the whispers on the wind. Soon after, he found a group of Touel'alfar in a copse of trees in a shallow dell a few hundred yards to the north. They were in the branches, mostly, some alone, others sitting in pairs, and with all of them whispering.
Aydrian knew their tricks; the elves could magically throw their voices, could weave a net of sound or the absence of sound by the very timbre of their song.
He could be out here with a fraction of his army and send them all running, he knew, and he intended to do just that. But then, as his spirit was moving to depart, Aydrian noticed a familiar face among the elves, the only one who had truly befriended him those years ago when he was a ranger-in-training.
Belli'mar Juraviel.
The last time he had seen Juraviel, the elf was setting out on the road to the south with Brynn Dharielle. Apparently, after helping Brynn gain her throne in To-gai, Juraviel had returned.
Aydrian was sorry of that. Of all the Touel'alfar, he felt friendship with only this one, and he didn't want to be forced into destroying Juraviel with the rest of them.
But so be it.
His spirit soared back to his encampment and his waiting corporeal body, then a moment later, he burst outside. "I need our hundred best soldiers ready to march with me immediately," he told the guards at his tent flap.
"Be quick to your Allheart leaders and see to it!"
The two men rushed off.
Aydrian looked to the dark north, a smile growing on his handsome and strong face. "First contact," he whispered. "First victory."
"They are well-schooled and disciplined," Juraviel said to Cazzira as they sat together on the low boughs of a tree. "I would have expected no less of a force led by Aydrian."
"Why is he coming?" Cazzira asked, and it was not the first time. "If these humans are as deserving as you have told my people from the beginning, then why has young Aydrian betrayed the trust of the Tylwyn Tou?"
Belli'mar Juraviel looked away, his expression grim. Dasslerond had told him of her last encounter with the young ranger, of Aydrian's magical assault that had nearly left her dead. She had known that he would return - which was why she had honestly bid Jilseponie to help her to fight the young king - and so this marching force had not been wholly unexpected.
Juraviel had led a sizable force of Touel'alfar out of Andur'Blough Inninness then, moving to shadow the approaching army, using the elven song to try to dissuade some soldiers.
It wasn't working.
"Blynnie Sennanil has them in sight," came the call of another elf from the base of the tree, and the pair looked down. "At your word, she and her archers will begin punctuating our warning with arrows.' For Juraviel, this order was about as difficult as any he had ever issued. On this point, though, Lady Dasslerond had been uncompromising; if the humans couldn't be persuaded to leave by magically enhanced whispers on the night breeze, then Juraviel was to strike terror into their ranks, stinging them in the dark, killing them as they slept.
He hesitated only long enough to remind himself of Dasslerond's expression when she had sent him out, one that left no doubts in his mind, as there were obviously none in hers, that Aydrian would indeed find his way to Andur'Blough Inninness, and that Aydrian meant to destroy it.
"At her discretion," Juraviel replied, and the elf below disappeared into the shadows.
"Perhaps someday you will find it in your heart to answer me," Cazzira remarked when Juraviel turned back to her.
Her tone and look stung Juraviel's heart. "Perhaps someday I will better understand why young Aydrian is so removed from the hearts of his father and his mother," he answered, putting a gentle hand on Cazzira's delicate fingers. "Nightbird was as great a human as I have ever known, and Jilseponie proved to be a worthy companion for him."
"You have never spoken of either with anything less than sincere admiration," Cazzira agreed. "But what of Aydrian? How is it that he, raised in the shadows of your valley, has turned so wrong?"
"It may be precisely that," Juraviel replied. "I do not believe that we were wise in bringing the baby Aydrian into our care that dark night on the field outside of the human city of Palmaris. Does a child not belong with its mother?"
"All ill has come from it," Cazzira agreed. "Jilseponie hates you,