Exiles Gate

had failed them. They had cause to be angry.

The sun came up full. The land went gold and green.

And as they crested a rise of the plain and looked on a darkness that topped the rise ahead he felt a moment's dread that it was some band of riders—till his eye adjusted for the scope of the land and he knew it was woods that he saw.

They camped among ancient stones, beside a stream which crossed the low point among them, under the branches of trees which arched over and trailed their branches waterward. Among the ruins, a sparse and stubborn grass grew, on a ridge well-shielded by the trees; and there the horses grazed.

They ventured a fire only large enough to heat a little water, and ate bread Morgaine had made at the last camp, and fish they had smoked; and drank tea—Chei's prepared with herbs against the fever.

Chei had borne the ride, Vanye reckoned, very well—was weary, and only too glad to lie down to sleep, there in the sun-warmth, on the leafy bank. So, then, was he, leaving the watch to Morgaine, and listening to the water and the wind and the horses.

'It has been quiet,' she whispered when she waked him, while Chei still slept. 'Nothing has stirred. A bird or two. A creature I do not know came down to drink: it looked like a mink with a banded tail. There is a black snake sunning himself down on that log.'

These were good signs, of a healthier vicinity. He drew a deep breath and yielded her up the blankets, and tucked himself down again in a nook out of the wind. He had a bite to eat, a quarter of the bread he had saved back from their breakfast; and a drink of clear water from the stream which ran here, more wholesome than the river had been.

And when toward dusk, Chei stirred from his sleep, he rose and stretched himself, and put together the makings of a little fire—again, hardly enough to warm water, quick to light and quick to bury, and a risk even as it was.

Morgaine roused them for tea and day-old cakes and smoked fish, and sat against the rock, sipping her portion of the tea and letting her eyes shut from time to time. Then her eyes opened with nothing of somnolence about them at all. 'We might stay here a day,' she said. 'We have put distance between ourselves and the gate— which is very well. But this is the last place we may have leisure. Another night's riding—and we will be beyond Gault's holdings. Is that not the case?'

'That is the case,' Chei said. 'I swear to you.'

'Bearing in mind that hereafter I will not permit Vanye's horse to carry double, and tire itself.'

'I will walk. I can fend for myself, lady.'

'Are you fit to walk? I tell you the truth: if you are not fit—we will give you that day's grace. But there may be other answers. Perhaps you know something of Morund's inner defenses.'

Chei's eyes widened in dread. 'Guarded,' he said. 'Well guarded.'

'I,' Vanye said, and rested his chin on his forearm, his knee tucked beneath his elbow. 'I have stolen a horse or two in my life. I suppose Morund has pastures hereabouts. And for that matter, liyo, I can quite well walk.'

Morgaine glanced his way. So he knew that he had guessed her intention all along, by that calm exchange. And he had had a queasy feeling in all this ride, good as the reasons were for quitting the last camp: Arrhan might carry double at a very slow pace, but not in haste—his liege not being a fool, to press one of their horses to the limit.

But that she risked them this far on this man's word had bewildered him, all the same—until she asked of Morund.

'Or,' he said in the Kurshin tongue, 'we might let our guide walk these trails he claims to know—alone. And we go the quicker way, the two of us, by night and by stealth, liyo, and get clear of this place. That is my opinion in the matter.'

She gave him a sudden sidelong glance.

He gave a little lift of his shoulder. No frown was on her face, but that, he thought, was because there was a witness.

'I will have a word with thee,' she said, and motioned off toward the streamside.

But: 'I do not think there is overmuch to say,' he said, and did not rise. 'I am ilin. Ask. I will do it. Steal a horse? That is nothing. Perhaps I should take Morund. You hardly need trouble yourself.'

'Thee is unreasonable!'

'I do not think I am unreasonable. Everything you wish, I will do. Can a man be more reasonable? Take Morund. Better that than walk in there. Far better than drag this poor man in there, since you are set on stirring up a trouble we could ride around. We have come this far on this man's advice. Take the rest of it, I say, and go where he bids us go, and let us go around this place.'

For a moment she did not speak. There was sullen anger in the look she gave him. Then: 'Oh, aye, and trust to luck and half a score human bands, shall we?'

'Better luck than this Gault, liyo. And what will we, do general murder? Is that what you want? It is what you lead us to. Someone will die, likest myself, since I have to shield you. I have a bruise the size of my fist on my right shoulder—'

'Whose fault, that?'

'—and a man by me I do not trust; or we do trust him, enough to let him free where he could cry alarm; or we do murder outright on this man—Which is it, do we kill him, do we tie him to a tree for the wolves and his enemies to find, or do we trust him to go free? Or if we trust him for that, why in Heaven's sweet reason do we not trust him down the back trail ourselves, and take ourselves clear of this damnable place before we raise hue and cry from here to the north?'

She rose abruptly to her feet and walked off. It left him Chei's frightened stare.

'We are having a dispute,' Vanye said, 'regarding the ease of finding horses.'

Chei said nothing at all. He looked from one to the other of them, and for a long while Morgaine stood by the streamside, arms folded, staring off into the gathering dark.

Vanye buried their fire, and went down to wash the single pan they had used.

'Thee confuses me,' Morgaine said, standing behind him as he rinsed the pan. 'Thee considerably confuses me.'

It was not, precisely, what he had expected her to say.

'Then,' he said, 'we confuse each other.'

'What will you?'

That was not the question he was prepared for either—or it was the earnestness of it which confounded him.

'What will you?' He turned from the stream, for he sensed her precisely where she was, her back turned to their prisoner and the horses; and all manner of mischief possible. 'I have no idea—'

'Thee does not kneel.'

'I am washing the cursed dish,' he retorted, 'and you have your back to the man. Do you trust him that much?'

'Now thee is watching. I trust that thee is watching. What will thee? To let him free? Ride in among his folk, on his guidance? Or do we kill him or leave him for the wolves?'

'Ah. I thought it was his oath we trusted.'

She drew in a sharp breath, and said nothing at all as he got to his feet. They were of a height. He stood lower on the bank. And for a long moment he did not move.

'Or,' he said, 'do you think we should not trust his guidance? Lord in Heaven, you took his oath. Did you count me so lightly? I do not recall my pledge was much different.'

'Thee is Kurshin,' she said, and recalled to him what he had forgotten: that it was more than the language she spoke, that she was, perhaps to a greater extent than he had thought—Andurin, out of the woodland cantons of his own land.

'You will not let me remember it,' he said, and jutted a clenched jaw toward the man who waited by the