Dennis asked, ‘How can this place exist?’
Tinuva knelt at the edge of the stream and said, ‘Feel the water.’
Dennis did as he was bid and exclaimed, ‘It’s warm!’
Asayaga knelt next to him and after he had plunged his hand into the water, said, ‘I would not call this warm, but it lacks the icy bite I would expect from melted snow.’
‘Exactly,’ said Dennis.
Tinuva pointed to the north-west. ‘Above us lies Akenkala, a volcano. In my youth she spewed liquid rock and filled the sky with smoke that lasted for more than a year.’ He stood up, wiping his hand on his tunic. ‘She sleeps now, but there is still fire within her.’
‘Which heats the water running down into this valley,’ said Asayaga.
Dennis looked around. ‘The air here is warmer than it is to the south, in Yabon.’
Asayaga nodded. ‘It is a wondrous place.’
‘The bounty of this place is beyond anything I’ve seen,’ said Tinuva. ‘We passed orchards as we scouted.’
They resumed walking. The men were not lulled by the relative kindness of the environment. They were still in enemy territory, and it would be foolish to expect whoever lived here to be a friend.
For they knew someone live here.
They had yet to find a single person, but the valley was clearly inhabited. They had passed three farmsteads, constructed of heavy logs, all of them still intact. In the fireplace of one the fire was still smouldering and in the barn a dozen chickens were to be found in a coop.
As the afternoon progressed the men became more and more uneasy at the eerie silence, the sense that they were walking through a realm of ghosts.
Tinuva and Gregory had ridden ahead and Dennis finally called a halt, moving the men up towards the treeline to rest, but forbade them to light fires. The afternoon sun, however, was relatively warm and in the still air it was actually rather comfortable. Soon nearly all the men had drifted into an exhausted sleep, including Dennis.
Brother Corwin was quietly tending to the wounded, seeing to their comfort, working with skilled hands to clean an arrow-wound in the arm of one of Asayaga’s men, who wandered over to watch.
The priest deftly bandaged the wound, laid out a blanket for the soldier to rest upon and stood up, wiping his hands. He saw Asayaga watching.
‘All these men have been pushed beyond the limit,’ Corwin said slowly, speaking in the manner one does when talking to a foreigner and is not yet sure of his skill with the language.
Asayaga grunted and said nothing in reply.
‘Even the men without hurts need several days with a roof over their heads, plenty of hot food and sleep. If I could get the wounded into shelter I think I could save all of them as well.’
‘Perhaps there is something ahead,’ Asayaga ventured.
‘This is a strange place. It’s on no map.’
‘You have a map?’
‘Ones I saw in the monastery,’ Corwin replied quickly. ‘I studied them before coming up to join the army.’
‘Where are you from?’
‘Many places, but from Ran originally. Why?’
‘Just curious. How far from here?’
‘A month or more by caravan.’
‘And this is your first time in battle?’
‘No,’ said the monk, obviously not wishing to repeat his personal history. ‘I’ve seen a scuffle or two. I joined the order late, I was in my thirties when I got the calling to serve.’
‘Why?’
‘You are full of questions, Tsurani.’
Asayaga smiled. ‘It is my job to learn. I understand there was some trouble regarding you. You didn’t start with this unit, they found you and as a result a close friend of Hartraft was killed.’
‘How do you know that?’
‘I have ears, I listen when the Kingdom troops talk. They all speak of it.’
‘Two of my brothers and I were coming up to join the army. We got lost. My brothers were captured by one of your units. I fled and stumbled into Hartraft’s company. I ruined a surprise attack they were planning and in the chaos that followed Hartraft’s closest friend and advisor was killed.’
Asayaga nodded thoughtfully. ‘Which unit of my army?’
‘How am I suppose to know? You all look alike to me.’
‘You all look alike to me, except for the Natalese scout. Which unit?’
‘I don’t know. Why?’
‘If Hartraft destroyed one of the units of my army I’m curious to know.’
‘It all happened so quickly,’ Corwin said slowly, as if the memory of the incident was still painful. ‘One moment the forest was empty, the next Tsurani troops were everywhere and I ran.’
‘Their helmets. Some are marked with feathered plumes, others with coloured cloth wrapped around the top,’ and as he spoke Asayaga pointed to the strip of faded blue cloth tied to the back of his helmet.
‘I don’t remember.’
‘Was it yellow? I know that Zugami’s company was on patrol. Maybe pale green of Catuga, or the red feather of Wanutama?’
Corwin looked thoughtful. ‘I think green. Who was this Catuga?’
‘Was?’
‘They were all killed; you know that don’t you?’
Asayaga lowered his head. ‘Green then.’
‘Yes, I’m almost certain.’
‘I see. The leader, Catuga, he had a spiked helmet and was tall for one of my race, as tall almost as Hartraft. He was an old friend of mine. Did Hartraft kill him?’
‘Yes. I remember seeing that. I saw Hartraft kill him towards the end of the fight.’
Asayaga nodded and looked over to where Dennis slept.
‘Scouts coming in!’
It was young Richard whom Dennis had detailed with an unfortunate half dozen others to stand watch while the rest of them slept.
Instantly men were awake, sitting up, looking to the west. Down along the brook which they had been following Asayaga could see the two riders slowing, turning aside, and coming up the hill to the edge of the woods.
At once Dennis was awake and on his feet and Asayaga fell in by his side. He could hear Dennis groaning softly as he walked, stretching, trying to shake off the exhaustion.
Gregory and Tinuva reined in and dismounted.
‘Two miles ahead. A stockade. Fairly new from the looks of it, a good position, set on top of a hill, a dozen or so farmsteads surrounding it.’
‘Occupied?’ asked Dennis.
The scout nodded. ‘Humans.’
‘They know we’re here?’
‘Fair to assume so. The gate was closed, no one was in the fields or farmhouses outside the stockade.’
Dennis rubbed his chin as he thought.
‘They