“Captain Tempest,” Gaborn asked, recalling the man’s name from earlier in the day, “where is my father, King Orden?”

“Dead, mi—milord,” the captain said, then sat down in the snow, his head hanging. “They’re all dead.”

Gaborn had expected it. Yet the news punched him. He put one hand over his belly, found himself breathing hard. I was no help, he thought. Everything I’ve done has been in vain.

He surveyed the damage, his shock and horror growing more profound. He’d never seen a castle so destroyed—not in a matter of hours.

“How is it that you survived?” Gaborn asked weakly.

The captain shook his head, as if searching for an answer. “Raj Ahten took some of us prisoners. He—killed the others. He left me alive, to bear witness.”

“To what?” Gaborn asked.

Tempest pointed numbly at the towers. “His flameweavers struck first. They summoned creatures from the netherworld and hit the castle with spells that burned iron—and a fireball that burst in the air above the gates, tossing men about like sticks.

“But that was not the worst of it, for then Raj Ahten himself came and shattered the castle’s foundations with the cry of his Voice. He killed hundreds more of us!

“I . . . my helm has thick leather pads, but I can’t hear from my right ear, and my left is still ringing.”

Gaborn stared at the castle, numb.

He’d imagined that Raj Ahten had brought some terrible engines to bear on those walls, or had his flameweavers conjure some unspeakable spell.

He’d seen that great mushroom of fire rise in the air. But he’d never imagined that the walls could crumble from a mere shout.

The soldiers behind him had spread out, were slowly riding over the battleground, to seek for signs of life among the ruins.

“Where is—where can I find my father?”

Tempest pointed up a trail. “He ran that way, toward Tor Loman, chasing Raj Ahten, just before the battle commenced.”

Gaborn turned his horse, but Captain Tempest rushed forward, dropped to his knees. “Forgive me!” he cried.

“For what, surviving?” Gaborn asked. Gaborn himself felt the guilt of those who live, unaccountably, while all around them die. It was heavy on him now. “I not only forgive you, I commend you.”

He let his horse trot over the snowfield to the sound of Tempest’s sobbing and the howls of wolves.

The rings in his mail rang as the horse broke into a gallop, and Gaborn rode up a muddy trail. At first he could not be certain he headed in the right direction. Snow covered the trail, and he could discern no tracks.

But after half a mile, as the trail moved under the aspens, he saw signs in the mud and fallen leaves—the huge strides of men with enormous metabolism racing through the woods. Tracks ten steps across.