“Hey!” the corporal exclaimed as the plain opened up before the party.

“What now?” Away from WoodHeart, Belius’ hangover was threatening to unhinge his sanity.

“That’s what,” the corporal pointed.

“It’s bleedin’ Seria,” a trooper pointed out unnecessarily.

“Aye, at third quarter.” the Corporal insisted. “And where’s Phora? He should be well up in the sky by this time ‘o night!”

“But....” Belius wasn’t that hung over. They’d entered the forest during the waning of the lesser moon and spent six days within. There shouldn’t be any moon, let alone a third quarter. And the corporal was correct in that —even if they did see Seria in her next third quarter phase— by the tables, the greater moon, should be readily visible.

“We were in there for a month?”

“Longer,” Swallow Courting pointed. “See you the mariner?”

Belius followed her arm. “We call it Ophium’s Chariot, but, aye, tis full across the sky from where it belongs.”

“We were Rip Van Winkled,” Storm informed them.

“Oh, aye, and thankee very much, Sor,” the corporal grimaced, “but what would you be meaning by that?”

“Simply put, Corporal,” Storm replied with a wry smile. “That when one drinks with the mountain kings, one shouldn’t expect to be hurrying home.”

“Aye and don’t that clear things up nicely, and thankee very much Sor.”

“A tale from my lands,” Storm laughed. “About a man who got drunk with some very strange characters in a very strange wood, and woke up twenty years later thinking it the next morning.”

“By the gods,” Belius bemoaned. “Early spring to early fall. How much of that stuff did I drink?”

“How cold does it get hereabouts in the winter?” Storm asked of no one in particular.

“Right cold enough them wenches o’ yourn’ll freeze solid with all that skin hangin’ out.” a trooper suggested. “Cold enough to make yer wish fer some o’ that wolfie hide fer a coat.”

Storm lowered his head, putting hand to eyes. He was supposed to teach these to get along? The old wolf was saying something about it warming right up with a full belly and how the trooper had to sleep sometime, but apparently the Turaleeans didn’t understand him. Small favors. “Then we’ll need supplies before we head for the mountains,” Storm pointedly dismissed the exchange. “Anybody know where we are?”

“If I’ve got me bearings right, sor,” the corporal supplied, scratching at the back of his head. “And we’re where I think we are, Our barracks in Clairbourne is four days hard ride that way,” pointing northwest up the road.

Turning around to point eastward, “Yonder should be a three way crossroad, p’raps ‘alf a stad off. And beyond, a fair-sized city —Thurgen they call it— most of three days ridin’, does ye turn north.

“And,” turning again to face straight out across the plain, “a thieves’ station two days ride in that direction.

“I’m thinkin’ that’ll be the place we’ll get the least strange looks travelin’ wi’ our wee friends here,” his backward-gesturing hand nearly touched the nose of the white wolf, who’d been walking almost in his shadow since leaving the cathedral. “Although I can’t be sayin’ surely that even there we won’t be lynched on sight, ner torn to bloody bits.”

“The thieves’ station is a good thought, Corporal,” the Tairn allowed. “But what if the stranger of us waited out here while one or two of you normal sort wandered over to the city to pick us up some mounts?”

“Aye, an’ I’d be happy to oblige ye sor, but I’m thinkin’ that meself an’ the lads’ve been given up fer dead by now, an’ a new patrol assigned. Ye’ll be rememberin’ how t’was we met?”

“Right. I’d almost forgotten. And with that thought in mind, I’m not particularly thrilled with leaving a track through all that grass and no speedy way to evade. We’ll wait inside the trees until you get back.”

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“Aye sor,” the corporal flushed at the praise. “I’ll be needin’ some gold, then, sor, an’ will the lassies be needin’ mounts as well?”

“I don’t know,” Storm turned to the sylvans. “Do you ride?”

Thrush Dancing grimaced. “We have never felt the need. Anywhere we have ever gone, our own feet were there for us.”

The dead sergeant’s horse snorted and then whickered.

“Really?” Thrush Dancing regarded it. “Thank you.” Turning to Storm, she pointed to the horse. “We’ll ride Sandahl. He has offered.”

“Sandahl?” Storm eyed the horse strangely, remembering the time in the cathedral and the stories of racing the sunset. There wasn’t any doubt the beast had been changed by its time with the oldest, though he was only just realizing how changed. Turning to the corporal, he shrugged. “There you have it.

“As for gold,” his brow furrowed, realizing suddenly that the only local currency he had available was that which he’d taken from the dead sergeant and the pair of troopers he’d killed back down the line. “How much will you need?”

Not that the question meant much. He’d no idea what the coins he did have were even worth. He wondered if, even were he to take up a collection and add it to what he already had, would the lot of them have enough to purchase a single animal, let alone thirty or more.

“Aye an’ I’ve never paid fer a horse, Sor,” it was the corporal’s turn to shrug. “I’ve always requisitioned the’ beasties when needed.”

A glance at Belius netted another negative. “I’ve been working for the kings for the past twenty years myself. Any time I wanted a horse, I mentioned that and one was produced.”

Nor were the troopers any more helpful, adding only that it were unlikely a poor line troop could afford his own private mount, and more’s the pity sor. Only the sergeant had been born with sufficient wealth to be able to procure his own mounts, and The Tairn had done by way of putting him out of the horse buying business.

The wolf yipped and growled, tail thumping. His head tilted and he shot an ear.

The Tairn shrugged and reached for the pouch he’d inherited from the dead sergeant, opening it and spilling what coins it contained into an open palm holding it out to the old grey. “Just this, and don’t ask me what it’s worth, I have no idea.”

“Ye c’n understand th’ beastie, then?” the corporal inquired.

“Mostly,’ he turned as the wolf examined the small pile of currency, sniffing. “Don’t you?”

“Nasor, not since leavin’ himself, the oldest. Tis just a muckle o’ growlin’ t’me.”

“Just a matter of listening close.”The Tairn told him. “And watching. They speak with their whole bodies. Ask him yourself in the morning, maybe he’ll teach you.”

“In th’ morning, sor?”

“When the sun’s out.”

“Sor?”

More yips and growls.

The Tairn made a fist around the coins, turning to face the wolf with some surprise. “You mean they don’t know?”

Yip whine bark.

“I find that very hard to believe.”

“Sor?” the corporal’s tone was pleading, and even Belius evinced curiosity.

“Well what the hell did you think were meant?” The Tairn was having trouble believing they’d been in the dark the whole time.

“Why, as to that, sor, it means fell an’ aivil, don’t it?”

“It means, friend corporal, that in the sunlight, he—”

Long, low growl.

“They’re supposed to be our friends now,” he was half growling himself. “And they’ll find out soon enough anyway.”

Snorting howl

“Okay, don’t believe me. Did you believe the oldest one?”

The ruff of the wolf’s neck flared and he growled low.

“Genocide? Who said anything about genocide?” The Tairn shook his head. "Look, it’s a fairly simple matter. If you stay with the party, they’ll figure it out within the day.”

With a last snort, the old grey thumped to the ground, turning his head away in disgust and wrapping his tail around his nose.

“Oh, all right.” The Tairn addressed the group as a whole, “you’re all sworn to secrecy, right? Upon your souls?”

Nods, somewhat reluctant.

“Right,” he continued. “It means that when the sun comes up, they become men and women, just like us.”

“I knew it!” Belius blurted into the resulting silence. All eyes focused on him and he flushed. “Well, I suspected.”

The corporal clearly didn’t believe a word of it, nor did any of the other soldiers, come to that. The sylvans, of course, had known all along, for Bayel’s Wood was a sylvan wood.

“We’re losing track of where we’re going here,” Storm interrupted the ensuing argument. “We were talking about the price of—”

“Corporal! Corporal!” one of the troopers who’d been put out on guard raced back to the group.

“What is it, lad?”

“Slavers! Just north of the crossroad and moving this way!”

The air grew suddenly cold, and the sylvans were taken with such a bout of wild shivering that it caught the attention of even the most bigoted troopers. Then the troopers, too, felt it, and turned to regard the source.

“What?” Storm’s voice had gone silky-soft, and the cold was radiating out from him in battering waves.

Even Belius was taken aback. Magic? And not parlor tricks, either. Prior to this moment he hadn’t an inkling that The Tairn might be a mage above all his other strangenesses.

"S-Slavers, Sor,” the trooper stammered.

“Slavers,” the man’s eyes bored into those of the unfortunate trooper. “You people have slavery here?”

“Er... aye,” the trooper’s voice shriveled beneath the glare of the sapphire eye.

“Horse!” Storm spat.

Sandahl, trotted obediently over, head lowered, and allowed the man to mount. “Wait here,” Storm ordered the party at large as he uncouched the lance and reined the horse eastward, cycling his mechanical eye to infrared.

Orders or no, the rest of them remained still only long enough for him to round the bend. Nothing was going to stop them from seeing this show.