'I don't want to go back there,' said Rebraal.

'Please, Rebraal, this isn't the time to dredge up old animosities. You must be well.'

Rebraal shook his head. 'Just don't make me talk to them. They have no faith.' He offered Mercuun his right hand. 'Help me up, will you? I'm not too sick to walk.'

But as soon as they started, he wasn't so sure. The pain in his shoulder built steadily as Mercuun's soothing poultice wore off, and his legs were cramped. He felt weak and light-headed and leant on his friend for support but refused to rest again until they'd put real distance between them and the strangers who had taken his temple, his life. Taking it back would be sweet. Every Al-Arynaar that had fallen would be avenged ten times over.

'Tell me how you fared, Meru,' he said, when he found the energy to speak and the pain had dropped temporarily to a numbing thump.

'I have announced the alarm. The Al-Arynaar are alerted and the word is spreading. I have stressed the need for our people to be aware north and I have asked for information from anyone who saw these people land. There is confusion about how the strangers found the temple and remained undetected for their whole journey. We fear the worst for the watchers in the northern canopy and uplands. But the ClawBound are walking and the TaiGethen are closing. These strangers will never leave Calaius.'

'How long before we are assembled to retake Aryndeneth?'

Mercuun sucked in his cheeks. 'Remember, Rebraal, we weren't due to be relieved for another seventy days. The gathering has to take place and the prayers must be spoken or we will anger Yniss. There are gaps in the net; people are on hunting expeditions and it is the season of contemplation. So many of those closest by are at hermitage.'

'How long?' Rebraal knew what Mercuun said was true, and knew the rituals must be observed. He felt a chill enter his body and a vision played across his mind of the desecration that could be visited on Aryndeneth in a few short days.

'Eighty will be ready to attack in twenty days' time.'

'Twenty days!' Rebraal's shout put birds to flight, and in the undergrowth animals scampered from the supposed threat. 'Gyal's tears, that is too long.'

He stopped walking and leaned against the rough bole of a fig tree under attack from strangler vines that were slowly enmeshing it. Eventually, they would kill it. He would have understood ten days, maybe even accepted the delay as inevitable, but this…

'Please, Rebraal, the Al-Arynaar are moving as fast as they can. But we are not the reactive force of our fathers' days. Our mage numbers are small and we cannot afford to go in without their support.'

'But in twenty days, all could have been lost. The cell of Yniss opens in fourteen. What if they are after his writings? Think of the cost. These aren't treasure seekers. There are too many of them. They want something they believe is inside the temple.'

Rebraal began walking again, quickly, his eyes piercing the night as surely as any panther's. He denied the pain that thundered through him at every footfall, praying to Beeth, God of root and branch, to keep him from falling.

'We can't wait, Meru. We'll have to get people from the village. I know they aren't true believers but we have already been betrayed or how could the strangers have found us?'

He had expected Mercuun to be happy at his sudden insistence on enlisting help from their birthplace, the place where his family were treated almost as outcasts because they would not relinquish what were now popularly considered to be old ways. Although every elf on Calaius believed in the harmony, and in Yniss its highest deity, they did not believe in the sanctity of Aryndeneth enough to honour the village quota and send every fifth child to the calling of the Al-Arynaar.

They did not see the honour it bestowed on their families, nor did they appreciate the importance of keeping the calling strong. Rebraal shuddered at the thought that the strangers might actually damage the stones of the temple. If they were powerful enough, it was possible. Theft of the writings of any god was hideous enough, but the balance of Aryndeneth had to be maintained.

Mercuun, though, said nothing. Rebraal slowed and turned to see his friend twenty yards behind him, crouching on the ground.

'Meru?' Rebraal's head was thudding. He was hungry and thirsty and his blood loss sapped his strength.

Mercuun looked up, his face drawn and anguished. He tried to speak but coughed instead, a sick sound from deep in his chest. Rebraal hurried over to him.

'Meru, what is it? Snake? Yellowback frog?'

But it wasn't animal poison. Mercuun shook his head and raised a hand, asking for a moment. He caught his breath and coughed again, a great racking that shook his body. He raised his sweat-slick face to speak.

'I don't feel good,' he managed, Rebraal refraining from telling him he was speaking the obvious. 'Like a wave of something unclean washed through me. It clogged my lungs but they're clearing now. I thought I would fall; my balance went for a moment. I'll be all right. Don't worry about me.'

'We should rest here. Neither of us is fit to go on. I'll bring you liana to lace for hammocks, then I'll fetch food and water. Give me your skins and jaqrui.'

Mercuun made to protest but the relief on his face was all too evident. Instead he nodded. 'But we must push on before dawn. I agree with you. I don't think we've very much time.'

The morning cacophony of monkeys, birds, insects, frogs and anything else that had a voice was in full cry when Ben-Foran decided to wash in the temple pool. Yron's rather clumsy work on the statue's hand might have eroded the majesty of the sculpture but it had had the desired effect. The much increased water flow into the pool had quickly cleared the grime from four dozen sweaty filthy bodies, and now, in the diffused light of dawn, it was crystal clear once again.

Yron was keen for his men not to get lazy and so, barring the sick and the mages, who were tending the ill and examining scrolls and parchments in a room that had opened up with the first touch of light, everyone was outside. Everyone, that is, except Ben, who was duty temple officer. While he swam, Yron and all the rest of the relatively fit were either on hunting parties, investigating the rear of the temple and the area surrounding it, collecting more firewood or preparing breakfast and making a stores inventory.

Despite the hardships of the rainforest, the loss of so many of those he'd travelled with and the feeling he couldn't shift that, despite his loyalty, this was a raid too far, Ben-Foran had to admit to himself that he was rather enjoying it. Partly it was because he had survived with barely a scratch and without catching the fever to which so many had succumbed. Mostly it was because he was with Captain Yron, a real leader and universally loved by the men in his charge. He commanded total respect because he treated all in his command as equals, whatever their rank; a very difficult balance to strike given his position of superiority. And he was a great teacher, constantly springing surprises and doing things by a book all of his own devising. His unorthodoxy didn't endear him to his masters and was, no doubt, why he had gained plenty of experience in places like the Calaian rainforests, but for his men, it was something they could always talk about. If they survived.

Ben-Foran was scared of swimming in rivers, indeed any open area of water where creatures might lurk, but this pool was relaxation itself. On a whim, he duck-dived and swam down, drifting slowly over the statue's hand that lay at rest at the bottom of the pool, the living forest sounds muted as the water closed over his head.