The Silver Mage - Katharine Kerr [120]
“Horsekin raiders couldn’t get their mounts through here either,” Faharn remarked. “No wonder they’re looking farther west.”
“Just so,” Laz said. “And they’re looking farther south, too. If they get control of the grasslands, they’ll have a hundred easy roads into Lijik territory.”
In narrow valleys, where black boulders pushed through thin soil, the army passed more deserted farms. Empty houses and barns stood behind crumbling earthworks. Now and again they saw a cow or a few sheep gone wild among the hills.
“It makes my blood run cold,” Faharn said, “seeing all this. Where are the people, do you think?”
“Dead, maybe?” Laz said. “I’ve no idea.”
In such rough terrain, the army made slow progress, crawling up a steep hill only to pick their way down from the crest. The supply wagons became a constant problem. Even the straked wheels of the dwarven carts broke against half-hidden rocks or tangled themselves with weeds. Whenever one of the carts lost a wheel, the army halted, slowing the march further. Faharn began to worry about food.
“The supply train’s only brought so much,” he pointed out. “What if we eat it all before the war’s over?”
“Ye gods!” Laz snapped. “Always thinking about your cursed stomach! You eat too much anyway. It dulls the higher faculties.”
Faharn blushed a dark red and fell silent. When the army stopped for its noon rest, Laz noticed that Faharn ate only a few scraps of dry flatbread and one sliver of cheese.
“Well, you could eat more than that,” Laz said. “My apologies. I shouldn’t have snapped at you like that.”
Faharn stared at him in utter surprise. Surely I’ve apologized to him for my bad temper before? Laz thought. Yet he couldn’t quite remember any other time when he had.
During the journey, whenever the army stopped to rest their horses or to camp for the night, Laz made a point of scrying for the dragon book. During the day he saw only the darkness that meant the book lay swaddled in some sort of covering. At night, he got a few brief glimpses of it by the dim light of a single candle, none of which gave him the slightest clue as to its location.
“I begin to wonder if we’ll ever find the wretched thing,” Laz said to Faharn. “The impression I get is that the astral currents are pushing it away from us, not bringing it closer.”
“That’s truly odd,” Faharn said. “Or is it the work of that blue-and-white spirit you told me about?”
“That I doubt. She was so sincerely willing to help. Well, we’ll just have to wait and see if she reappears. I don’t have the slightest idea of how to summon her.”
On the fifth day out, they reached an entire fortified village, some twelve round buildings surrounded by stone walls laced with timber, all of them deserted. Grass grew wild and tall upon the roofs. Unlatched doors banged in the rising wind. A flurry of chattering sparrows rose from the top of the tallest tower, circled the village once, then settled again. Otherwise, not a living thing moved in the dun. Voran called a halt, then sent a squad of men down to scout out the complex.
“It’s amazing,” Faharn said, “that the Lijik Ganda never knew all this was here. It’s so close to their border.”
“Plenty of people did know, Envoy Garin for one,” Laz said. “The information never reached Dun Deverry, is all.” He rose in his stirrups for a better view of the silent fortress below them. “Huh, one of the scouts seems to have found something.”
Inside the walls, the scout was holding up a piece of cloth. When he shook it out, Laz could see the device crudely painted upon it: a Boar.
“So, some of our enemies have withdrawn,” Laz told Faharn. “I wonder where they are, and the rest of them, too.”
Prince Voran apparently shared his wondering. The prince gave a string of orders to make the night’s camp with as many men as possible