"It feels like we're being watched," Zdislav remarked as they took their first steps among the dark pines of the Vale. The crunch of ice and needles underfoot didn't seem to travel as far as it should have. Even their voices were muted.
"It always feels that way here," Rhujag said grimly. "We likely are."
Zdislav grimaced a little at that. "Already?"
"They've been in these woods for thousands of years, uninterrupted," Rhujag muttered. "Imagine how well you know your own house: the step that creaks, the shutters that bang, the habits of the animals in your garden. Then imagine you've had a couple centuries to learn the patterns of every little thing. Even without magic, our presence disturbs the forest."
"Magelight only," Adéla ordered, flowing seamlessly back into her role as commander of the mission. She was a battlemage, not a general, but their captain was not foolish enough to pretend he knew anything about elf-magic. "No fires."
"We can't cook over magelights," someone said in the back.
"You heard the Mágissa. Until we have some manner of understanding with the Vale and its occupants, iron rations only. We have enough for months," Kamil said bluntly. There was little sign of his earlier levity now.
Seben put a hand over Naji's jar. "Sorry, dear one," she murmured. "You may be in there for a bit." She looked over at Adéla. "Do we have anything for glamor?"
Adéla nodded. "Not perfect in every sense, but there were enough texts about defending from mind magic in the ancient days preserved to allow for the crafting of some defenses." She opened her palm to show two iron rings, one small and one large with identical sigils engraved. "For you and Rhujag. You will need to lock them to you with a droplet of blood each. That will be enough to prime and maintain the spell. Far easier than me weaving a shield around each and every person."
"And if I lose the ring?" Rhujag asked, picking up his and inspecting it.
"That is why you lock it," Adéla said. "It will still grant protection, even if it is parted, though it may not be as potent. I can craft more if needed, but it is taxing and I would rather not waste my strength if we are in an elven wood."
Rhujag pricked his thumb with his dagger and smeared his blood across the sigils. Instead of dripping off, the dark liquid seemed to vanish into the iron. He slipped it on. "Have I ever mentioned how creepy your magic can be, Adéla?"
"Once or twice," the mage said with a faint smile. "Seben?"
The fire-speaker used an arrowhead to prick her own hand. There was a bright flash of celestial gold when her blood touched the primed ring. The sigils burned white for a moment, slowly diminishing to a faint, barely-there glow.
"I'd forgotten about your blood for a moment there," Adéla admitted. "I imagine you are at least as well defended as I am."
"It might as well be good for something." Seben slipped on the ring and felt a faint warmth seep into her skin. Her thoughts didn't feel any clearer than usual, but she was confident that the mage's creation worked as explained.
"Do not leave the road," Zdislav said, gesturing to the track that led into the woods. It would be difficult to march people down without disturbing the undergrowth, particularly the soldiers, but they could move two abreast through the press of trees. Everyone wore their armor, carrying their weapons where they would be easily readied.
Seben had her bow in her hand, not at all reassured by her leather armor. The worst dangers posed by the forest were not likely to be physical, at least not in the sense of a piercing arrow or cutting blade. "Shall we go?"
Adéla nodded, signalling to the whole group with a glyph of blue light that appeared in the air ahead of them. It shimmered for a moment, then faded. "I worry that if something happens, voices won't carry." The plan was to keep their mage and Seben in the middle, Zdislav and Rhujag in front, Kamil and the Captain behind. It was the safest for their casters and easiest for them to respond to threats ahead and behind.
"We will do better than the last," Kamil said, resting a comforting hand on Adéla's shoulder as the column started to move.
Rhujag raised an eyebrow. "The last?"
"Our expedition is not the only to have entered the Vale. A month ago, another group led by a mage named Bonifác Svoboda went in. We lost contact with them almost immediately and they have not returned." Adéla pulled a smooth onyx orb about the size of a fist from a pouch at her side. "These allowed us to communicate, both with each other and with Zaeylael. So far, there has been no contact. I suspect that this one will become nothing more than a pretty stone as well."
Seben shifted uncomfortably. "That doesn't sound good."
"They could still be alive and on the mission." Zdislav flashed her a reassuring smile. "We do not have to assume the worst, though we cannot rely on them until we make contact with them again."
The group advanced into the forest, surrounded on all sides by trees grown so thickly together that the only light to escape down to the forest floor was cast in a sickly green shade. It would have been impossible to see more than just dim shapes without the magelight, though, which burned like blue fire on the right shoulder of each man so that no one would lose their illumination, even if they strayed.
It felt eerily timeless without being able to see the sun. Rhujag sniffed the air frequently, shifting his shoulders to loosen them every time he tensed. "This whole place is a khiirdu," he muttered.
Adéla and her spellguards gave him a quizzical look, but it was the mage who spoke up. "That sounds orcish."
"It is," Rhujag said. "There are places in Ash Kordh where the world isn't....right. Maybe it's bigger or smaller than the outside looks, maybe time passes strangely or doesn't pass at all. Creation doesn't flow like it's supposed to in a khiirdu. It's all tangled up, broken up."
Zdislav adjusted the position of his sword at his hip. "How can you tell that you're in one?"
"I've been in them before. They've got a feeling to them, if you know what you're feeling." The orc sighed. "You'd need a shaman to tell you what's really going on."
Their mage closed her eyes and gestured with one hand, mumbling under her breath for a moment. The longer she focused, the more perplexed her expression became. "Rhujag is right. There are more threads of magic here than I've ever seen, and they're all tangled. I don't know enough to know what it's doing, but our senses may be deceived even without glamor." She spoke quietly, audibly only to the four closest to her.
"There are tracks, tracks of boots!" someone called back from the front.
"Bonifác's people?" Captain Dalibor asked. Seben appreciated the veteran commander, he seemed to have a good head on his shoulders even if he mostly spoke just to his men. He was a short, stout man with a bristling beard touched by grey and truly impressive beetling brows.
Rhujag grunted. "It's been a month. Those tracks would be buried."
Dalibor took his knife and scratched a symbol into the bark of a tree that grew beside the road. "We follow, and if we see this again, we know we're going in a circle."
"How could we be going in a circle?" Seben asked. "The path hasn't turned or branched."
"It's not a bad idea," their orc said.
"The path splits ahead! Right or left?"
"Left!" Dalibor's voice seemed to carry better than anyone else's, as that of a man used to shouting.
After another hour of following the path, Seben spotted Dalibor's mark, but something scratched at the back of her mind. "Dalibor."
He looked over at her, expression questioning.
She pointed at the mark. "Did you put that on the right or left side of the path?"
"Right."
Seben's unease doubled. "So why is it on the left? We haven't doubled back."
Dalibor growled. "This place is getting us nowhere, and already people are getting tired of picking their way through the forest in armor."
"We should go back," one of his lieutenants muttered.
The veteran soldier glared at him. "And you know which way that is, Havel?" Then Dalibor looked back to Seben and Adéla. "We need a way to find a path through this place. If the elves want to play with magic, let us do the same."
Adéla nodded in agreement. "Call for a rest."
Zdislav cleared his throat. "Dalibor, do a head count as well. Just to be safe."
Everyone settled down onto the needle-covered path, careful not to leave it. Adéla frowned deeply enough that care lines formed on her forehead. "I don't understand how to get through this," Adéla said. "We cannot see the sun, the path itself is alive, and the magic here is so tangled that there are no threads to follow."
Seben looked over at Rhujag. "How do your shamans get through khiirdu?"
Rhujag scratched at his chin, thinking hard as well. "They have a head for magic and following its flow. Tangled as it is, wrapped up in itself as it is magic still moves. The giants are better at finding their way, they're practically made of the stuff."
"Then perhaps Naji can find the way," Seben said thoughtfully. "If I open the lid to his jar, he should be able to peek out without being a threat to anything in the forest."
Adéla nodded hesitantly. "Go carefully, Seben. This forest has a special hatred for fire...and that will put you at the front of the formation."
"I'll be fine."
"Captain!"
Dalibor looked up at the shout, bordered with panic as it was. "What?" His tone was clipped, brooking no nonsense.
"We're missing four from the rear!"
The Captain swore a blue streak and rose to his feet, striding down the length of the column. He grabbed a man from the rank ahead of the four missing. "You didn't see or hear anything? They were practically touching you!"
The soldier seemed to shrink down into his armor. "No sir!"
Dalibor exhaled a few more harsh words, though they didn't seem directed at the man he was holding. "All of you, take out your cords!" he ordered. "If someone else gets grabbed, someone is going to feel it!"
Thin lengths of strong cord were passed and tied together, so everyone in the formation was connected without impeding their arms, linked at the belt. By the time that was finished, everyone seemed calm again.
"I hate this place," Dalibor growled.
Lieutenant Havel looked to his commander. "Are we going to go looking for our missing?"
"We're not leaving the gods-damned path."
"Does it make a difference if we're on the path?" Havel demanded. "It is leading us wherever it wishes, as malevolent as everything else here!"
Dalibor seized the man by the front of his breastplate, pulling him in close. "This is not the place and time for you to speak so to me, Havel," the captain said dangerously. "The Mágissa said we were not to leave the path. So what are we doing, Havel?"
"Not leaving the path," the man muttered. He looked over at Seben. "And this Eth stranger is to guide us?"
"The Mágissa said Fire-Speaker Femi is finding the path for us. So who is finding the path for us, Havel?"
Havel looked somewhat surly, but was calming down quickly. "Femi."
Dalibor shook his lieutenant meaningfully. "Fire-Speaker Femi."
"My apologies, Captain. Fire-Speaker Femi."
WIth that response, Dalibor released his subordinate and turned back to Seben. "We're following you and your djinni. I hope it has a better idea of how to get us out of this mess than Havel here."
Seben carefully opened the lid to the soul-jar, covering the top with her hand so Naji knew not to rush out. "We're a little lost, Naji," she said gently to her faithful djinni. "Can you find us a way?"
The flames beneath her hand crackled softly in understanding, a hint that Naji was turning his attention to the problem. She moved her hand away from the lid and a single curl of flame flicked out, sensing the air like a serpent's tongue.
Around them, the trees creaked menacingly at the sudden appearance of fire. Branches moved above them, twisting like snakes.
"I don't think they like him." Zdislav's tension was audible in his voice, one hand on his sword.
Naji's flame became a hand, pointing down the path. His understanding of the situation passed through his bond to Seben.
"We're lost because we don't know where we're going, and because certain things don't want to be found. If we solve one of those problems, we only have to contend with the other," Seben said, smiling in gratitude towards her djinni.
Adéla moved forward, handing the orb of communication to Seben. "These are anchors for scrying. Perhaps if we try to move to the location of the other, we will get somewhere."
Naji's voice snapped and crackled from the soul-jar.
"He thinks that will work," Seben said, balancing the orb on her hand. "I suppose we'll see." She focused her mind on the orb, visualizing its twin. She felt the forest shift around them, so subtly it was barely noticeable. She didn't know elvish, but she had something just as powerful at her command. In the God-Tongue, she uttered a single command. "Take us."
Around them, the forest seemed to twist and writhe, trees shifting against trees until an archway of branches formed ahead of them, trunks forming a tunnel of solid wood.
Dalibor gave a low whistle. "Seems like progress."