Brittle leaves had blown into every hollow, making the hill look smooth and rounded, though Hiyawento knew from experience, it was not. Dips and rocky holes stippled the ground, making it treacherous footing, especially if a man were running for his life. He’d move these warriors immediately, as soon as he’d talked it over with Saponi.
Disu made it to Saponi and touched his friend’s foot, announcing his presence before he crawled up beside Saponi and started talking.
Saponi shoved up on one elbow to search for Hiyawento, then he lifted a hand, waving Hiyawento to join them.
As he crawled forward, the smell of death, of rotting muscles and intestines, drifted through the trees like an invisible miasma, blowing up from the corpses piled against the Bur Oak palisades and the surrounding meadows. It would get worse as the day wore on.
Hiyawento slid forward and Disu moved to the side, yielding his position next to Saponi. Saponi was a burly man with brown eyes and a nose like a flattened beetle. His cape bore the interlocking green and blue rectangles of the Snipe Clan. Hiyawento wedged himself, shoulder-to-shoulder, between Saponi and Disu. Boulders rose twenty hands tall on either side of them.
“We’re very glad to see you War Chief Hiyawento,” Saponi said.
“And I to see you. After I heard about the Mountain army, I feared all I would find here was a smoldering pile of rubble.”
“Not yet, but we just received word from one of our scouts that there’s a Flint war party heading this way.”
“They’re part of the alliance, Saponi. They—”
“If I knew Chief Cord was still alive, I wouldn’t be worried, but he may be dead and the new Chief no friend of ours.”
Hiyawento took a breath and through a long exhalation said, “How long until the Flint war party arrives?”
“Nightfall. Even if they’re on our side, they won’t make it in time to help us.”
Hiyawento thought the ramifications through. He didn’t have the luxury of worrying about the Flint People right now. He’d consider them later, if he was still alive. “All right. Here’s the situation: Towa will arrive shortly, dragging hundreds of Landing People with him. Some are warriors. By the time he reports, he’ll have the warriors who wish to fight for us separated out. There may be one hundred. Two if we’re very fortunate. The rest are starving women, children, and elders.” He vented a breath. “Now, tell me what’s happening here?”
Through the narrow crack in the rocks, Hiyawento could see almost the entire battlefield below. He scanned it quickly … Bur Oak Village on the left, along with the useless burned-out husk of Yellowtail Village. Just in front of Bur Oak, in a wavy line, stood around four hundred warriors. Then, out at a distance of perhaps seventy paces, the Mountain army created an enormous crescent. It cupped the meadow on three sides, and was perfectly positioned to close in with crushing force.
“Those are Negano’s warriors.” Saponi pointed to the four hundred.
Hiyawento grimaced. “Why on earth does Negano have his people sandwiched between the Standing Stone archers and the Mountain warriors? Is he trying to get them killed?”
“We’ve been wondering the same thing. It is … incomprehensible.”
“When the battle starts, the Mountain army will push the Hills warriors right into the range of the Standing Stone archers. They’ll be butchered.”
Disu added, “Unless they are shot from behind first—as many will be. I don’t care what agreement has been made, this is the chance of a lifetime for Mountain warriors to fulfill blood oaths against the Hills People.”
A ghostly wail, high and thin, wavered in the distance and Hiyawento thought for a moment it was mingled cries of unbearable pain, then he saw the Mountain army shaking fists with their heads thrown back. Clan war cries. The army began to move. Like a many-legged beast, it lurched forward with ragged clan flags jerking about in blurs of blue, red, and black.
A wayward arrow thunked into the boulder to Hiyawento’s left and splintered into a thousand flying pieces. Disu covered his head and flattened out on the ground. Saponi and Hiyawento just flinched and continued watching the advancing army.
The warriors on the Bur Oak catwalks had their bows fully drawn back, patiently waiting for the enemy to get into range.
Hiyawento shook his head. “Why haven’t Negano’s warriors already started picking off the people in the open on the catwalk? They’re just standing there.”
“I don’t know how he thinks, but…” Saponi extended a finger toward the far right where the curve of the meadow butted against the rocky eastern hills. Twenty or so people stood in a knot. “You should know that the man lying on the ground before Atotarho is the Prophet, Sky Messenger.” Reverence touched Saponi’s voice. He was a believer. He had witnessed the monstrous storm.