The Elven (63 page)

Two caravels were trying to board the longships kept back as reserves. But another seven ships would soon round the barricade and attack it from the rear.

“Back to the longships!” Liodred cried. “We’ll form a double line!”

With a heavy heart, Mandred descended the boarding ramp. Behind them, he heard the shouts of the knights ridiculing them. The jarl thought of the gold-studded dagger that Liodred had given his wife. “Send us the elves, Luth,” he murmured in despair. “Send us our allies, and I will never touch a horn of mead again.”

Aboard the Queen’s Ship

N
uramon stood at the railing of the
Elflight
, the queen’s flagship. From the starboard side, he could see the Firnstayner ships, chained together and closing off the entrance to the fjord like a wall. Beyond the longships billowed the huge sails of the enemy fleet, each with the symbol of the Tjured, the black tree. Approximately half the Tjured ships were locked in battle with the longships. In the narrow fjord, the Tjured could not exploit their superior numbers. Liodred and Mandred had forced the enemy into a bloody man-to-man battle, and it was impossible for Nuramon to estimate how well the Fjordlanders were holding out. All he could see was that there was movement on the ships, a close-fought melee.

Several of the enemy ships were attempting to sail around the Fjordlanders’ barricade, trying to pick a channel through the rocks between the longships and the cliffs. One of the caravels was already on the rocks with its hull ripped open. The crew seemed to have gone overboard, but the fate of one caravel was apparently no deterrent to the rest. Other ships were still searching for a way through, to encircle the Fjordlanders or to attack the queen’s ship.

Nuramon hoped that nothing had happened to Mandred or Liodred. Battles like this obeyed a different set of rules than one man fighting another. Pure chance could decide between life and death. If only the
Elflight
were faster. Nuramon looked back along the rows of oars that disappeared beneath him into the side of the ship. There must have been forty rows altogether. He had seen some two hundred oarsmen disappear below the deck. He had no doubt that they were doing their best down below, but the queen’s huge ship made only slow headway. The small galleys from Reilimee were far ahead of them and would soon reach the Fjordlanders. Nuramon had heard that the sorceress of the sea, whose name no one knew, had equipped the boats. Behind the galleys sailed triremes from Alvemer. Nuramon was surprised at how fast the ships of Albenmark had been able to put to sea. It had taken just twelve days to equip and assemble the fleet.

The gate they had sailed through had already closed again. The wonderful play of colors over the seas of Albenmark that Emerelle had created with her magic was forever engraved in his memory. The gate was so wide that at dawn, the entire fleet had sailed through in one line.

Among the soldiers on board, rumors flew about Emerelle. Some thought the fact that the
Elflight
sailed with no accompanying ships was an attempt to draw the enemy to them. When Nuramon looked around now, he could believe this was true. The
Elflight
was like a floating battlefield. The oarsmen sat at the oars down below, and the fighters were assembled on the decks. More than three hundred elven warriors were waiting for battle, gathered in a space of sixty paces from stem to stern. To get more fighters on board, the queen had left behind the crew who would normally have handled the sails. In this battle, there would be no need for them, and the masts of the huge galley had been stepped and lashed on deck.

The ship was holding course for the Fjordlanders’ left flank, to support them on that side. Obilee had explained the strategy to Nuramon: she and the fighters from the other galleys would board the Fjordlanders’ longships to relieve their allies at the battle line, who could then retreat to the galleys and recuperate, then return to the battle later.

Someone laid a hand on Nuramon’s shoulder. He turned and saw Master Alvias. “The queen would like to see you,” he said.

Nuramon took his bow and followed Emerelle’s counselor back through the throng of warriors. Alvias looked unusually warlike in his leather armor, with a sword at his hip. It was said that he fought beside the queen in the first troll war.

Alvias led him to the quarterdeck, in front of which Emerelle and Yulivee were surrounded by guards. The queen was giving instructions to her officers. She wore the gray robes of a sorceress, the same she had worn the night she had given him her counsel to prepare him for the elfhunt.

Nuramon saw Obilee there, too. She seemed to be waiting for final instructions ahead of the battle. She was wearing the same armor she wore when he saw her in the Royal Hall.

Little Yulivee greeted Nuramon with a playful wave. She was also dressed in a gray robe, like the queen. It still bothered Nuramon that the queen had brought the little sorceress with them. He was worried about her. This was no place for a child, however powerful Yulivee might be.

The queen spoke to Obilee, and then she waved Nuramon to her. She greeted him kindly, then said, “I see that you are concerned for Yulivee, but believe me when I say that there is no safer place for her here than at my side.”

Nuramon replied with a brief nod. The queen was right. But he still would have been happier if Yulivee had remained in the palace in Albenmark.

“Nuramon, I would like you to go with Obilee,” said the queen. “She will be in command on the forecastle once Dijelon and Pelveric have reached the Fjordlanders.”

“Yes, my queen.”

“Then go.”

Yulivee left Emerelle’s side and came to Nuramon. “You’re coming back, aren’t you?” she asked.

Nuramon went down on one knee. “Is that concern I see on your face?”

She looked away from him, but nodded.

“Have no fear. Stay with the queen. You heard what she said.” He kissed her on the forehead. “Now go.”

Without another word, Yulivee returned to the queen. There she grinned and held aloft a quiver. In it were the arrows that Nuramon had found along with the bow when he had visited the dwarves. At first, he had wanted to take them with him into this clash, but the queen had advised him to use regular arrows and to save these for special battles.

“We have to go, Nuramon,” said Obilee, laying one hand on his shoulder.

Nuramon looked one last time at Yulivee, then he went forward to the bow with Obilee. The warrior woman seemed dejected.

“What’s the matter, Obilee?” he asked.

“It’s only . . . ,” she began but stopped, as if she did not trust herself to say the words. Then she looked him in the eye and said, “I should not be the one leading you, Nuramon.”

“You are not the young girl you once were,” he said. “You are a warrior, a great warrior, far more important than I will ever be. You have already proved yourself in so many battles. I admire you.” Obilee’s lips quivered. “Don’t be sad because of me, or Noroelle. Death is not the end. Nothing can stop me from finding Noroelle, in this life or the next. And what do you think she will say to you when she sees you again? She will be just as proud of you as I am.”

Obilee smiled, and finally she reminded him of the lighthearted girl he had once known. “Thank you, Nuramon.”

The elf had no fear of death. For death would not mean the end of his search, it would just delay it. The night before they had sailed, he had told his clan the stories of his travels and had asked them to keep the knowledge in case he died in battle. He had already begun to write his own soul book, as his dwarven friends did. He knew he should have started earlier, but he had never looked Death so directly in the eye before today.

They came to Obilee’s fighters; on this ship, they were the only ones from Alvemer. The emblem emblazoned on their tabards identified them: a silver nymph on a blue ground. Fifty men and women, half of them armed with long swords, the others with bows. While Obilee spoke to them, Nuramon tried to look ahead. But the fighters were massed too thickly, blocking his view on all sides.

When could they finally start? Somewhere ahead of him, Mandred was locked in battle, and he was trapped on a galley that was hardly even moving. He could only hope that the ships from Reilimee had already reached the Fjordlanders.

Nuramon thought of Farodin. It depressed him to think of his companion with the troll prince, even though Farodin had told him repeatedly that he should not worry on his account.

A woman in a warrior’s armor pushed through the crowd of fighters. “Are you Nuramon?” she asked.

He looked at her in surprise. “Yes.”

“My name is Nomja.”

That was the name of the young elf woman who had traveled with him on the search for Guillaume. “Are you . . . ?”

She nodded. “Yes. Your companion from Aniscans. I was reborn.”

She had no resemblance at all to the woman she had been before. Now she was short and wore her black hair close-cropped. She seemed much more mature than the young warrior who had ridden with them on the hunt for Guillaume, but she had the same joy in her eyes as he had seen in her back then. Nomja’s death during their escape from Aniscans had hit them all hard, especially Mandred.

Nuramon threw his arms around her in a warm embrace, like meeting a friend he had not seen for a long time. “I am glad you’re here.”

When he released her, he realized how much his hug had taken her by surprise.

Nuramon saw the bow in her hand. “You are an archer?”

“Yes.”

“Back then, you were very good.”

She smiled but said nothing. He must certainly seem strange to her. She had no memory of her previous life, of course, and here he was greeting her as a dwarf would greet someone who had been reborn.

Suddenly, Nuramon heard the sound of shouting coming from in front of them. “Be ready,” Obilee cried.

Nuramon craned his neck. Still he could see nothing, but he could hear the sounds of battle: the ring of steel on steel and the screams of the injured.

From port came the shouts of fighters. “Faster!” they were crying. Nuramon pushed aside two elven soldiers and forced his way to the port rail. What he saw made him catch his breath. A mighty three-master was bearing down on them, the black tree of the Tjured resplendent on the mainsail. The enemy must have made it through the reef on this side and were now trying to intercept the queen’s ship.

From midship came more shouting, and crossbow bolts flew overhead. Clearly, the battle had come to them.

A jolt ran through the ship, and a second nearly knocked Nuramon off his feet. The enemy’s three-master had rammed them. Chaos broke out. Fighters to the left and right yelled battle cries.

The warriors around him were restless. Nomja, too, looked nervous. Only Obilee seemed to have no fear. “Archers to starboard!” she ordered, and Nuramon followed her command without hesitation. He pushed to the other side of the forecastle, where the archers were taking positions along the railing.

Some distance ahead, he could now see the entire line of the Fjordlanders’ longships. Many of the enemy’s ships had stuck fast to the barricade, but the galleys from Reilimee were also there and had joined the battle. The caravels from Fargon formed a dense throng; heavy lines now bound them together, and the Tjured knights coming as reinforcements had to climb across several ships to get to the battle line. The battlefield was growing, and the
Elflight
, with Nuramon on board, was now in the thick of it. He tried to make out Mandred among the Firnstayners, but his companion was not to be seen in the dense fighting.

Obilee led them to a gap in the railing. A wooden ladder had been attached there and dropped to just above the first of the Firnstayners’ ships. “Swordsmen forward to me!” Obilee shouted. “Archers hold the railing! Pick your targets and be sure of them!”

More archers came from the rear of the ship and filled the space to the end of the railing. Others formed a second row, ready to join the moment an archer at the rail fell.

Like the archers to his left and right, Nuramon drew an arrow from his quiver, laid it on the bowstring, and searched for a clear shot. There. He saw a knight climbing down a boarding ladder to the longship directly in front of them. Nuramon was about to let his arrow fly when he saw Nomja beside him shoot and hit his target.

The individual fighters were moving too fast and unpredictably for Nuramon. Finally, he spotted a squad of enemy warriors gathering some distance away, apparently preparing for a concentrated attack. They were a good hundred paces from him, but there were so many of them and they were clear of adversaries just then, so Nuramon fired at the group. He did not wait for his first arrow to reach its target, but immediately shot a second.

One of the soldiers fell to his knees with the arrow in his belly, causing the men around him to duck for cover behind a low railing. More arrows made them fall back until they were out of range.

Searching for a new target, Nuramon caught sight of a flag with a blue star on a silver background. The banner of the
Albenstar
that King Njauldred had once presented to him. It was no longer the same ship on which he had sailed east with Farodin and Mandred. The new
Albenstar
was much bigger, but it was clear that someone had kept the original flag, perhaps to recall past glory.

Nuramon caught sight of Mandred. The jarl had taken a position along one side of the
Albenstar
, where he had enough room to swing his axe. He and his men were in trouble. They were far outnumbered. A lone Tjured ship had penetrated the line of elven galleys and was attacking the longship next to the
Albenstar
. The knights stormed onto the longship, their assault threatening to break through the Fjordlanders’ battle line, which was now under attack from all sides. They were driving a wedge between Mandred and the elves.

Nuramon took aim at the Tjured ship. He sighted on the short plank that connected it with the ship next to it. A Tjured fighter tried to board the
Albenstar
. Nuramon let his arrow fly and it curved high, striking the man’s body a moment later.

The elf was not satisfied. He had been aiming for the head. Too much time passed before an arrow hit its target. It was just a matter of time before he hit a friend instead of a foe.

He set a new arrow onto the bowstring. Then what Nuramon had feared happened: a Tjured knight was creeping toward Mandred from behind while he faced two in front. Nuramon quickly took aim. He had to be certain of hitting the man. One mistake, and he might kill Mandred instead. As the enemy warrior raised his sword, Nuramon threw all caution to the wind and released the bowstring. He held his breath as the shot flew toward its target in a high arc.