Crimson Shadow, The - R. A. Salvatore Page 0,190

to the western bank, where Belsen’Krieg and his remaining eight thousand would make short work of them.

The cyclopian main group had marched all morning, up to the north, then across Felling Run, and then back to the south, giving the enemy a wide berth so that they would not be discovered until it was too late. There was good ground west of the encampment, the cyclopian leader knew. He would squash this rebel rabble, and then, depending on his losses and the weather, he could make his decision: to go again against Montfort, or to turn back to the west and crush Port Charley.

Now the enemy was in sight; soon they would understand that they could not cross the river, and by the time they recognized the trap and were able to react to it, they would have no time to go in force into the mountains, either. Some might scatter and escape, but Belsen’Krieg had them.

Yes, the cyclopian leader thought himself quite clever that morning, and indeed he was, but unlike Luthien, Belsen’Krieg had not taken into account the cleverness of his adversary. As the cyclopian’s force pivoted to the good ground in the west, another force had even better ground, up above them, in the foothills to the south.

“This is not so good,” Oliver remarked to Katerin when word of the cyclopian move reached them. They stood together under a solitary tree, Threadbare and Riverdancer standing near to them, heads down against the driving sleet.

“Likely they’ve got the river blocked,” Katerin reasoned, and she motioned that way—there was some movement on the fields to the east, across Felling Run. “We have to go into the mountains, and quickly.”

“So smart,” Oliver whispered, honestly surprised. The halfling didn’t like the prospects. If the cyclopians chased them into the broken ground to the south, they could not hold their force together in any reasonable manner. Many would be slain, and many more would wander helplessly in the mountains to starve or freeze to death, or to be hunted down by cyclopian patrols.

But where else could they go? Certainly they couldn’t fight the Avon army on even, open ground.

A pop and flash, and a smell of sulfur, came out of the tree above them, and they looked up just as Brind’Amour, materializing on a branch above and to the side, found his intended perch too slippery and tumbled to the ground.

The old wizard hopped up, slapping his hands together and straightening his robes as though he had intended the dive all along. “Well,” he said cheerily, “are you ready for the day’s fight?”

Katerin and Oliver stared at the happy wizard incredulously.

“Fear not!” Brind’Amour informed them. “Our enemies are not so many, and not so good. They are hungry and weary and a long, long way from home. Come along, then, to the horses and to the front ranks.”

Oliver and Katerin couldn’t understand the man’s lightheartedness, for they did not know that the wizard had been watching through the night and the morning with far-seeing, magical eyes. Brind’Amour had known of the cyclopian pivot for some time, and he knew, too, about the secret friends perched in the south.

No need to tell Oliver and Katerin, Brind’Amour figured. Not yet.

Katerin brushed a lock of drenched hair back from her face and looked at Oliver. They exchanged helpless shrugs—Brind’Amour seemed to know what he was doing—retrieved their mounts, and followed the wizard. All the Port Charley camp came astir then, digging into defensible positions, preparing to meet the cyclopian charge.

“I do hope he has some big booms ready for them,” Oliver said to Katerin after the wizard left them in the front ranks. The halfling stared across the open ground at the masses of black and silver.

“They are not so many,” Katerin replied sarcastically, for the cyclopian force dwarfed them four to one, at least.

“Very big booms,” Oliver remarked.

It seemed fitting to them both that the storm intensified with a burst of snow just as the cyclopians began their roaring charge.

To their credit, the hardy fisherfolk of Port Charley did not break ranks and flee. Word filtered down the line that a cyclopian group had indeed entrenched on the eastern riverbank, and it seemed as if the roaring mass of enemies would simply plow over them. But they did not flee. Their bowstrings took up a humming song, and the folk began to sing, too, thinking this to be their last stand.

Brind’Amour stood back from the front ranks, his skinny white arms uplifted to the