Toward late afternoon on the fourth day since their landing, they were coming down a rocky slope into a small valley. The slope was too steep to support many trees, but at the bottom the forest was thicker. Blade thought it might even give them a dry spot to spend the night. The sun was peeking through the low clouds to the west, but it hadn't been out long enough to dry the ground. They were halfway down the hill before Blade spotted the horsemen riding out of the trees and dismounting.
There were just enough trees on the hillside so that the three travelers could easily get under cover. Khraishamo stayed there while Blade crept down the hill, moving from tree to tree until he was close enough to get a good look at the horsemen.
They were definitely Maghri. Blade recognized the rough-coated, sturdy little brown or gray horses, the rawhide harnesses, the leather jackets and breeches, the wooden shields with iron or bronze spikes in the middle, the short thick bows and long spiked war clubs.
He also saw something he hadn't expected to see. Stirrups. They were no more than loops of heavy leather, but they should be enough to let a rider use lance or club from horseback and press home a charge. Some unknown genius among these horse people had come up with the invention needed to give this whole Dimension effective cavalry. Blade was certain this little surprise was going to have interesting consequences the first time the horsemen and the Goharans met in a full-scale battle.
He also suspected that this first meeting might be only a few days away. Certainly the horsemen were well inside Goharan territory, and in considerable strength. Blade counted at least two hundred and fifty horsemen, with more coming out of the trees every minute. The Goharan commanders in Mythor were going to hear of them sooner or later, and have to do something about them.
Then Blade realized that the horsemen weren't behaving as if they were in enemy territory. They were dismounting, building fires, butchering and roasting their day's catch, making no effort to set guards or search the forest around them. They didn't even seem to care that their fires were sending up thick clouds of grayish smoke. With the clearing weather, the smoke would be visible miles away.
There might be many reasons for this apparent carelessness, Blade realized. They might know there was no enemy close at hand, they might be relying on their numbers for safety, or their leaders might simply be foolish. Blade knew that many «mysterious» events had a simple explanation: somebody didn't know his job.
There was another explanation, both sinister and plausible. The horsemen weren't on guard because they knew they weren't in enemy territory. They'd been invited to march on Mythor by Prime Minister Kloret.
The more Blade thought about this explanation, the more sense it made. Sooner or later, Kloret would need allies outside Gohar. The riders of the western plains were too barbarous, and the pirates would demand too high a price. The merchants of Gohar would certainly turn against Kloret if he gave the Sarumi what they asked. The Maghri, on the other hand, might ask nothing except a free hand against Mythor. Kloret was the sort of man who would calmly throw away half an empire if this increased his chances of ruling the other half.
By now the horsemen were settling down for the night. It was time for Blade and his friends to be on their way, just in case all the horsemen weren't as careless as they seemed. In the fading light Blade was able to make the trip uphill faster than he'd come down. Without bothering to sit, he told the others what he'd seen and what he suspected.
Both Khraishamo and Rhodina started off by looking at him as if he'd lost his mind. He went on, and gradually both of them began to look as if they might believe him. Blade was even ready to reveal his mission for Harkrat and Elyana if he couldn't convince them any other way. Fortunately this wasn't necessary. Khraishamo stood up and pulled Rhodina to her feet, although she groaned at the pain of half-rested muscles.
«We need to get to the first honest rebel you know,» he said. «Never mind how big he is, we want the closest one. Your friends need a warning.»
Rhodina nodded, frowning as she tried to call up a mental map of the farms and estates of rebel sympathizers in the area. Fortunately, like many illiterate people, she had an excellent memory. Her time on Shell Island and the ordeal of the escape hadn't weakened it. In a few minutes she came up with the name of Riddart, a wealthy farmer only a day's march away.
Even that was more time than Blade wanted to take, but they didn't have any choice. They were going to have to walk. Blade knew he could steal one horse from the poorly guarded Maghri camp, but probably not three. In any case, Khraishamo couldn't ride. The leg and hip bones of the Sarumi were so arranged that they couldn't straddle a horse. As far as Blade was concerned, it was still «One for all, and all for one,» and he wasn't even going to think of abandoning the pirate and Rhodina.
They didn't know exactly when dawn came, because in the middle of the night it started to rain again. They splashed along through puddles and under dripping branches, once more soaked to the skin, stopping only to check their bearings. Fortunately they'd passed through a rocky gorge before the light went, and Rhodina said that as long as they kept going downhill after that they wouldn't get lost. Blade knew that didn't guarantee they would find Riddart's farm in time to do any good, but said nothing, Rhodina was only on her feet by sheer willpower. Blade suspected that she might have asked to be left behind long since, if she'd thought either man would listen to her. Knowing they'd never leave her, she was determined to keep going until she literally dropped dead in her tracks.
Before that happened, Blade swore, they were either going to find Riddart's farm or rob another man's for proper food, clothing, and a riding mule for Rhodina. She deserved more-such as being clothed in silk and waited on hand and foot for a year. But that would be enough to keep her alive until either they found friends or their enemies found them.
Slowly the night gave way to a dreary, damp dawn. The coming of what passed for daylight didn't do much to lift their spirits. That only came when Rhodina recognized a yellow barn with a narrow cart track winding away behind it.
«That's Old Wuga's Stead,» she said. «Riddart's another hour down the road.»
They moved on, grimly putting one foot in front of another. At last they came to a point where the track widened into a road, and a hundred yards beyond it a point where another road joined it. Rhodina looked down at the hoofprints and fresh horse droppings, and burst into tears.
It did look bad. A large force of horsemen had come out of the side road and moved off toward Riddart's farm. From the droppings, they'd come by no more than an hour ago. Who were they, and what were they doing at the farm?
There were — two encouraging facts. There was no smoke visible ahead, and the prints were those of shod horses. The mounts of the Maghri weren't shod. The riders might not be friends, but at least they weren't the enemy Blade now feared the most.
The three now moved forward like a patrol advancing into enemy territory and expecting an ambush at any moment. A mile short of Riddart's farm they left the road entirely and cut across country, using the cover of the woods until they were nearly at the farm. It was bounded by a low wall of piled field stone, and beyond the wall Blade could see broad fields of partly harvested grain. The chimney of the house was smoking heavily, but otherwise Blade saw no signs of unusual activity. All the farm buildings seemed to be undamaged, which was definitely a good sign.
Both Khraishamo and Blade made it clear to Rhodina that she was going to sit down, rest, and wait while they took a closer look at the farm. Then the two men crept out of the trees, and through the standing grain. They came to the edge of the grain and stared at the farm across a broad stretch of bare, black muddy ground.