It had once been a large settlement, and even from his slightly elevated position, Ramus could not make out its extremes. No building was more than a single story high. They were built mostly of carved square stones, though he could see the remains of a few timber buildings intermingled here and there. Roofs had rotted and fallen in, walls had collapsed and plants obviously held dominion here once more. Walls were covered in swathes of a small-leafed creeper, its stems twisting between stones and forcing cracks through walls. Taller shrubs and trees grew around the village, many of them erupting through buildings, pushing down walls and taking the homes for themselves.

“Too late,” Lulah said, but too late for what, she did not say.

“This doesn't look that old,” Ramus said. “There are places like this in Cantrassa, abandoned when the farming land grew sterile. Maybe whoever was here moved on.”

“Maybe.” Lulah walked down the slope, shrugging the bow from her shoulder. She did not walk like someone who had recently climbed a three-mile cliff.

Ramus followed. He was very conscious of the roll of parchment pages in his backpack, the figures and writing displayed there, what that writing could do. He scanned the abandoned streets for signs of people, but there was nothing.

Animals lived in the village, and they seemed unconcerned by the new visitors. Birds continued to sing, ground-dwellers called and barked, and even as Lulah and Ramus approached the first building, there did not seem to be a hint of panic in the sounds.

“Wait here,” Lulah said. She strung an arrow and walked slowly into the village. Grasses swished about her legs, creeping plants tried to trip her, but she stepped lightly and never took her eyes from the buildings. Ramus noticed for the first time just how tall the main doorways into the buildings were.

He waited nervously. This place was no longer lived in, but that did not mean there was no one or nothing here. Perhaps they were being watched even now.

Lulah drew level with the first building. She paused there for a long time, like a person turned to stone. Then she glanced over her shoulder and nodded to Ramus.

By the time he joined her, she had moved to the front wall of the first building and was peering inside through an opening in the wall. If there had ever been a window shutter of some sort, it had long since vanished. Ramus looked in as well. The ceiling was holed, and it let in enough light for them to see one wall swathed in metal pipes. They were as thick as a finger and curved around one another, tied into junctions here and there that reminded Ramus of the rope charm he had bought for Nomi. Most of them were rusted, and a couple had ruptured and spewed blood-colored dust down the wall.

“Dead place,” Lulah said.