“The hells!” swore Ladon, and Veras echoed him.

A light bobbed out in the grass. The horses neighed, pulling at their harness, and were answered. Out of the darkness rode a swarm of riders, veiled men covered head to toe, only their eyes and hands showing. Bai and Tohon staggered in at the point of spears as the riders spread out to encircle their group. The cloud of bugs sank into the earth as though banished.

“Did you lose the cursed men we were chasing?” demanded Edard. “Now look what trouble we’re in!”

Bai looked at him sidelong, unwilling to take her gaze off the riders. “We didn’t lose them. These folk killed them, all five. Why they didn’t kill us, I don’t know, for I fear we have trespassed where we are not wanted.”

“Where is that?” asked Tohon as he scanned the picket of riders, seeking any weak link and shaking his head when he found none.

“We’ve strayed into the Lend. A wide and mostly empty land, to be sure, but it looks to me as though we’ve violated a tribal boundary.”

“Eiya!” muttered Edard. “They’ll execute us for sure.”

BUT THE LENDINGS did not kill them, although they ignored all overtures of friendship or bargaining. If they spoke to each other, they did so out of earshot. They watered their horses at the stream, and the next morning a leather blanket laden with tart cheese, creamy yoghurt, boiled mutton, and a flavorless flat bread appeared beside their camp.

“Good food,” said Tohon, eating the last two boiled sheep’s eyes.

“Folk don’t like to murder folk they’ve shared food with,” said Bai.

Tohon scratched an ear. “Good horses, too. Big, elegant, and strong. Captain would like a herd of those. I wonder what we can trade for them.”

“If they mean to kill us,” said Edard, “I wish they would just cursed do it and not make us wait.”

After the first day, Shai and the militiamen exercised the horses as well as they could, and afterward paced out training drills. Even Eridit joined in, although she hadn’t enough strength to damage anyone. Bai fought dirty and would not share her meanest tricks no matter how hard Ladon and Veras tried to wheedle them out of her. The lendings appeared to ignore the drill, but it was hard to say with them having veiled faces. One morning Eridit began to pace out the measures of a chant, and the lendings abruptly and deliberately turned their backs. She stopped immediately, looking truly frightened for the first time.

Two days turned to four. Three times Tohon tried sneaking out and three times got himself prodded back, politely but firmly. Four days turned to eight. Bai led the others in the prayers that welcomed dawn and night, but they kept their voices low and their gestures modest. At these times, Tohon and Shai sat apart. Tohon was not a praying man, although Shai whispered supplications to the Merciful One.

On the morning of the eleventh day three new riders appeared, faces unveiled. Shai thought they looked like women, although their long robes were cut so cunningly to hide their bodies while making it easy for them to ride that it was hard to tell. Their dark skin looked human enough, but it was mottled with a strange green color, like something was growing on them. They reined in their horses out of arrowshot, dismounted, walked four paces forward, and waited with arms crossed.