The Gold Falcon - Katharine Kerr [34]
With a shake of her head, Dalla turned away and strode through the camp. Despite the new town, most of the People, as the elven folk called themselves, still spent every spring and summer traveling in small groups, or alarli, following their herds of horses and flocks of sheep. In this alar two dozen round tents sprawled across a meadow near a stream. Out in the grasslands behind them, a herd of over four hundred horses, guarded by armed riders, grazed at tether.
In among the tents, the adults stood talking together in twos and threes or sat around small fires, finishing the evening meal. Children ran around, playing with leather balls, chasing each other or their dogs. Occasionally, Wildfolk materialized to join the games. Warty little gnomes wandered between the tents; translucent sylphs and pale sprites flitted after the children or teased the dogs, who couldn’t see them but who could feel their pinching fingers. The dogs would bark and snap, and the Wildfolk would disappear, only to pop up smirking somewhere nearby.
On the surface the camp seemed no different from the elven camps Dallandra had always known. The tents were just as brightly painted, the fires just as warm. The People lived their lives as noisily as ever, in a society of ever-shifting relationships that made Deverry folk shake their heads in bewilderment. But here and there Dalla saw the signs that everything had changed.
In front of every tent, like guests at the meal, stood longbows and quivers. Mail shirts and other pieces of armor lay close at hand as well. Most of the men and some of the women wore swords, even when they were merely chatting with old friends. At the cry of birds passing overhead the camp would fall silent; hands on sword hilts, a few men would look up, judging whether or not the birds were ordinary creatures or magical spies, mazrakir, as the Horsekin called shape-changers. Sooner or later, everyone knew, the same raids that were bleeding the human farmlands were bound to ride their way.
In the middle of the camp Dallandra finally spotted the Banadar, or warleader, of the Eastern Border, to give Calonderiel his official title. He was sitting by himself on a dead log in front of his tent, the second largest in camp. In the flickering firelight the deer painted upon the tent walls seemed at moments to fling up their heads, ready to run. Calonderiel’s hair gleamed, so pale it was almost white, but shadows hid his violet eyes.
“I’ve spoken to Ebañy,” Dallandra said. “And I see trouble coming.”
Calonderiel looked up, startled. “What’s he done now?”
“It’s not what he’s done, it’s what he’s found.”
Calonderiel moved over to give her room to sit beside him on the log, but after a moment’s hesitation, she knelt on the ground nearby. At the gesture he winced; he’d fallen in love with her all over again, and as it had before, his devotion annoyed her. Before he could speak of his feelings, she brandished Salamander’s news like a shield.
“The Horsekin are raiding in Arcodd again.”
“Bastards!” Calonderiel paused to spit into the fire. “I wonder if Cengarn’s going to call in our alliance?”
“I don’t know, but maybe Ebañy can find out. He thinks the Horsekin might be trying to hide something, a fort or armed camp, he said, near the border.”
“And they’re using the raids as a distraction?”
“Well, that’s what he suspects. He doesn’t know. I take it that seems logical to you.”
“It’s the first thing I thought of. If his suspicions are right, we’ll have to mount some kind of attack. A Horsekin fort nearby? Ye gods, it’s like a dagger at our throats!”
“That’s rather what I thought, too.”
“We might be the ones to call in our alliance with Cengarn, not the other way round. At least we have Mandra now. If things get desperate, we can get the prince and his family to safety there and fortify the place. If it looks like the town’s going to fall, well, they have boats.”
“Do you