As they rode northeastwards, they began to encounter groups of armed men. The Lamorks were never very far from full mobilization anyway, and they were able to respond to their king’s call to arms quickly. In a melancholy repetition of the events of some five centuries earlier, men from all the kingdoms of western Eosia streamed towards a battlefield in Lamorkand. Sparhawk and Ulath passed the time conversing in Troll. Sparhawk was not certain when he might have occasion to talk to a Troll, but since he had learned the language, it seemed a shame to let it slip away. They reached Kadach at the end of a gloomy day when the sunset was staining the clouds to the west with an orange glow much like that of a distant forest fire. The wind from the east was stiff, and it carried with it the first faint chill of the oncoming winter. Kadach was a walled town, stiff and grey and rigidly unlovely. In what was to become a custom, Kring bade them goodnight and led his men on through the city and out of the east gate to set up camp in the fields beyond. The Peloi were uncomfortable when confined in cities with such urban frivolities as walls, rooms and roofs. Sparhawk and the rest of his friends found a comfortable inn near the centre of town, bathed, changed clothes and gathered in the common room for a supper of boiled ham and assorted vegetables. Sephrenia, as usual, declined the ham.

‘I’ve never understood why people would want to boil a perfectly good ham,’ Sir Bevier noted with some distaste.

‘Lamorks over-salt their hams when they cure them,’ Kalten explained. ‘You have to boil a Lamork ham for quite a while before it’s edible. They’re a strange people. They try to make everything an act of courage – even eating.’

‘Shall we go for a walk, Sparhawk?’ Kurik suggested to his lord after they had eaten.

‘I think I’ve had just about enough exercise for one day.’

‘You did want to know which way Martel went, didn’t you?’

‘That’s true, isn’t it? All right, Kurik. Let’s go nose around a bit.’

When they reached the street, Sparhawk looked around. ‘This is likely to take us half the night,’ he said.

‘Hardly,’ Kurik disagreed. ‘We’ll go to the east gate first, and if we don’t find out anything there, we’ll try the north one.’

‘We just start asking people in the street?’