Lumina Brightstone's Arc

Chapter 2 of 3

The clans had their blades out, but no order held them. Lumina saw it at once. River trolls pushed one way. The old chieftain's fighters pushed another. They shouted over the grinding and drowned each other out. If they ran at the orchard like this, the machines would kill them in pieces. Lumina climbed onto the moot stone and raised her arms. "Wait," she called. "Not scattered. We go as one, or we go to our deaths." No one listened. A hundred voices argued at once. Lumina had united them in spirit. She had no plan to send them forward. A slow voice cut through the noise. "They will not follow shouting." An old purple troll stepped from the ferns. White beard, white topknot, a gray sash across his chest. He walked like the ground belonged to him. The arguing died as he passed. Lumina knew him by name only. Thalgrim Deepknower, who kept to himself and was said to know more than he told. She had never expected him at the moot. "You know the orchard," Lumina said. It was half a question. "Better than any here." Thalgrim reached the stone. He knelt and swept a flat space in the dirt. With one thick finger he drew the grove, the narrow gap between two ridges, the single path the machines had to take. "They came through here. Wide land behind them. Narrow land ahead. Send your fighters at their front and they cut you down." He looked up at Lumina. "Send them here, where the ground pinches, and their machines cannot turn." Lumina crouched beside him. She saw it now. The lights, the falling trees, the one throat of land the enemy had to squeeze through. "We split," she said. "River clan holds the mouth. The rest strike the flank while the machines are stuck." "That is the shape of it." Thalgrim smoothed a fresh line in the dirt. "But only if they move together. One clan late, and the plan dies." Lumina stood. She pointed at the river troll with the waist-long braid. "You hold the narrow ground. Do not charge. Make them come to you." The troll gripped her blade and nodded. Lumina turned to the old chieftain. "Take your fighters to the ridge. Wait for my horn." He did not argue this time. He gathered his clan and went. The shouting was gone. The clans moved in three parts now, each with a task, each waiting on the next. Lumina felt the change in her chest. This was an army, not a mob. Thalgrim rose and brushed the dirt from his hands. "They will hold the plan until the first troll falls," he said quietly. "Then we will see what your banner is worth." Lumina lifted the horn to her lips. Below, in the cold light, the machines ground on. She blew, and the clans of Mossrot began to move as one.