In unison great leathery wings beat the air, raising flurries of dead leaves and dust as the animals clawed for purchase in the sky. Once, twice, three times the animals’ mighty wings smote the air and then they were away, rocking unsteadily at first as each animal adjusted its balance, and then climbing swiftly into a sky only touched by the rising moon. From other clearings on the forested top beasts rose by twos and threes to soar into the clouds. As they climbed they sorted themselves out into four formations of threes. They might have appeared to be on a mass mating flight, save that not even these creatures mated so deep in winter.
The long, snake-like necks stretched forth and the animals squinted to protect their eyes from the searing cold.
The cold bit sharp and fierce at the Captain despite his gloves and the muffler-like veil wound around his face. He flexed his fingers to keep them supple and otherwise ignored it. Cold, hunger and hardship were always the lot of the Shadow Warriors and they were trained from childhood to bear them. Again he considered the plan and nodded to himself.
A glance behind him showed the Captain that the other warriors on his beast were flat against the animal’s back, partly to cut the air resistance and partly to stay out of the wind.
As the gaggle of flying beasts scudded through the sky, the Captain kept a close watch for landmarks. With the force under a strict ban on magic, he could not use more reliable methods. His trained senses told him there was little magic below or around him to conceal any use of magic by the Shadow Warriors.
Far below a lone, lost woodsman caught a glimpse of the horde as it hunted across the sky. With a whimper he thrust himself back into a bramble thicket and hid his eyes from the sight.
As the Shadow Warriors flew east the other parts of the operation fell into place.
The stone hall was boiling with activity. All along the line Watchers called out as new magic appeared in their crystals. Reserve Watchers rushed to their stations. Magicians whispered into communications crystals. Wizards took their stations, ready to repel magical attacks and to add their abilities to those of the Watchers. Finally, from their laboratories and lodgings, the Mighty began to arrive. The room filled with the nose-burning tang of ozone and shimmers of magical force.
Bal-Simba entered with Arianne at his side. He stood in the doorway for a moment, surveying the organized chaos, and then moved to the great chair on the platform overlooking the room.
On the wall opposite a map sprang into existence showing the Lands of the North and much of the Freshened Sea. Already there were six arrowheads of red fire approaching the Southern Coast. Six strikes coming in at widely spaced points, two of them obviously directed at the Capital. Here and there nebulous patches of gray and dirty green glowed on the map where the Sight would not reach.
Bal-Simba leaned forward in the chair to study the pattern of the attack.
“What do you make of it?” he asked his apprentice.
“If half of that is real,” she said, gesturing to the colors on the map, “it is the biggest attack the League has ever mounted. Do you suppose that has something to do with the great disturbance in the Wild Wood this afternoon?”
“No, that was something else.”
“This is powerful, but it seems—disorganized—as if it was hastily put together. Also, we have had no reports from the South to suggest an attack was being readied.”
Bal-Simba waved her to silence. “Let us watch and see if we can find the underlying pattern.”
Down in the pit three sweating magicians worked to keep the map updated. To the right of Bal-Simba’s great chair on the platform five of the Mighty sat in a tight ring around a glowing brazier, mumbling spells. Now and then one or the other of them would throw something on the fire and the smoke and the reek would rise up to fill the chamber. Down in the earth and up in the towers, others of the Mighty worked alone, weaving and casting their own spells to aid the defense.