“Sorry. I feel guilty, and it’s making me cross. We put a blanket over him and Algol got some water into him. I didn’t know what else we could do.”
The elf nodded. “Honestly, I don’t know what else you could have done. Water and a blanket was a good thing. I could wish for a fire and food in him, but wizards…well, if one woke up to a goblin troop, it could go very badly. Poor guy.”
He pondered. “I can send a pigeon to the rangers and tell them to keep an eye out for a shocky wizard in that part of the woods.” He paused. “If you’d like to read it first—I wasn’t going to tell them about you, but I understand—”
Nessilka shrugged. “I can’t read Elvish, and it’d look awfully odd if you sent them a note in Glibber, wouldn’t it?”
“There’s that.” Sings-to-Trees looked into his mug, seemed surprised to find it empty, and began digging in a tin for more tea. “I wonder why the wizard picked that as an escape route, though,” the elf mused. “They don’t do well with surprises, most of them. I’d think one would want to go to a safe place, familiar surroundings. The middle of a forest under elven protection seems a little strange.”
“Maybe he was from around here,” said Nessilka, who’d been wondering something similar herself. “The humans from the town can go into the forest, right? As long as they don’t cut the trees or overhunt?”
Sings-to-Trees nodded. “There are fairly strict rules and quotas, and the rangers check up on those, but generally we find that as long as they know what they can and can’t do—and that there’ll be repercussions if they break the rules—the humans are pretty reliable.”
Nessilka sighed. “Maybe that was our problem. We didn’t make any rules, we just left.”
Sings-to-Trees shrugged. “It might not have helped. The goblin tribes go everywhere, but they’re usually pretty thin on the ground. You would have had a hard time enforcing the rules. Whereas elves—well—”
“You’re tall and impressive looking and you can put an arrow into a squirrel’s eye from a hundred paces,” said Nessilka.
“There’s that, yeah. We had charisma and numbers and mayhem. All you had were pigs and enthusiasm. It’s not your fault.”
She called up the goblin army in her mind’s eye, and had to laugh. Pigs and enthusiasm described it pretty well.
The silence that stretched out was companionable. Dusk had finished with the trees and was starting to work across the yard. Crickets chirped, and a few fireflies telegraphed their attractiveness to the world.
She gathered the mug up to head back inside. “I should probably go make sure they haven’t broken all your plates.”
The elf shrugged and followed. “I’ve learned not to get too attached to plates. Here—take a lantern if you’re headed to the barn for the night.”
She glanced over at Thumper, still asleep. Sleeping on a head wound worried her. She hoped the elf knew what he was doing.
“I’ll wake him every few hours. That’s part of why I want him where I can keep an eye on him.”
“Ah. Thank you.” She grinned, showing blunt tusks. “I seem to keep thanking you.”
Sings-to-Trees grinned back. “So few of my patients can. It’s a nice change of pace.”
Nessilka took the lantern down to the barn, where Algol and Murray were conscientiously overseeing the washing, and found, against all odds, that she was whistling.
FIFTEEN
It was still the small hours of the morning. The barn was smothered in shadow and in the rather thick smell of goblin digestion.
Someone was shaking her shoulder. Sergeant Nessilka opened one eye, saw The Enemy standing over her, and threw herself sideways before it could bring the lantern crashing down on her head. She snatched up her club and lifted it, eyes glittering in the orange light.
“Err,” said Sings-to-Trees.
“Oh. Oh…right.”
She straightened up and climbed out of the straw. “Sorry. Old habits…”
“I quite understand.” He stood back politely while she roused Blanchett, Algol and Murray. “Out of curiosity, are you often woken up that way?”
“Once. Night attack.” The barn was warm, but the air coming through the door was cool and damp. She shrugged into her armor. “I broke his kneecaps.”
“Ah.”
“With my forehead.”
“Goodness.”
They left the rest of the Nineteenth behind, a symphony of snoring and gas in the dark barn. It was going to smell like a feedlot in there by dawn. Sings-to-Trees didn’t seem particularly bothered by the idea.