The mounted elf waited, exposed and alone, until the Khurs sent out riders of their own. After five long minutes, a quintet of armored soldiers came out the gate. A scarlet and gold pennant flew from one rider’s stirrup-post.
The Khurs approached slowly, as though wary of treachery. At one point Planchet waved a biting fly away from his face, and the Khurs froze. He realized they were very frightened.
In the center of the quintet, flanked by imposing cavalry men rode a squat human with a thick neck and a beet-red face. As the Khurs drew nearer, Planchet recognized him.
“Hail, General Hakkam!” he called. “Peace be with you!”
“And with you, Planchet of Qualinost,” rumbled the choleric general. “What in Kargath’s name goes on here?”
“I was about to ask you the same question. The city gates have been closed to us since yesterday afternoon. Our only supply of water is what we carry from Khuri-Khan’s wells.
We were beginning to get thirsty.”
“Is that why you called out your army?”
“The Sons of the Crimson Vulture have caused much trouble, for you and for the mighty Sahim-Khan. Consequently many of them have been sent to meet their ancestors.”
“Then the city is open to us?”
“I have no orders otherwise.”
A fresh gust, smelling of the sea, swept over the parley.
Planchet’s truce banner snapped in the wind. Twisting in the saddle, he raised the banner high, and waved it at the horde of elven warriors who watched in silent concern. When Planchet turned back, Hakkam and his escort had their hands on their sword hilts.
“I was merely alerting our soldiers that all was well,’ Planchet said mildly.
“Who’s that coming?”
Two elven riders emerged from the line of heavy cavalry and cantered to where Planchet and Hakkam waited. It didn’t take long to recognize the Speaker and a single escorting warrior, General Taranath. When they arrived, Planchet explained the situation.
“Thank you, General,” the Speaker said to Hakkam. He extended a lean hand. “Your duty has been well served.”
With little enthusiasm the general shook the Speaker’s hand. Gilthas assured him he would withdraw his warriors, then added, “One other matter. My councilor, Lord Morillon, did not return last night. Is he inside the city?”
“He had an audience with Sahim-Khan, then left the palace.”
“Is he well?”
Hakkam frowned. “How would I know? He left the palace. That’s all I know.”
With a curt nod, Hakkam turned his horse around. Planchet was aghast at the human’s rudeness, turning his back on a reigning Speaker without so much as a by-your-leave!
The shaft of sunlight, so long shining on Planchet and Gilthas, at last faded. Gilthas looked up at the roiling clouds. He frowned. A slender object, dark against the sky, seemed to hang in the air over the city. No, not hang. It was moving, falling.
“Arrow!” Planchet shouted.
He threw himself in front of the Speaker, but the missile was plummeting from such a height its path was almost straight down. The broadhead cut Gilthas’s jaw and struck him in the hollow of the neck, on the right side.
Pandemonium erupted. Gilthas was saved from hitting the ground by Taranath, who caught him by the shoulders and bore him up. Hakkam’s guards drew swords, whirling their horses in tight circles to see who had loosed the arrow.
A shout went up from the front rank of elven warriors. They had seen the arrow’s fall and its awful termination. The shout was followed by a hedge of swords sprouting along the line. In ragged order, for the rear ranks did not yet know what had happened, the elves charged up the hill to their monarch’s defense.
The thunder of the oncoming elves sent Hakkam’s escort spurring for the city. The thick-necked general roared, “Come back, you wretches! Stand your ground!” One halted. The rest made straight for the city gate, now swinging shut.
“What treachery is this?” Planchet cried, kicking his feet free of the stirrups and leaping from his horse. The Speaker had collapsed over his horse’s neck.
“It is not by my order!” Hakkam retorted, also dismounting.
He and Planchet took the Speaker from his horse and j lowered him gently to the road. The arrow was still embedded in Gilthas’s neck.
“That did not come from my men,” said Hakkam. “It’s not a Khurish war arrow.”
“What is it, then?” Planchet demanded.
“A hunting arrow. My men aren’t issued such.”
It was fortunate for Gilthas the missile wasn’t a war arrow. Stoutly shafted, with a square or triangular iron head and leather fletching, a war arrow would have driven deep into the elf’s slender body. The hunting missile, lightly made, with a flat broadhead and white pigeon-feather fletching, had struck Gilthas’s collar bone and stopped. The wound was nasty, but with prompt care it would not be fatal.
