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 Both, I would say.
The woman gestured for him to continue, but he shook his head.  I have
seen nothing else of importance. Dion, Rafe, and the others have reports for
the central and southern parts of the border.
Dion stood reluctantly and took her place before the assembly.  I scout the
area from the Devil s Knee to the second camp, ten kilometers below the
Sky Bridge, she said. The elders nodded, and she continued.  As long as I
have been running that length of trail, the raiders have guarded the Sky
Bridge completely. It is useless as a crossing. From what I have seen, they
travel the river road between the bridge and the Knee, but not regularly, and
not in numbers. If they are moving supplies and people to the north, it is on
one of the trade roads that runs through the woods, back from the canyons,
not along the Phye.
 It is so, Sobovi agreed.  They use the river road only when they want to
track someone along the rim.
 Along the Phye itself, there are far more raiders south of the Sky Bridge
than north of it, she continued.  Plus, they do not seem to care that their
night camps can be seen from Ariye. Her voice sounded puzzled, and the
Lloroi s eyes sharpened. This he had not heard. He watched Dion narrowly
as she chose her words with care.  It is almost as if, she said hesitantly,
 they challenge us to see them, to cross the river to deal with them directly.
Gamon frowned. If the raiders were more bold to the south, it was probably
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a ruse to catch Ariye s attention and pull it away from the Slot.
Moonworms, but if the first refugee had not himself crossed and made
contact with them, the Ariyens would never have sent a scout across the
border to the north. The Bilocctar camp could have been a breeding ground
for raiders before Ariye even noticed what had happened. His frown
deepened suddenly. The escape of the refugees into thin air& The raiders
must be incensed, but also wary. If they guessed that Ariye knew of their
camp& Did Dion realize she had intimated that the raiders were toying
with the Ariyen scouts? She must, he told himself. She was a careful
speaker, astute and thoughtful; she would have thought deeply about the
implication before she was willing to put it into words. It was one of the
reasons he himself listened more often to the guarded opinions of this
healer than he did to some of the elders. The other reason, he reminded
himself, was that Dion had seen more of the raiders than most people in his
county, and she understood what she had seen. He smiled faintly. She might
think she was asked to speak so often before the council only because she
held the station of a healer and wolfwalker; she did not realize that she
would have the respect of the council whether or not she carried the weight
of the silver circlet or the bond of the wolves. Even the Lloroi asked her
opinion as if she were an elder herself.
One of those gray-haired people had been thinking along the same lines as
Gamon, and now the elder stopped Dion with a question.  How many
camps are we talking about? he asked.  And how large are they on
average?
She shook her head.  Three camps? Five? Depends on the night and the
stretch of river you look along. The further south you go, the more there are
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 sometimes half a dozen in one place. And I, too, have seen some signs of
them to the north. As far as numbers at each camp, that is difficult for me to
tell.
 But you have the ear of the wolves. Can you not sense their numbers that
way?
A strange expression crossed her face, and Gamon s gaze narrowed as Dion
shook her head.  The wolves on the west side of the river have closed their
song to me. I cannot read them except as a distant echo, so what I guess
now is only what my eyes and ears can tell me. Gamon filed the comment
away; he would ask her about it later.
 Numbers at each camp? Dion continued.  At the Sky Bridge, perhaps ten,
maybe more. South of the bridge, increasing numbers until there are as
many as twenty at the camps on the lowest border of my run. Ruskic, she
said, motioning toward another woman,  can tell you of the next section of
the border.
The next scout rose, and so it went, report after report filling in the
descriptions of the county boundary along the river and down to the lower
regions of Ariye, where the foothills faded into Wyrenia Valley. Gamon
was called back to speak then, giving a summary, which he did grimly. He
knew of the movements to the north and, like the Lloroi, understood their
implications. There were patterns in the raiders plans shifting purposes
that confused the eye like a feint being laid out before them. So many
raiders in arrogant sight on the lower Phye, while a hidden town was being
built up north&
The Lloroi glanced at him, noting his thoughtful look.  The north? he
asked in a low voice.
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Gamon nodded.  We ll have to send more people up there than three
scouts, he murmured.
The Lloroi grunted his agreement softly.  Another camp will be difficult to
accept.
 Just one? Gamon asked.  From what Sobovi says, we might do better to
think of three or four.
 Hmm. The Lloroi did not comment, and Gamon sat back, letting his
shoulders rest against the stone tier. He did not envy his brother. The task of
leading the Ariyens to support another camp or more than that to the
north was not an easy one. Ariye could bear the weight of the supplies
each family supported the camps as best they could with their skills and
goods. But this was spring, and the farms had to be tended, the mining
worms retrieved and bred, and the yearly crop of winter wool gathered from
the mountain goats and sorted for export. Giving up more men and women
to watch the raiders could cripple those activities. He shook his head. The
thinned numbers of this council was a constant reminder of the three
hundred people already guarding the borders to the south. Another fifty [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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