Kurik grunted. ‘Let’s get in out of the weather. I’ve got a fire going in what’s left of that watchtower over there.’ He looked rather peculiarly at Sephrenia, who carried Flute in her arms. ‘Lady,’ he greeted her respectfully

‘Dear Kurik,’ she said warmly ‘How are Aslade and the boys?’

‘Well, Sephrenia,’ he replied. ‘Very well indeed.’

‘I’m so glad to hear it.’

‘Kalten said you’d be coming along,’ he said to her. ‘I have water boiling for your tea.’ He looked at Flute, who had her face nestled against Sephrenia’s. ‘Have you been keeping secrets from us?’

She laughed, a rippling cascade of a laugh. ‘That’s what Styrics do best, Kurik.’

‘Let’s get you all inside where it’s warm.’ He turned and led the way across the rubble-strewn courtyard of the ruin, leaving Berit to care for the horses.

‘Was it a good idea to bring him along?’ Sparhawk asked, jerking his thumb back over his shoulder in the direction of the novice. ‘He’s a little young for an all-out battle.’

‘He’ll be all right, Sparhawk,’ Kurik said. ‘I took him to the practice field at Demos a few times and gave him some instruction. He handles himself well and he learns fast.’

‘All right, Kurik,’ Sparhawk said, ‘but when the fighting starts, stay close to him. I don’t want him getting hurt.’

‘I never let you get hurt, did I?’ Sparhawk grinned at his friend. ‘No. As I recall, you didn’t.’

They stayed the night in the ruin and rode out early the following morning. Their combined forces numbered just over five hundred men, and they rode south under a still-threatening sky Just beyond Darra stood a nunnery with yellow sandstone walls and a red tile roof. Sparhawk and Sephrenia turned aside from the road and crossed a winter-browned meadow towards the building.

‘And what is the child’s name?’ the black-robed Mother Superior asked when they were admitted into her presence in a severely simple room with only a small brazier to warm it.

‘She doesn’t talk, mother,’ Sparhawk replied. ‘She plays those pipes all the time, so we call her Flute.’

‘That is an unseemly name, my son.’

‘The child doesn’t mind, Mother Superior,’ Sephrenia told her.

‘Did you make some effort to find her parents?’

‘There was no one in the vicinity when we found her,’ Sparhawk explained.

The Mother Superior looked gravely at Sephrenia. ‘The child is Styric, she pointed out. ‘Would it not perhaps be better to put her with a family of her own race and her own faith?’

‘We have pressing business,’ Sephrenia said, ‘and Styrics can be very difficult to find when they choose to be’

‘You know, of course, that if she stays with us, we will raise her in the Elene faith?’