Kevin could tell that his master was trying to get inside the shadow's reach for another stroke to the head or torso, where, perhaps, some vital organs resided, but the creature was holding him back. For his part, the squire couldn't hurt the phantom, but perhaps he could distract it. Yelling at the top of his lungs, he charged and beat at it.

The shadow whirled, loomed above him like a mountain about to give birth to an avalanche, then it jerked, and the point of Gray Dancer popped out of its belly. Ajandor had seized his opportunity to bury the mithral weapon in its back. The cat toppled, and Kevin scrambled aside to keep it from dropping on top of him.

Panting, his heart pounding, the squire was content to stand clear and hope that the shadow wouldn't get up again, but Ajandor was not. Seemingly contemptuous of the cat's flailing limbs, he kept on attacking. The shadow stopped moving and still he hacked at it, until the body abruptly melted away to nothing.

Only then did Ajandor turn to Kevin. The knight's eyes had gone from dull and dazed to fierce and hard.

"Are you all right?" Kevin asked. The collar of his tattered cloak chose that moment to tear completely apart, dumping the garment around his boots.

"Yes." Ajandor inspected his blade of "true silver," only to find that, except for drops of rainwater, it didn't need cleaning. The phantom hadn't possessed any blood to foul it. "Let's move on."

"Move on? After a fight, if it's practical, a warrior always rests and recovers his strength. You taught me that."

"Don't throw my own words back in my face."

"I'm just saying… look, further wandering may be a bad idea. We've just seen that the survivors told us the truth. Tilverton is haunted. We should-"

Ajandor turned away, his patched, faded war cloak swinging, and headed up the street. Kevin mouthed a silent curse, snatched up his ruined mantle, threw it around his shoulders like a beggar's rag, and hurried after him.

They prowled until darkness began to envelop the city, creeping up on them as stealthily as the shadow cat, or so it seemed to Kevin. With the sun hidden behind the perpetual gray cloud cover, he had seen no hint of its setting.

"We should get back to the horses," he said, "and make camp for the night."

Ajandor shook his head. "I want to walk."

The mounts need care, assuming that some horror hasn't killed them already."

"You can tend them. It is part of your duties, is it not?"

"Yes. Still, what's the point of searching for Pelethen"- Ajandor flinched almost imperceptibly at his son's name-"in the dark? You could march right past his body and never notice."

"I still feel like wandering."

"But the shadows will be more active in the dark, for that's the way of shadows, and without a single light burning anywhere about the streets, you'll never see them coming. They'll kill you before you can even lift your sword!"

Ajandor frowned, considering. At length he said, "1 wouldn't want to fall without striking a blow. That would make a poor end to the tale of my line. We'll return to the Cormyr Gate."

On the way back, they passed one of the sets of stairs that climbed to the Old Town, a precinct built on high ground. Famed for its picturesque beauty, it was likely as ruinous as the rest of the city. Partway up the steps was an Altar of Shields, unmarred by the devastation that prevailed on every side. To Kevin, it almost seemed a mockery, as if Helm, god of guardians and protectors, had preserved his own little shrine while permitting the rest of the city to perish.

The squire's mood soured still further when they reached the gate. Redwind, Ajandor's charger, lay dead. No shadow had come to rend the faithful animal. Rather his heart had given out and small wonder. At the knight's insistence, the two riders had pushed their mounts unmercifully once they heard about the destruction of Tilverton, even though, from a coldly practical perspective, they no longer had any reason to hurry at all.

Ajandor gazed down at the horse that had borne him for the past ten years, an animal that, Kevin believed, he had loved.

"Poor old fellow," murmured the knight.

"It's too bad," Kevin said.

Ajandor turned away from the fallen steed. "The animal got me here. I suppose that's all that matters."

"Until we want to ride away."

Ajandor didn't reply.

"Well," said Kevin after a pause, "after I see to my horse, we'll want a fire and our supper."

"Do as you like." Ajandor walked back to the east end of the stone tunnel that was the gate, where the rain created a sort of shimmering, pattering curtain and stood staring out as night swallowed the city.

By the time Kevin finished preparing a meal of fried ham, crumbly yellow corn cakes, and dried apples, the vista beyond the gate had gone utterly black. He tried not to think of what might be lurking unseen just a few feet away. A faint cry came from the opposite direction, out in the countryside, making him jump. Some of the refugees hadn't fled very far from Tilverton, and perhaps shadow creatures were ranging outside the broken walls as well.

At the sound, Ajandor glanced over his shoulder then turned away once more.

"Supper's ready," Kevin called.

His master didn't answer.

For a second, annoyed, the youth was tempted to let it go at that. The gods knew, he was hungry enough to eat both portions himself. He rose from the fire and carried the two tin plates to the end of the gate.

"Here," he said, thrusting one dish forward.

Thus prompted, Ajandor accepted it. He took a token nibble of corn cake then stooped to set the plate on the ground.

"No!" Kevin said. "Sir, you need more than that, or you'll get sick."

"I'm not hungry."

Kevin took a deep breath, screwing up his courage. He had never hesitated to speak his mind to the kindly mentor who had taken him in after his own parents drowned in a boating accident, but this taciturn stranger daunted him a little.

"Sir, I think I know what's in your mind. We couldn't have gotten here any faster."

"That's a convenient way to think."

"It's the truth. We left home the same day the herald brought us word of the call to arms, and we had to ride from one corner of Cormyr to the opposite one, slogging down muddy roads and fording swollen rivers." That, of course, was why the kingdom of Cormyr and its allies were going to war. A city of wizards was tampering with the weather, producing constant rain that ruined crops, birthed floods, and made travel a nightmare. "Despite it all, we did arrive before the date specified in the princess's decree."

"But not in time to fight."

"Obviously, no one anticipated that the shades would lay siege to Tilverton before our forces could march on them. Anyway, do you think we could have changed the outcome if we had been here? Do you think you could have saved your son?"

Ajandor sneered. "You're glad you were let off, aren't you? Glad you weren't obliged to die in the service of the Crown."

Kevin groped for a suitable answer. Nothing sprang to mind.

"Get away from me, coward. Leave me to mourn in peace."

The squire obeyed then found that suddenly he, too, had no appetite.

He took the first watch as was customary and his duty, even though Ajandor did not avail himself of the opportunity to rest. Afterwards, the youth found it so difficult to sleep that he almost felt that he shouldn't have bothered, either. The occasional anguished cry from beyond the walls kept jarring him awake.

At daybreak, or what passed for it beneath the perpetual overcast, the two men-at-arms headed back into the streets. It was raining harder, but the stink of the bloated dead seemed worse than ever. At first it churned Kevin's stomach. Eventually, though, he forgot about it, when he noticed something about his master's demeanor.