Her voice carried such conviction that Hargoth hesitated over whatever words he had been about to say.

"My place is with the Promised One," said Gerrith. "My path lies northward. And I tell you there will be blood and enough to feed Old Sun before this is finished."

She held the skull higher in her two hands, over the fire, and the flames turned a sullen red, staining them all with the color of death.

Now Hargoth looked uncertain. But he was proud and obstinate. "I am king," he said. "And high priest. I know what must be done for my people."

"Do you?" asked Stark quietly. "Can you be sure? You know only the dream. I am reality. How do you know that I am truly the Promised One?"

"You come from the stars," said Hargoth.

"Yes. But so does the stranger who was brought to the Citadel, and he is the one who tells the ships to come, not I."

Hargoth stared at him for a long moment in the red glare of the fire.

"He has that power?"

"He has," said Stark. "How can you be sure that he is not the Promised One?"

Gerrith lowered her hands and stepped back from the fire. The flames returned to their normal color. She said calmly, "You stand at the crossroads, Hargoth. The path you choose now will determine the fate of your people."

A heavy and sententious statement, Stark thought, but he felt no desire to smile at it. It was the simple truth, and it involved his own and Ashton's fate as well as that of Hargoth's people.

His hand closed over the hilt of the sword taken from one of Amnir's men. He waited for Hargoth's answer. If the stupid man insisted on sacrificing Gerrith and going south, Old Sun was going to have some victims here and now.

Hargoth's gaze flicked uncertainly between Stark and Gerrith-the chill, flat, shining gaze of madness, of fanatic conviction. The lesser priests who had a.s.sisted him at Amnir's camp were gathered nearby, their masked faces immobile, watching. Suddenly Hargoth turned on his heel and joined them. They went apart. Their backs formed a wall that hid whatever they might be doing, but the movement of their shoulders indicated that some sort of ritual was being performed. They chanted, a low sonorous murmuring.

"Lacking a live victim," Gerrith said, "they're consulting some other augury."

"It had better be favorable," said Halk, and drew his swordblade hissing from the sheath.

The silence lengthened. The guttering fire hissed as snow and frost fell into it. The People of the Towers stood in the blowing darkness beyond, and waited.

The priests made one long moaning sigh. They bowed to some invisible Presence. Then they returned to the fire.

"Three times we have cast the sacred finger-bones of the Spring Child," said Hargoth. "Three times, they pointed north." His eyes showed a desperate, thwarted rage. "Very well. We will go up against the Thyrans. And if we win past them, do you know what waits beyond Thyra, to keep us from the Citadel?"

"Yes," said Stark, "I know. The Northhounds."

A shadow crossed Gerrith's face. She shivered.

"What is it?" asked Stark.

"I don't know. It seemed-that when you spoke that name, one heard it."

Across the desolate miles to the north, a great white shape had paused in its measured padding through blowing snow. It turned and swung a huge, fanged muzzle southward, questing across the wind.

16.

As Hargoth had said, the broad land narrowed. It began to rise sharply toward a series of ridges, and on either hand were rough hills and deep gullies choked with tumbled ice. The track of Amnir's wagons still followed the ancient road. Apparently the summer thaw was strong enough to cut the road in many places. It had been remade across the beds of wider channels, the narrower ones filled in with stones, a tribute to the hard work and enterprise of Amnir's men. And much good it had done them in the end.

With Hargoth's people, the party now numbered thirty-six: two tens of fighting men and their captain, armed with slings and javelins; the Corn King and eight priests, armed with magic; and the original six from Irnan, counting Stark, who would just as soon have dispensed with his new allies. The force was too large to move easily in secret, and too small to be effective as an attack unit. Still, he thought the Corn King and his priests might be useful in one way, when they came to meet the Northhounds. The breath of the G.o.ddess might at least slow down these legendary demons. In any case, he had had no choice.

The narrow men in gray proved to be nearly tireless. Their marching gait was a sort of springy trot that was difficult at first for Stark and the others to keep up with after the long days of captivity. But they fell into the pace gradually, feeling strength and elasticity returning. Only Halk, who had suffered the worst confinement, stumbled along at the rear, sweating and cursing. He was so vile-tempered that Breca gave up trying to help him and rejoined the others.

"How far to Thyra?" asked Stark.

"Three long marches." Hargoth had not been to Thyra himself, but Kintoth, captain of the fighting men, had. He wore lightning-strokes on the cheeks of his mask and he carried an iron sword.

"We go there somewhiles to trade for tools and weapons," Kintoth said, slapping his sword-hilt. "The Thyrans are great smiths. We always go in force. We trade them dried meat as well as hides and cloth, but in the old days before the trader we were afraid of being added to their feedstocks ourselves. Now that Amnir is dead, we shall have to start worrying again. The Thyrans keep beasts and trade knives to the lichen-gatherers for fodder but there's never enough in the starving times."

"We trade women, too," said Hargoth. "A matter of necessity, though neither we nor the Thyrans like it. We must both have fresh blood to survive. There was a third city once that neighbored us, but the people kept too fiercely to themselves and finally they died."

He trotted on for some time in silence. Then he added, "Sometimes the Wandsmen bring us women from the south. They don't live long here. Usually we give them to Old Sun." And he looked at Gerrith.

"What about the Citadel?" asked Stark, not missing the look.

"We've never seen it. No one has. Not even the Ha.r.s.enyi. There are the Northhounds, to guard against strangers. And there is the mist."

"Mist?"

"Thick mist that boils like steam above a cauldron and never lifts. It is a strong magic. The Citadel is always hidden."

"But you know the way there?"

"I know what the Ha.r.s.enyi have said. Some of their people serve the Wandsmen."

"But you don't really know. Do the Thyrans?"

"I have told you. The way is known, and not known."

"What about the women from the south?"

"The ones they give us are never taken to the Citadel, but brought straight on." Hargoth's mouth was a thin line. "The gifts of the Wandsmen! They bring us more than women. Small phials and pretty powders, joy and dreams for all, and perpetual slavery. They tempt our young ones to go south and join the Farers. We are not fond of the Wandsmen."

Hargoth studied the strangers. Old Sun was above the horizon now, and his gaze moved from one face to another, not hurrying, seeing in the rusty daylight what he had not seen by starlight or by the flickering gleam of the fires.

"You have come a long way to destroy them. Why?"

They told him.

Hargoth listened. When they had finished he said, "You Southrons must be soft indeed to let yourselves be so badly ruled."

Gerrith held up a hand to forestall Halk's angry outburst. She looked coldly at Hargoth and said, "You've heard of the Farers. You've never seen them. You've never seen a mob in action. Perhaps you will before you're through. Tell me your opinion then."

Hargoth inclined his head.

"The Lords Protector," Stark said. "What do you know of them?"

"I think they're a lie, told to keep the Wandsmen in power. Or if they ever lived, they've been dead a thousand years. That's why I would call this a fool's errand, except that I know the Wandsmen are real. And if, as you say, they intend to keep us from the stars-"

Apparently he was still not quite convinced. And he continued to glance sidelong at Gerrith from time to time, in a manner that Stark did not care for.

"My lord Darkness, my lady Cold, and their daughter Hunger," Stark said. "You worship the G.o.ddess and she sends her power through you. Yet you also worship Old Sun?"

"We need him to keep the darker G.o.ds at bay. Otherwise we would die. Besides, the Sun Woman was to be a parting gift."

Long after Old Sun's setting they went aside from the road and found a secure hollow in the hills. The warriors built tiny fires of what dead mosses and lichens they could find among the wind-scoured stones. They had not expected to be so long away from the Towers and so the rations were short. No one complained. They were all used to hunger.

When it was time to crawl into the skin tents for sleep, Stark said to Gerrith, "You'll shelter with me. I think Hargoth still has notions."

She accepted that without protest. Stark saw Halk watching, wise and sneering, as he followed Gerrith into the tent.

Their two bodies crowded the small s.p.a.ce, and Stark realized that this was the first time since that b.l.o.o.d.y day in the square of Irnan that he had been alone with Gerrith. On the way to Izvand there had been the Irnanese and the troop of mercenaries, and not so much as a hand's breadth of privacy. Halk and Breca pleasured themselves as the fancy took them, without embarra.s.sment, but theirs was an old relationship. Stark and Gerrith had no relationship beyond their two roles as Wise Woman and Dark Man, one hardly conducive to intimacy, and he was not at all sure that she wanted any other. Her status as prophetess set her apart, surrounding her with a certain aura of untouchability. Besides, it had been most h.e.l.lishly cold.

Afterward, as Amnir's captives, they had had no opportunity even for conversation, let alone anything else.

Now, in the shelter, with a minuscule lamp for light and each other for warmth, he felt something totally new. He was conscious that they touched, at thigh and hip and shoulder. Their breath mingled in fault clouds of vapor. Animal heat rose from their living flesh. Lying close, he felt her stop shivering, and he put his hand on hers.

"Has your gift told you yet why it was you had to come all this weary way?"

"Let's not talk about it now." She turned her head and looked at him. "Let's not talk about anything now."

He drew her to him. She smiled and did not resist. With his fingertips he traced the outline of her cheek and jaw; thin, he noticed, with the beautiful structure of the bones quite clear beneath the wind-browned skin. Her eyes were enormous, her mouth soft and sweet, welcoming.

He kissed her, a first tentative touching of the lips, and her arms came around him fiercely, and after that nothing was tentative. She was strong and hungry, warm life in that place of cold and death, giving and taking without stint. And Stark knew that this had been going to happen right from the beginning, from the moment when Mordach ripped away the robe and left her clothed in nothing but her magnificent and indestructible pride.

Neither of them spoke of love. Love is for a long future. They slept in each other's arms and were content.

In the black morning they were away again, following the green star. They halted briefly for the ritual greeting of Old Sun at his rising, when Hargoth looked regretfully at Gerrith, who was surrounded by Stark and the Irnanese. At noon they halted a second time to rest and chew their journey rations, hard chunks of edible lichens pressed into cakes and a strong-flavored mixture of fat and meat fibers pounded together with bitter herbs.

Stark discussed strategy with Kintoth.

"You see here," said the captain, making out a rough map in the snow with his finger. "This is the road we're on now. It winds about so, and here is Thyra, sitting on a dozen hills. The old city, that is. The new one is dug in and around." His finger made vague marks on the perimeter.

"How old is the new city?" asked Stark.

"Not as old as ours. No. Say only a thousand years, or so. The People of the Hammer came out of nowhere, the bards tell us, and took up these ancient cities . . ."

"More than one?"

"There are several tribes. The Thyrans are the only ones we have to do with, but it is said that there are more in other places, and that they all have the same G.o.d, Strayer of the Forges."

"They all have the same madness," said Hargoth, "and that madness is for iron and the working of it. They mine the bones of the cities, and the metal is more than wealth to them, it is life."

"All right." Stark looked at the map. "The road. Thyra, old and new. What else?"

Kintoth sketched stylized mountains on the far side of Thyra. "These are called the Witchfires, for a reason you will understand when you see them. They mark the boundary between the darklands and the high north. Here is the pa.s.s that we must take to cross them, if we ever reach it."

Thyra stood like a wall before the mouth of the pa.s.s.

"Is there no other way across the mountains?"

Kintoth shrugged. "There may be a hundred. This is the only one we know, and the Citadel lies somewhere beyond it. Now, on the road, here..." He drew fortifications across the approach to Thyra. "This post is strongly held. And all around the city are sentry posts." His finger poked random little holes in the snow. "I don't know the exact locations. The Thyrans live in and around the edges of the rums, and they're more vulnerable than we in the Towers. They take care to guard their wealth and their precious flesh, lest both be devoured."

The land seemed totally deserted. Stark asked, "What enemies have they here?"

"This is the northern edge of the darklands," said Hargoth. "We live all our lives in a state of siege. Anyone, anything, may come. Sometimes the great snow-dragons, with the frost white on their wings and their hungry teeth showing. Sometimes a band of Outdwellers who run demented across the world and take whatever they can lay claws on. And there are creatures who wait, hidden just out of sight, smelling the warm food that walks and hoping they can s.n.a.t.c.h it."

"It doesn't do to show weakness or inattention," said Kintoth. "The Ha.r.s.enyi, for instance, might be tempted to attack if they thought they could gain by it. The other tribes of the Hammer might become greedy. And of course, the Thyrans have a bigger worry than most."

He stabbed his finger at the sketched-in range of the Witchfires. "They have neighbors here among the mountains. The Children of Skaith-Our-Mother."

Stark stared at him in the bra.s.sy twilight of the hollow. The wind blew snow in vagrant clouds.

Halk laughed, a harsh and jarring sound.

"Perhaps you will be lucky a second time, Dark Man!" he said, and laughed again.

17.

Shadows lay long across the road, pointing north. Soft-shod, the party moved quietly. Wind scoured, their tracks faded away as soon as they were made.

"What are they like, these Children of Skaith-Our-Mother?"

Hargoth shook his narrow head. "The Thyrans say they're monsters. They have many tales of them, all horrible."

"Are they true?"

"Who can say?"

"You have no knowledge yourself? Haven't any of your people gone into the mountains? Through the pa.s.s?"

"In the darklands," said Hargoth, "it is difficult enough to stay where one is. One does not travel for any reason other than survival."

"The Ha.r.s.enyi seem to manage it."