Broken Wings

Agendas

As the group of ogern led me through the encampment, I was distracted from further scheming about Faolin by a growing sense of astonishment at the length of the walk. We'd left the human section behind, something only apparent because of the abrupt end of humans wandering around between the tents. I was surprised to discover the Sylvan seemed to be using the same type of lodgings they'd forced the humans to accept. Several minutes later we even passed out of the range of my ability to overhear the humans' conversations. Yet there was still not the slightest hint of an end to the countless tents scattered between the trees in every direction.

The tents varied in size and shape, but all were covered by a brown cloth that looked similar to the cloak I'd taken from Faolin. Most were either the two-person kind I'd been sharing with Captain Walker or more dome-shaped ones large enough to hold a family, but I also saw a few that looked like barns or hangars made of canvas. These big ones were set up in a clearing, and I heard some weird animal sounds coming from them as we passed. I didn't bother asking my guards about them; they only acknowledged me if they decided I wasn't following them closely enough.

More than what might be hiding inside the tents, what was really starting to intimidate me was the sheer number of them. There had to be thousands of sylvan living out here, and then I had to add in an unknown number of the ogern who served them. I cast a furtive glance around at my guards. They were all as physically impressive as any sylvan was frail. I had yet to see one of these people who looked like less than two hundred pounds of muscle, and they behaved like well-disciplined, professional warriors. Even if they really only had the primitive bladed weapons and bows I'd seen so far (and I knew they had more; they had lots of bewitched items and a least some magic-wielders like Os'tarell), in these numbers they would still pose a severe threat to anyone they ran across except proper military units fully outfitted for combat. Where the devil did they all come from?! They can't have been living out here like Anea this whole time! People would have run into them by pure chance, whether they were visible or not!

Eventually, we reached a large, nearly circular clearing with two concentric rings of tents surrounding a large, slightly-flattened dome. I guessed this was our destination and was proven right as we made a beeline for the central structure. I didn't think this one was just a tent like all the others. It had the same canvas covering, but the material didn't sag between the supporting ribs.

There were many sylvan milling about, and as far as I could tell, none of them were speaking to each other. In fact, since leaving the mess of human conversation behind, the only speech I'd heard was a couple of orders being passed and accepted. There was also a peculiar, dull buzz hanging in the air. It was the same not-sound Anea and I had followed to the two sylvan and Skor back in Pineda, and I had a new guess about what it meant. It was Sylvan telepathy of any kind, not just someone's mind being ripped open. I could tell they were communicating, but I didn't seem able to overhear it unless one of them directed it at me. And judging by their near complete silence, telepathy was the Sylvan's preferred method of communication.

We reached the main entrance of the dome, and I was passed to a different set of ogern guards, this one overseen by a sylvan woman. No words were exchanged and the new group led me without pause into the dome. It was lit by their floating werelights and seemed to be broken up into sections by hanging canvas sheets in place of walls. My earlier apprehension was creeping back up my legs into my gut again. Only the awful memory of having my will stripped away by my collar kept me from trying to escape. Before long, my escorts opened one of the flaps along the walls and began filing into the room. I gulped and steeled my nerves as I followed them in, but I stopped dead at the hateful sight that greeted me!

We were in a room like the one where I'd been interrogated by the Speaker earlier, maybe the same one. That damned chair was right there in a corner, its countless tendrils splayed and waiting to grasp and bind the poor idiot who sat down among them!