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And victory it was! But at a cost: apart from Balom, Xylor and Tann and, most surprisingly, the wizard, Valens, all lay dead on the battlefield. The exhausted victors buried the dead by torchlight, tramping silently along the river, past Lentor’s huge body (riddled to death), back to the Twin Towers.
They sat in sombre mood around the usual candlelit table, reduced from ten to six, plus Palustric. Emily had used the word victory, but Sapiens shook her grey head. “It’s not so much a victory,” she said, “as time gained before the next inevitable clash. Things are always the same: the wheel whirls and the world changes, but, in reality, it never changes. Take the elves, for instance; they were already a dwindling folk. Today many forest elves have lost their lives. We have lost our broth
