“What I can’t understand, though, is why Dahlaine even permitted the crazy man to take over that part of his country.”

“Heritage, Sorgan,” Narasan explained to his friend. “Dahlaine doesn’t like to interfere with the people of his Domain. Azakan was the son of the former king, so he inherited the throne when his father died.”

“That might be all right in normal situations, Narasan, but ‘crazy’ sort of disqualifies somebody for leadership, wouldn’t you say?”

“That might depend on how many people the crazy one can persuade to join him—or her. Dahlaine’s sister has quite a few problems, and she’s been getting all kinds of bad help from her priesthood. Dahlaine should have locked her away years ago.”

Then Sub-Commander Andar came back from the advance cohorts. “The Malavi called Ariga came up from the south, Commander,” he reported in his deep voice. “He wanted me to tell you that he and his friends haven’t encountered any of the creatures of the Wasteland so far.”

“Have they been able to reach Gunda’s wall yet?”

“Not yet, Commander. They have seen the northern end of the gorge. So far, they’ve been checking every nook and cranny down there to be certain that the bug-people aren’t hiding in the bushes up here on this end of the gorge.”

“Ah, well,” Narasan said. “Apparently we’re going to have to go down the gorge by ourselves to find out how far Gunda’s managed to get.”

“I’m sure he’s done just fine, Commander,” Andar said. “Gunda’s just about the best when it comes to building walls.”

It was two days later when the grassy meadowland came to an abrupt stop and some very rocky mountains reared up out of the ground.

“Every time we turn around here in the Land of Dhrall, we seem to encounter more of these silly mountains,” Narasan grumbled.

“They’re pretty to look at,” Sorgan replied.

“Looking is all right, Sorgan,” Narasan said. “It’s the climbing that I don’t like. There are hills down in the empire, but they’re a lot gentler than these piles of rocks we keep encountering here in the Land of Dhrall.”

Sorgan sighed. “I know how you feel, my friend,” he said. “Hills and mountains had a lot to do with my decision to become a sailor. There are big waves out at sea—sometimes almost as steep and rugged as these mountains are—but our ships do all the climbing for us.”

“How nice of them,” Narasan replied. Then he shaded his eyes and looked up toward the top of the steep ridge. “Here she comes again,” he said to Sorgan, pointing up the slope that Trenicia was descending at a dead run. “Doesn’t she ever run out of breath?” Sorgan demanded. “As far as I’ve been able to determine, she runs all the time.”

“Are we still practicing our plodding, Narasan?” Trenicia called as she loped on down the slope.

“Why do you run so much?” Sorgan bluntly asked the warrior queen.

“I like to run,” she replied with a shrug. “It’s the best way I know of to stay in good shape—a much better way than sitting around drinking beer day in and day out.”

“Be nice,” Sorgan replied mildly.

“I’m always nice, Hook-Beak.” Then she pointed off to the left. “If you and your people go that way, you’ll find the going much easier. You’ll start to encounter a lot of trees if you go around the other way.”

“How far would you say it is to the mouth of Crystal Gorge?” Narasan asked her.

“I could run there in about three hours,” she replied. “I’d imagine that it’ll take you and the other plodders about two days. I’ll go on ahead and keep an eye out for those enemies of yours. I’ll come back and warn you if I happen to see any of them.” Then she turned and ran off again.

“That woman’s starting to irritate me,” Sorgan muttered.

It was slow going for the next two days, and Narasan blamed Dahlaine for that to some degree. The time they’d spent in the cave under Mount Shrak rather painfully brought back the warning that old Sergeant Wilmer had repeated over and over when Narasan had been only a boy. He could almost hear the old soldier’s warning, “If’n y’ don’t git no exercise a-tall fer three straight days, yer a-gonna stort gittin’ flabby an’ short-winded. If’n y’ don’t stay in good shape, yer enemies’ll cut y’ all t’ pieces the first time y’ come up against ’em—an’ that’s the pure an’ honest truth.”

“I think I should have paid more attention,” Narasan privately admitted.

It was about midafternoon of their second day in the rugged mountains that formed the southern boundary of Dahlaine’s Domain when Ariga the horse-soldier rode up to meet them. “It’s just a couple more miles to the north end of Crystal Gorge,” he advised, swinging down from the back of his horse.

“Just what does this crystal look like?” Sorgan asked.

“I think it’s that pale rock called quartz,” Ariga replied, “only it’s not quite that clear quartz that shows up now and then down in Malavi. It’s got a sort of pink cast to it.”

Sorgan suddenly laughed. “I think we’d better keep Eleria away from it, then—and probably Zelana as well. Just the word ‘pink’ perks up their ears.”

“Have you been on down to where Gunda and Sorgan’s men are working on the base for our wall?” Narasan asked.

“A couple of times, yes,” Ariga replied. “We pretty much have to go through the gateway they’ve built when we need to check the lay of the land on down to the south of the wall.”

“What’s it like down there?”

Ariga grinned. “There are lots and lots of little side canyons that look almost like they were made for ambushes. I’m sure we’ll be able to make life very unpleasant for the bug-people.”

“Right up until the time that they bite your horses and you have to start walking instead of riding,” Sorgan added.

“We’ve already taken care of that, Captain,” Ariga said.

“You’ve been training your horses to wear those bison-hide cloaks?” Sorgan asked.

Ariga shook his head. “We decided to use boots instead.”

“Boots?”

“I’ve never seen one of these bug-people but Ekial says that they’re very short. All we had to do to make our horses bite-proof was wrap a couple layers of that bison hide around their legs up to the joint. Anyway, when the bug-things come up into the gorge, we’ll whip out of those side canyons, kill a few hundred of them, and then duck back into our canyons.”