Only, Venick did notice. It was the elf’s shadow, which had peeled away from its owner and was pooling like oil at Venick’s boots. Venick blinked back a step. His weapon teetered.
A mistake.
The elf lunged.
Venick brought his sword up just in time, andwheredid the elf get a dagger? Blades glanced as Venick blocked the elf’s blow, then swung his sword with all the force shoulder and arm could muster. A clean hit. The dagger flew from the elf’s hand.
Which opened and curled.
The shadow rose.
Conjuring.
Venick slashed again as the rest of the elf’s shadow sloughed away from him, face leaking of color, every crevice and corner illuminated bone-white. A skull. The conjuror’s fingers twisted and his shadow obeyed, racing over Venick’s skin, into his mouth and nose and eyes. The world went black. Blind.
Panic. It slammed into Venick’s chest. He swiped his sword uselessly through the air.
“Now it is my turn to ask questions,” the conjuror said. His voice was reedy. High. “Who sent you?” Venick gripped his sword tightly, swiping again. “What interest does a human have in elven affairs?”
Venick wasn’t listening. He resisted the urge to drop his weapon and start pawing at his eyes. He couldn’t seeanything.
“How did you find us?”
Venick tried to calm himself. He couldn’t afford to panic. He drew up a vision of Ellina, remembered that crook of a smile.The shadows cannot hurt you, she’d said.They might blind you. They will certainly follow you.
“And where did you get that sword?”
Venick made his shoulders relax. The elf was weaponless now. The shadows couldn’t hurt Venick. The conjuror wanted him confused, wanted him afraid.
“Answer me,” the elf demanded. “Why are you here?”
“I wanted the truth.”
Venick remembered the conjured storm. The way blackness had settled over the world. He’d nearly panicked then, too.
“Man knows no truth.”
But Venick hadn’t needed to see, not really. He’d let go of all thought, had simplyacted.
He did again.
Venick thrust forward in a burst of energy, sword lifting from below. The elf made a noise as he dodged the sudden attack and Venick listened to that noise, refocusing, homing in, green glass up and swinging faster than any steel sword ever could. He heard a shuffle of earth, a surprised grunt, and Venick followed the sound with his blade, striking backhanded now, shoulder and body crowding, pulsing, pushing. His weapon hit something soft and yielding. The elf made a strange, strangled cry. The world leaked back into color.
To reveal the elf dead at his feet, neck split open like a red grin.
The fight fled Venick all at once. His sword became heavy. The end dripped blood.
He blinked into the daylight. The forest. He’d never noticed. Was it always so dappled and bright? It seemed to him like something from a dream. Hallucinatory.
He scrubbed a hand across his face, then forced himself to move, first to check to see if their fight had been overheard by the other elves—it hadn’t—then to drag the body away. His thighs burned as he pulled.
He didn’t really notice. His mind grew quiet. He replayed the elf’s words in his head, imagining what would happen if the story played out as the elf described. This southern army would march north. There would be war.Truewar, unlike the kind the northern legion was trained for. The southerners would have the advantage of size and strength. They would have theadvantage, because they were not bound by Queen Rishiana’s laws and could kill elves freely. They would. This army would strike the north like one of those battering rams. It would devour cities in its path. Maybe it would even hunt for the hidden city of Evov. The queen herself.
The legion would be forced to act. They would leave the safety of the mountains to meet the southern opposition. They would be unprepared, untrained to battle on the open tundra. Unless the northern legion was given time to gather their own defenses, the coming battle would not be a battle. It would be a slaughter.
Venick dumped the body into a river. He watched it float, then sink.
He turned north. Ellina must be warned.
