engage in a campaign. Sometimes, he took service with one of the lesser
nobility. A few times, he ran with the bands of the forest and road, to
rob travelers. But he was cautious to avoid the great Earls, realizing
the danger of detection.

Always, he kept his direction to the east, knowing that he would have to
reach the sea and cross to the eastern land before he could feel
completely safe. His store of money and of goods grew, and he hoarded it
against the time when he would use it.

Sometimes, he posed as a merchant, traveling the land with the caravans.
But always, he followed his path eastward.

* * * * *

Florel Derikuna looked back at the line of pack animals. It had been a
long trip, and a hard one. He smiled grimly to himself as he remembered
the last robber attack. For a time, he had thought the caravan guard was
going to be overwhelmed. He might have had to join with the robbers, as
he had done before. And that would have delayed his plans. He looked
ahead again, toward the hill, crowned with its great, stone castle.

This, then, was the land of the east--the farthest march of the land of
the east. It had taken him a long, cautious time to get here. And he had
spent his days in fear of a searching party from Budorn, even when he
had reached the seacoast itself. But here, he would be safe. None from
this land had ever been even to the mountainous backbone of his own
land, he was sure. And certainly, there would be no travelers who had
guided their steps from here to faraway Budorn and back.

None here knew Budorn, excepting him. Flor, the serf--now Florel
Derikuna, swordsman at large--was in a new land. And he would take a
new, more useful identity. He looked at the stone buildings of the town
and its castle.

They were not unlike the castles and towns of his native land, he
thought. There were differences, of course, but only in the small
things. And he had gotten used to those by now. He had even managed to
learn the peculiar language of the country. He smiled again. That
coronet he always wore beneath his steel cap had served him well. It had
more powers than he had dreamed of when he had first held it in his
hands in those distant woods.

Here in Dweros, he thought, he could complete his change. Here, he could
take service with the Duke as a young man of noble blood, once afflicted
with a restless urge for travel, but now ready to establish himself. By
now, he had