A portcullis opened to a guardroom where a dozen pikemen might keep watch. The gears to the portcullis were kept some eighty feet back, in a separate room. A pair of guards could be housed in the gear room.

Off from the gear room lay an armory and the Duke’s treasury. The armory was well stocked with arrows and ballista bolts—more than Orden would have imagined. The arrows were bound into bundles of a hundred. A quick guess told Orden that at least two hundred thousand arrows lay there, most newly fletched with gray goose feathers—as if the Duke had been vigorously preparing for the end of the world.

The Duke’s armor and that of his horse were gone, taken by one of Raj Ahten’s Invincibles, no doubt. Still, Raj Ahten’s men had left a princely long sword—fine Heredon spring steel, honed to a razor’s edge.

Orden studied its hilt. The name of Stroehorn was branded into it, an artificer of exceptional skill some fifty years past—a veritable Maker.

The Indhopalese, who’d never worn anything but leather mail in battle till fifty years ago, didn’t value Northern armor or swords. In the desert, heavy ring mail or plate was too hot to fight in. So men there had worn lacquered leather armor, and instead of the heavy blades of the North fought with curved scimitars. The curved blades maximized the cutting edge of the sword, so that a single strike could slice through a man’s body. Against lightly armored opponents, curved scimitars proved to be elegant, graceful weapons. But when a scimitar’s edge met ring mail, the blade quickly dulled or bent.

For fighting a man in ring, one needed a thick Northern blade, with its straight edge and hard steel. These could pierce armor with a lunge, or could chop through small rings.

Seeing this fine sword abandoned here in the armory gave Orden hope. Raj Ahten marshaled a great number of troops. He might terrify, but he fought in an unfamiliar clime, with inferior Southern steel. How would his desert troops fare come winter?

Eight hundred years ago, the kings of Indhopal had sent gifts of spices, ointments, and silk, along with pet peacocks and tigers, to Orden’s ancestors, in hopes of opening trade. In return, Orden’s forefather sent back a gift of horses, gold, fine furs, and wool, along with Northern spices.

The kings of Indhopal spurned the gifts. The furs and wool seemed overburdensome in warm lands, the spices unsatisfactory. The horses—which they thought of inferior quality—were fit only for use as draft animals.

But they loved the gold, enough to send the caravans.

So Orden had to wonder how the Indhopalese would acclimate. Perhaps they’d not learn the value of wool or fur until half of them froze. Perhaps they’d spurn mounts bred for Northern mountains, just as they spurned Northern steel.