Behind Sol, the five shei'dalins followed in swift and graceful silence, their long scarlet robes and veils exchanged for brown traveling leathers. Fifty Fey, silent and grim, surrounded the small group. Their eyes glowed with power, the elongated pupils lengthened and widened like a hunting cat's. A shifting dome of Spirit hid them as they made their way across the unprotected mountainside towards the Garreval.

Kieran kept the small party moving and did his best to hide his worry. Not one booted foot had emerged from the Mists since Rain's cry to prepare for battle.

Eld ~ Boura Fell

"Master Maur." The Primages of the Mage Council bowed low as he entered the war room, his ravaged face hidden by the folds of a deep-hooded robe. He knew better than to reveal how damaged his physical body had become. The moment he revealed such weakness, ambitious Primages would be after him like thistlewolves stalking an injured ram.

"Status?" he snapped.

The Primages turned their attention back to the war map. Sib Vargus, the oldest of the Mages, touched his fingers to the Celierian section and swept upward in a single motion, whispering the Mage spell as he did so. A dark, shimmering image of the Celierian map rose over the table, dotted with several dozen pinpoints of bright light. He waved again, enlarging the view of the northeast quadrant of Celieria, from the Garreval to Orest.

"The Teleon force is in position in the Well, as you ordered. The rest have assembled in Boura Dor, awaiting your command."

Vadim examined the map. "Tell the commanders to attack. Here." He pointed to one of the pinpoints of light, whispered a Feraz witchword, and the light changed from white to red. He touched several other pinpoints in succession. "And here and here and here." His eyes narrowed on the section that showed the Garreval. A cluster of white lights was moving south along the very edges of the map.

He smiled and touched a pinpoint of light just east of them. "And here. Bring Ellysetta Baristani's family and the shei'dalins to me, alive."

Celieria ~ Teleon

The Eld appeared from nowhere. Thousands of them. They came without warning and seemingly from every direction: the guardhouse, the barracks, the watchtowers, the bailey, all the fields surrounding the outpost. They simply poured out of great gaping black holes in the air, preceded by a hail of barbed sel'dor arrows and blue-white balls of Mage Fire.

The first scores of Celierians to die didn't even have time to cry out. Their only sound was the thud of their bodies falling from the walls.

The others, the ones who lived long enough to see their brothers fall and hear the crash of stone and splintering wood as Mage Fire blasted away towers and barracks, raised the cry. "To arms!" they shrieked, lifting sword and crossbow. "To arms! We're under attack!"

From the shadows of the outpost and behind the invisibility weaves of Teleon, Fey warriors who had gathered after Rain's urgent call sprang from their concealment, steel flashing in the sunlight.

"I san, sheisan, te Liss!" For love, honor, and Light!

They screamed the Fey battle cry and dove into war.

Three miles away, near the Mist-fdled pass of the Garreval, Kieran paused to glance back at Teleon. The outpost was ablaze. Flashes of Mage Fire and Fey magic exploded like lightning in the sky. Even from this distance, he could hear the muted screams and crashes of battle.

A shout—not so muted—rang out. Their party had been spotted. Dark shapes rushed across the grassy plain towards them, a scant mile away. Eld soldiers. And with them something else. Something on four legs rather than two.

One of the shei'dalins cried, "Darrokken!"

The snarling, slavering beasts gained on the Fey with deadly ease. Red eyes gleamed with menace, and Kieran's blood ran cold. He'd never seen a darrokken before, but he knew the beast didn't need to bring down its prey to kill it. The yellow fangs dripped poisonous saliva, and the long, razor-sharp claws carried plague and putrescence. One bite, one slash of those foul claws and, without healing, a victim would die within half a bell.

"Run!" Kieran snatched up Lillis, while Kiel grabbed Lorelle. "To the Mists!" They began to run. They pelted over rock and scrub. The warriors fell back to the rear flank to offer what protection they could. "Fey! Ti'Kieran! Ti'shei'dalins!" He broadcast the cry on the Warriors' Path.

Behind him, Fey'cha filled the air like rain, but for every darrokken felled, another took its place, and the acid blood of the loathsome creatures ate at Fey steel so that each blade called back to its owner's sheath was pitted and brittle and smoldering with foul vapors that burned Fey eyes and skin.

Two Fey at the back of the line were the first to fall as the massive, leathery, slime-covered bodies of the darrokken tackled them to the ground and fangs ripped through Fey throats.

The pack split up, a dozen of the foul beasts racing to cut off the approach to the pass and herd the Fey back towards the Mages.

"Up! Go up! Run for the Mists!" Kieran changed directions, charging up the mountainside. It was beyond dangerous to enter the Mists on mountainous terrain, but that risk paled in comparison to the certain death posed by the darrokken.

Globes of Mage Fire pelted through the air. Sol stumbled and went sprawling. The warrior who paused to haul him to his feet died without a sound as Mage Fire took his head.

Larger spheres of the deadly blue-white flame showered down. Earth exploded all around them. Rocks and trees—everything the Mage Fire touched—vanished in an instant, and great hunks of the mountainside tore away, tumbling down in an avalanche of falling debris.