“Naw,” the Imp admitted. “But the Gremlin can.”
“What Gremlin?” Aahz bared his teeth.
“He was here a minute ago,” Brockhurst scowled, looking around.
“Well, handsome,” Tanda sighed, eyeing me, “I think we just ran out of planning time. Better call your dragon. I think we’re going to need all the help we can get tomorrow.”
Gleep had wandered off shortly after our arrival, though we could still hear him occasionally as he poked about in the underbrush.
“You go get the dragon, Tanda,” Aahz ordered.
“Though it escapes me how he’s supposed to be any help. The ‘boss’ here and I have to discuss his war council tomorrow.”
Any confidence I might have built up listening to Aahz’s grand plan earlier fled me. Tanda was right. We had run out of time.
Chapter Seventeen:
“Diplomacy is the delicate weapon of the civilized warrior.”
-HUN, A.T.
WE waited patiently, for our war council. The two of us, Aahz and me. Against an army.
This was, of course, Aahz’s idea. Left to my own devices, I wouldn’t be caught dead in this position.
Trying to ignore that unfortunate choice of words, I cleared my throat and spoke to Aahz out of the corner of my mouth.
“Aahz?”
“Yeah, kid?”
“How long are we going to stand here?”
“Until they notice us and do something about it.”
Terrific. Either we’d rot where we stood, or someone would shoot us full of arrows.
We were standing about twenty yards from one of the encampments, with nothing between us and them but meadow. We could see clearly the bustle of activity within the encampment and, in theory, there was nothing keeping them from seeing us. This is why we were standing where we were, to draw attention to ourselves. Unfortunately, so far no one had noticed.