Thom strode out into the morning’s gloom, squinted up at the shafts of sun slicing through the clouds above, then shouted up to Davon, “How many?”
“Just a dozen,” Davon called back. “Looks like more are coming, though.”
Not good, Thom thought, trying to smother a frown. I wonder how many he’ll be able to muster to cause us problems. As Thordin and Phelan moved to flank him, he glanced between the two.
“Any idea on how many he’ll be bringing in for this?”
“Could be two dozen, could be two hundred,” Phelan said with a grimace. “But I doubt it’s more than fifty.”
Fifty still outnumbers us, Thom thought as he carefully climbed up to a perch on the wall near the gates for a look of his own. The snow beyond the walls sparkled where the light hit it, piled deep and hissing as the wind carried errant flakes over the icy pack. He saw the dozen at the far end of the fields, a dozen yards beyond where they’d burned the firbolg’s carcass.
He shivered as more of the camazotzi drifted in.
“None of the gremlins,” he called down to Phelan.
“That’s good,” he heard Marin say as she joined them, sounding slightly breathless as she did. He glanced back to see her filling the space between the two ancients he’d vacated. Matt was headed for the spot on the wall opposite him, shotgun in hand.
“That’ll work to our advantage, right?” she said.
“We can only hope,” Phelan answered.
Thom grunted, and looked back toward the field. Two dozen, now, but he didn’t see Cariocecus—not yet.
What’s the bastard waiting for? The best opportunity to make some kind of insane, grand entrance?
He squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, cursing the fact that he hadn’t thought to bring his sunglasses out here. Now that the clouds were clearing, the brightness of the sun glaring off the snow was nearly blinding.
Use that to your advantage, a little voice said in the back of his mind.
But how?
He almost—almost—snarled, but stopped himself, taking a deep breath. The sun was to their backs this early in the day. They’d be silhouetted against the brightness.
Maybe that’ll help.
He slid down from his perch and marched back toward Marin, Phelan, and Thordin. “Get the cover fire into position,” he shouted as more and more of their friends filtered into the empty ground between shelter and the gates. “If you’ve got a gun, I need you up on the walls. If you’ve got a bow, I need the same.”
Marin started to slip past him and he grasped her arm.
“I know you’re not about to tell me not to go up to where you just were,” she said without looking at him. “Because we both know that’s exactly where you need me, especially if it comes time to parley with them.”
Thom snorted at the idea of parley. “He won’t want to negotiate.”
“We can hope against hope that he’ll see that this is stupid,” she said. “Maybe he’ll realize that.”
“He won’t,” Thom said, hating how certain he was of it. He leaned in and kissed her. “Be careful.”
“I’m not the one who needs that,” she said, reaching up to stroke his cheek. “That would be you.”
“Thom!” Davon shouted. “I think I see him.”
Marin squeezed his arm and scrambled toward her position.
“How far?” Thom called.
“Dead center on the field,” Davon answered. “Looks like he’s heading for the gate.”
The blast of something that sounded vaguely like a trumpet echoed off the field. Dead silence reigned for a moment before Cariocecus’s voice rang out, rolling like thunder.
“Seer and Wandering One, I would treat with you this day!”
Thom’s stomach flopped, twisted in on itself. Hell.
He found himself answering without any additional thought. “We’re coming out.”
He grabbed Phelan’s arm and headed for the gate.
