Demontech: Rally Point: 2 (Demontech Book 2) by David Sherman Page A

He looked in the direction from which Wolf had come and saw the ground rise in a nubbin of hill. “They’re beyond that rise somewhere.”
    When he said that, Wolf grabbed his left sleeve and pulled hard enough that Haft had a choice of going with him or being pulled off his feet.
    “Whoa, what are you doing?” he growled.
    “Ulgh,” Wolf growled deep in his throat, and jerked Haft’s sleeve again.
    “I think he wants to show you something,” Birdwhistle said softly.
    “Nonsense!” Haft snapped. “Let go,” he ordered Wolf. The wolf let go, but kept looking at him expectantly.
    “I had a dog acted like that once. Let’s see what he wants. Maybe he saw them and wants to show us.”
    “Ulgh,” Wolf said, and bobbed his head up and down.
    Grumbling quietly, Haft let Wolf lead him. Wolf kept his head and shoulders low. Without conscious thought, Haft followed his example. They ran at an angle away from the road, around the rising ground. The sound of the horses dimmed almost to inaudibility.
    A streambed with a mere trickle of water in its bottom cut through the forest floor and meandered toward the farther end of the high ground. It was deep enough for them to stand slightly crouched and not be seen. Wolf led them into it and followed the watercourse for a short distance, closer to the rise, before he stopped and looked at Haft. They could again hear the clopping and jangling of the horses. The wolf bellied down and began to climb the bank. Haft started to stretch fully erect to look over the top of the bank, but Wolf grabbed his sleeve and pulled him back down.
    Haft looked at him oddly for a couple of seconds, then said softly, “All right, I’ll do it your way.”
    Wolf immediately let go.
    Crouched below the lip of the streambed, Haft leaned onto it and slithered up its side until he could peer over the top. He dropped right back down.
    “Bandits,” he whispered to Birdwhistle. The armed men he saw lying in watch over the road in his quick look probably weren’t soldiers; they weren’t dressed uniformly, nor did they carry the same arms. More carefully than before, he looked over the bank again. A dozen or more men lay on the slope of the rise where they couldn’t be seen from the road. They weren’t lying relaxed; they were alert and armed with a variety of short bows and swords, positioned to jump to their feet and rain arrows down onto the road from their higher vantage. The horses on the road were closer now, nearing the ambush’s killing zone. He twisted to his right at another sound and brought his crossbow to bear. He let go of the trigger just in time to avoid shooting the Skragland Borderer named Kovasch. Meszaros was right behind him.
    Haft resisted the impulse to snap at them for sneaking up on him. “Bandits,” he said softly.
    Kovasch nodded. He and Meszaros stayed hunched below the top of the bank and waited for instructions.
    Haft rose back up. What should they do? He didn’t know who the horsemen were. If they were Jokapcul, he should leave the ambush alone and let the bandits kill the enemy. But what if they weren’t? They hadn’t seen any sign of Jokapcul in several days; there was an excellent chance the company was still ahead of the invaders—especially inland on the peninsula. It was more likely the horsemen were refugees, in which case they should help them. But how? Four men and a wolf. What could they do against the dozen ambushers he could see? Worse, how many more bandits were there that he couldn’t see? The best he could hope for if he simply called out a warning was the bandits would run and all of them would get away. Even that best wasn’t very good—the bandits would all be free to attack them or other travelers another time. Yet the odds were too great for him and his few men and the wolf to attack directly.
    He heard the horses almost directly to his front now and saw the bandits ready themselves, the ambush was about to be sprung. He had to do something. A