The Bonemender by Holly Bennett Page A

Sir?” asked the unfortunate Ryvent.
    He was rewarded with a fierce glare. “We discuss these matters in my tent because they are not for general broadcast, Ryvent. Control your mouth.”
    Féolan had already guessed by the sheer size of the garrison that there would be a single, focused thrust through the mountains. Now he was certain.
    It was time to go. He hadn’t learned anything of great import, but if he could get across the mountains in time he could, perhaps, tell the Humans where to gather their armies. And he had something to tell his own people too. If the
Gref Orisé
conquered the Basin, Elvish life would be forever changed. They might hide in the forest for a long time, but they would never again roam free and unhindered.
    G ABRIELLE LOOKED OUT over the battlements, shivering in her cloak. It was a still clear night, piercingly cold. Moonlight flooded silver over the snow. Another full moon. It was nearly two months since Sylvain’s birth. Despite the cold, winter’s grip on Verdeau was weakening. The days were longer and milder now, and on sunny days the icicles dripped, and the roads became treacherous with slush and mud. Soon snowmelt would begin in earnest, and the Verdeau armies would be on the move.
    She thought back to that afternoon’s War Council. The troops, she had been told, would start to muster in a fortnight and begin the trek to the Krylian foothills by month’s end. They would take up their position before the mountains were passable.
    “But where?” she had asked.
    “That’s the question which has occupied us through this long winter,” said General Fortin. “We do not know where the Greffaires will cross over: at one of the three passes, or perhaps all. We must be prepared at each pass, yet dividing our forces increases the chance that they will break through and advance into Verdeau.
    “The western pass, on our side at least, is narrow and treacherous. It would be most difficult to move a sizeable army through it. The Maronnais are posting a small sentry force there, with a standing request to Barilles to send reinforcements. The middle and eastern passes both seem possible. We will guard the Skyway Pass, the Maronnais the Eastern Gateway—again with a request to Gamier for additional troops. We also need to leave a sizeable force within Verdeau, in case we fail to stop them in the foothills.”
    “What if they don’t come, after all this?” It was Poutin. “What if all this fuss and expense is for nothing?”
    “Then we will have erred on the side of caution, and we will hope the people will forgive us,” said Jerome impatiently. “They will not forgive us, on the other hand, if we allow them to be slaughtered through carelessness.”
    “They will come.” Gabrielle surprised herself by voicing what she had only meant to think.
    “What makes you so sure?” snapped Poutin.
    How she wished she had said nothing. “I have dreamed it,” she confessed, bracing herself for Poutin’s scorn. But the memory of the dream that had stalked her sleep through the long winter must have been reflected in her face because Poutin on the verge of ridicule, fell silent.
    In her dream, Gabrielle struggled to join together a rising tide of dismembered bodies. They were everywhere, awash with blood—legs, arms, trunks and the worst, the heads, crying out and imploring her—and the more she tried to match them up and piece them together, the more they piled up around her. In the backdrop of her dream, the battle raged, unseen but terrifying, unquestionably real. She was sure now. The Greffaires were coming.
    “Dominic stays with the reserve army, at the crossroads north of Chênier,” continued Jerome. “He is charged with the defense of Verdeau proper and the royal seat. Tristan and I will travel to La Maronne to meet the enemy. Gabrielle, it is time to call in the bonemenders who will serve our forces and decide who stays with the home force and who travels to the central