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request, eat a hot meal, sleep in a warm bed, then leave again at first light. As the negotiations had ended on good terms, the merchants could wait for another to return with the agreement. He had bid farewell to the Earl and his household that evening, for he left as dawn approached, accepting the loan of a sturdy gelding, and promising to return it on his way home.

      The Ranger kept his own counsel on the matter of the elf, not wishing to involve the Kingdom unless it became necessary. At the moment the only evidence he had was what he had seen, and there might still be some explanation that would remove his foreboding. Yet, there was something in the manner of that elf, the way he carried himself, something that communicated menace. If nothing else, he was dangerous.

      The quickest route to the dwarven stronghold at Caldara was through the Green Heart, the thick woodlands dominating most of the Duchy of Crydee. For the first ten miles inland, the coastline was dotted with small hamlets and solitary farms, trails and roads, and three towns of some size, Tulan, Carse, and Crydee. Light woodland occupied some of the land between them, but once a traveller moved farther inland, heavy forest was all one encountered.

      The Rangers of Natal were second only to the elves in their ability to move swiftly and quietly through the heavy woods, but when it came to the open road, they had no difficulty in letting a horse carry them swiftly. They were a close-knit society, the inheritors of a unique birthright. Their ancestors had been Imperial Keshian Guides, the elite scouts of the Empire’s army who had come to the region when the Empire of Great Kesh had expanded northward. Like Kesh’s Dog Soldiers, they stood apart from mainstream Keshian society. When Kesh withdrew from the northlands, abandoning their colonies, the Guides became the de facto intelligence and scouting arm of the local militia. The cities had become autonomous and had bound together in a loose confederation, the Free Cities of Natal. And the Guides became the Rangers.

      Rangers lived in large camps, moving as it suited them, always vigilant for any threat to the Cities. They felt more kinship with the elves of the north than the citizens they protected, and felt their only equals to be the present Keshian Guides and the Krondorian Pathfinders, also descended from the original Guides. The three groups shared a traditional greeting, ‘Our grandfathers were brothers,’ which was to them a bond.

      Many Rangers had died beside soldiers from the Kingdom and the Free Cities during the Tsurani invasion, and because their numbers had been small, it had taken a devastating toll. Alystan remembered his grandfather’s stories of the Riftwar, and now he feared another threat of that magnitude was approaching; he knew another such invasion might mean the end of the Rangers.

      Alystan was newly wed and as he rode through the dark pathways of the Green Heart he thought of his young wife, staying with his own mother and father as they broke winter camp down near Bordon and prepared to move up into the mountains for spring and summer. They had spoken of having their own child someday, and while they had yet to conceive, Alystan now feared that he might never see that child should his worst suspicions prove true.

      The Ranger rode through the first day without incident, the patrols from Carse had kept the King’s Road clear of bandits and other troublemakers. He had seen game sign, bear and elk, so he knew few hunters were nearby.

      In years past, the moredhel, the Brotherhood of the Dark Path, had roamed these woods and the Grey Tower Mountains making such a ride suicide without a company of soldiers as escort. Now times were more peaceful and the worst a traveller might face was a small band of poachers or the occasional outlaw. Still, goblins roamed the Green Heart from time to time, and more than three or four could prove dangerous to a solitary rider.

      Alystan made a cold camp on the first night, not wishing to draw attention to his presence with a fire. He staked out his horse and moved some distance away, lest the animal draw unwanted attention. He risked losing the horse that way, but gained the advantage of not being surprised.

      The night passed without incident.

      Alystan quickly saddled his horse after inspecting it to ensure it was sound. The animal was one of the best the garrison at Carse had to offer, a solid gelding, well trained and fit. Not the fastest mount available, but one capable of long journeys at a good pace. With luck he would reach the dwarven stronghold at Caldara within three days. He mounted and returned to the road.

      Three days later an exhausted rider and horse approached a gap in the mountains across which a large wooden palisade had been erected. Two dwarves stood on either side of the road, dutifully taking their turn at watch, though for years it had hardly been necessary. They waved him through, recognizing him from previous visits, and Alystan entered Caldara.

      The village looked lovely in the morning light, nestled in a cosy valley. Trails led up to the high alpine meadows that were used for summer grazing, and down to lower valleys where the cattle and sheep were kept during the winter. Alystan remembered that beyond well-tended fields, a small stand of apple trees in an orchard marked the eastern boundary of the holding.

      The wooden buildings were heavily thatched and plastered to keep out the winter cold. They shone pristine white in the morning sun, save for the massive longhouse that dominated the community. The King and his retainers lived there, with a large part of the local population. The longhouse was the hub of dwarven activity and on most nights any member of the community was as likely to be found sleeping on the floor of the great room before the huge fire as he was to be found in his own bed. Unlike the plastered walls, this building had been constructed in the old way: the boles of huge trees were stacked in cradles, forming the outer walls that defied both the elements and attacking enemies. The floor was made of stones laid upon the earth, flattened and smoothed so one could barely feel the joints when walking over them. But they were as impenetrable from sappers tunnelling up from below as the walls were from assaults above ground. The dwarves were miners and understood the uses of tunnels in warcraft as well as in mining.

      Alystan pulled up his mount before the entrance to the longhouse and dismounted. He unsaddled his horse, and put the tack over the hitching log, then quickly wiped down the animal with a rag from his saddlebags. It would have to do until he had time to take the animal to the stables and tend to it properly. Dwarves were not horsemen, and the only horses they did keep were draught animals, all of whom would be out in the fields this time of day pulling ploughs as the dwarves readied the ground for the spring planting.

      As he finished, a dwarf emerged from the building. ‘Alystan of Natal!’ he said with pleasure. ‘What brings you our way?’

      ‘I come to see your grandfather, Hogni. Is he inside?’

      The young dwarf’s grin split his long black beard. The dwarves were small compared to humans, but still broad of shoulders and powerful of frame, averaging a little over five feet in height. Nearing five feet, five inches tall, Hogni was especially tall for a dwarf. He had a merry light in his eye as he said, ‘Grand father refuses to take his rank seriously, as always. He says he’s still “new to this King business” as it’s “only been a little over a hundred years or so”.’

      ‘He’s down in the fields ploughing. Come along, I’ll take you there.’

      He waved over a dwarven boy and said, ‘Toddy, take that horse to grandfather’s stable and see to him, will you?’

      Alystan took his longbow off his shoulder and returned it to the familiar grip of his left hand. He wore a dubious expression: the horse had rendered stout service and deserved to be well treated and the boy barely reached three feet in height, topped with a shock of red-blond hair and an apple-cheeked grin; but if Hogni was confident that Toddy could somehow reach the gelding’s withers and groom him sufficiently, he wasn’t going to argue. The urgency of his news kept him from properly tending to the mount before seeing the King.

      They quickly made their way through the village to the eastern fields where a half a dozen draught horses pulled ploughs. Crossing carefully over the new furrows, they approached a dwarf with a grey head of hair and a long grey beard. He was perspiring heavily as he wrestled the plough’s iron blade through the hard soil, compacted by a winter’s weight of snow and the morning’s frost. The horses, like their masters, were powerful but diminutive. They looked more like broad-chested ponies than true horses, yet

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