soon we might expcet her I did not know. My nose was still clogged, and with that foul odor ever about me, I could not test any breeze.
It was an odd day—the sun was cloud-veiled, but there was no hint of rain, rather a misty hiding of the horizon. There was the feeling that beyond the limit of one’s sight was a significant and perhaps dangerous shifting, that one could not depend upon what was reported by one’s eyes. And I wished at that moment that at least one of our company was equipped with wings, that we could have a spy whose vision of the country would be wider and better than our own.
But if there had ever been any birds or flying creatures among the Thassa little people, I had never seen them. So our sight was limited. What did happen during the day was an increasing contact with the rest of the scattered company. They linked minds at times so that fragmentary reports sped along a line wide enough, I hoped, to cover the whole front Maelen might cross in her return to the hills.
There were paired combinations such as the two who shared my refuge in the dell, the big eared animals and their riders. Apparently these partnerships did not exist only on the stage, but held continually. Borba and Vors, Tantacka, the ones who had drummed and some I could not identify, all reported. Simmle must have remained at the camp as I had asked, for I did not pick up any answer from her.
We did not venture further into the plains. It was better to reserve our strength by waiting for Maelen. I discovered during that day, as I tried to hold and read those minds, that the little people did not equate the Thassa with the plainsmen, whom they looked upon as natural enemies to be avoided and regarded with suspicion and wariness. The Thassa, however, were accepted wholeheartedly as kin and trustworthy companions. I remembered what Maelen and Malec had said—that the Thassa who would be Singers dwelt as animals for a space. What form had Maelen worn when she had so run the hills? Had she been one with Vors, or Simmle, or these with whom I now companied? Did one have a choice or was one assigned? Or was it chance, as it had been with me because the barsk ailed and was available?
Twice during the day I roved out into the open country as stealthily as I could, seeking for any traveler. And on my second trip I sighted a mounted company heading toward the hills. But they were a troop riding under some lord’s banner, armed men mustering perhaps—and they were some distance to the south. I knew they would sight none of us.
Impatience came with nightfall. We sought food, prowling up and down the line we had assigned ourselves. I found my luck was such as to keep my belly empty, for I could not scent any game. But water was not lacking and I learned that to go hungry does not cripple one.
There came the middle part of the night and with it a ripple of message. “One comes!”
Only one person, I thought, could awaken that response in those with whom I shared this vigil.
“Maelen!” I sent an imperative mind-call into the night.
“Coming.” It was dull, a whisper, if such communication can be so judged.
“Maelen.” In contrast my sending was a wordless shout. “Trouble-take care, wait—let us know where you are.”
“Here—” Louder, a beacon to which we gathered from brush and grass.
She sat there in the moonlight on her hard-ridden kas. In contrast to the clouded day, the night was clear and the Three Rings burned in a glory of light. Her cloak was about her shoulders, the hood pulled over her head so that we could see no woman, only a dark figure on a stumbling mount. I ran into the open with my ground-covering leaps.
“Maelen— trouble!”
“What?” Again her send was a whisper, tired, as if strength had ebbed from her and she kept going by will alone. Now fear nipped at me, and I sped to her.
“Maelen, what is wrong? Have you been harmed?”
“No, but what has passed?” Her question was stronger, her body straightened.
“Osokun’s men raided the camp.”
“Malec? The little people?”
“Malec”-I hesitated and could find no way to tell it better-”is dead. The others are with me here. We have been waiting for you. They have tried to make the camp into a trap for us.”
“So!” The weariness had gone out of her. She made of that word the whistle of a whip lash. “How many of them?”
“Perhaps twelve. Osokun is wounded, another has taken command.”
For me anger had always been a hot and burning thing, but the wave of emotion which washed from her to touch me now was cold, very cold and deadly. Also it was very deep, and I flinched as I might have dodged a blow from her hand.
Moonlight became silver sparks as it struck the wand she held out. The light appeared to drip from that rod, until it held my eyes, made me dizzy. And she sang, first in a low murmur, but the words, the notes entered into one, became a tingling along the veins, nerves, muscles; and then louder and louder, to fill one’s head, driving out all save a will and purpose that caught us up and welded us all into a single weapon which fitted her hand as perhaps no sword has ever suited the plainsman who bore it.
I saw that silver wand move and I marched in obedience to it, with all the others of that furred company, as Maelen and her sword-sworn took the field. Of that journey back to the hills I do not now remember anything; for, as those with me, I was filled with a purpose which crowded out all else, save the necessity for satisfying the hunger that Maelen’s singing had set in me. And the answer to the hunger was blood.
There came a moment when we lay in hiding and looked down upon the camp. To our eyes this was deserted save by the kasi that stamped and nickered at their lines. But our other sense made it plain that those we hunted were still there.
Again Maelen sang, or else the echo of her earlier song moved in me. She got to her feet and started down the slope toward the vans. Back and forth before her she moved her wand. It had been burning silver in the moonlight. Now, though it was day, yet still it was bright, dripping fire from its tip.
I heard a shout from the camp. And then we were in upon them.
These were men used to dealing with animals they considered inferior beings, to be hunted, slain, tamed. But animals that had no fear of man, who combined for the slaying of men—these were so opposed to nature as our enemies had always known it that the very strangeness of our attack unnerved them in the beginning. Always Maelen sang. In us her song was a willing, a sending—what it might have been to the outlaws, I do not know. But I remember two men at least who dropped their weapons and rolled upon the ground, mouthing senseless cries, trying to cover their ears with empty hands. And such were easily dealt with. We were not all lucky, we could not be, but we did not know that until the singing ended and we stood in a camp we had taken at cost.
I was as one awakened from a vivid, frightening dream. I saw the dead, and one part of me knew what we had done. But another awakened from sleep and pushed aside such memories. Maelen stood there, not surveying the bodies, but rather staring straight ahead; as if she dared not look upon the havoc spread around her.
Her hands hung limply at her sides and in one of them was the wand. But it no longer shimmered with life, it was dull and dead, while her pale face was ashen gray, her eyes turned inward.
I heard a whimpering cry and toward her came Simmle, dragging herself along the ground, a great wound welling blood across her hindquarters. Then I heard other cries and whines as those who had battled, and were still living, tried to reach their mistress. But she did not look at them, only stared ahead.