“Then he looked up at the trees around him, and knew. A small band of trees, narrow along the river. A finger of the Dunnwood. But powerful, nonetheless. “Set fire to this wood,” he told the flameweaver.

Raj Ahten raced for the city gates, hoping he was not too late.

Sweat poured from Gaborn’s face as he urged the horses through the lower bailey. Thousands of troops clogged the gates.

Five hundred knights milled outside the city wall. Their warhorses wore the finest armor Sylvarresta’s smiths could forge, blackened and polished.

Another thousand archers stood ready near the walls with bows strung, should an army race out from the woods.

Yet the fact that so many men had already left the castle did not ease the congestion. Thousands of soldiers did not travel completely alone—squires, cooks, armorers, tailors, bearers, fletchers, prostitutes, washwomen all thronged the streets. Raj Ahten had seven thousand soldiers in his legion, but his camp contained another thousand followers. Armorers dressed the horses in the bailey. Children darted about underfoot. Two cows had run down the Butterwalk and now tramped through the crowd.

In the turmoil, Gaborn rode from the castle, trailing Iome’s mount, her father’s, and those of two Days, trying to keep his horse from kicking and biting every soldier who wore the red wolves of Raj Ahten on his shield or surcoat.

One dark-faced sergeant grabbed the reins of Gaborn’s horse, shouting, “Give me horse, boy. I take that one!”

“Raj Ahten told me to keep the reins myself,” Gaborn said. “It’s for Jureem.”

The sergeant drew back his hand as if the words burned him, eyed the horse longingly.

Gaborn rode through the press of bodies, toward the throng of soldiers gathering on the blackened grass outside Castle Sylvarresta. He held the line to the King’s horse tightly, glanced back.

The idiot king smiled at everyone, waving, his mouth wide with joy. Gaborn’s own mount, with its surly nature, waded through the masses, breaking a path for the horses that followed. Iome’s and King Sylvarresta’s Days trailed last.

Near the blackened gates, everyone sought to surge across the damaged drawbridge. One side had burned through from the elemental’s fires, but had been hastily repaired.

“Make way for the King’s mounts! ’Ware the King’s mounts!” Gaborn shouted.

Gaborn eyed the city walls as he passed beneath the portal. Archers everywhere guarded the outer wall, but most foot soldiers had deserted their posts.

Then, suddenly, he passed under the main arch. Gaborn did not entirely trust the ruined bridge to hold the weight of both his people and their horses. A few planks had been thrown over the rent, but they looked flimsy, so he dismounted, had Iome do the same. As for the King, he left the man mounted and cautiously walked each horse across, then entered the throng of soldiers milling about in the charred grass.