h many ruins and deserted quarters.

He was not sure how he had come there, but he was standing on his own
feet, and someone was pouring sour wine into his mouth. He drank it
greedily. There were people around him, jostling, chattering, demanding
answers to their questions. A girl's voice said sharply, "Let him be!
Can't you see he's hurt?"

Stark looked down. She was slim and ragged, with black hair and large
eyes yellow as a cat's. She held a leather bottle in her hands. She
smiled at him and said, "I'm Thanis. Will you drink more wine?"

"I will," said Stark, and did, and then said, "Thank you, Thanis." He
put his hand on her shoulder, to steady himself. It was a supple
shoulder, surprisingly strong. He liked the feel of it.

The crowd was still churning around him, growing larger, and now he
heard the tramp of military feet. A small detachment of men in light
armor pushed their way through.

A very young officer whose breastplate hurt the eye with brightness
demanded to be told at once who Stark was and why he had come there.

"No one crosses the moors in winter," he said, as though that in itself
were a sign of evil intent.

"The clans of Mekh are crossing them," Stark answered. "An army, to take
Kushat--one, two days behind me."

The crowd picked that up. Excited voices tossed it back and forth, and
clamored for more news. Stark spoke to the officer.

"I will see your captain, and at once."

"You'll see the inside of a prison, more likely!" snapped the young man.
"What's this nonsense about the clans of Mekh?"

Stark regarded him. He looked so long and so curiously that the crowd
began to snicker and the officer's beardless face flushed pink to the
ears.

"I have fought in many wars," said Stark gently. "And long ago I learned
to listen, when someone came to warn me of attack."

"Better take him to the captain, Lugh," cried Thanis. "It's our skins
too, you know, if there is war."

The crowd began to shout. They were all poor folk, wrapped in threadbare
cloaks or tattered leather. They had no love for the guards. And whether
there was war or not, their winter had been long and dull, and they were
going to make the most of this excitement.

"Take him, Lugh! Let him warn the nobles. Let them think how they'll
defend Kushat and the Gates of Death, now that the talisman is gone!"

"That is a lie!" Lugh shouted. "And you know the penalty for telling it.
Hold your tongues, or I'll have you all whipped.