Elvar glared at the wanderer in annoyance. "What do you want?"

"I am hungry," the strange man said quietly.

"And I suppose you want me to feed you," Elvar said in disgust. He rested his chubby hands on his broad hips. "I suppose you think we should be happy to give a cretin like yourself food when we haven't enough to make it through the winter ourselves."

The wanderer gestured to the storehouse. "You have plenty of grain."

"Don't tell me what I have or don't have," Elvar snapped. He studied the wanderer. Suspicion gleamed in his beady eyes. "Tell me, beggar, where did one so wretched get such a fine horse?"

"She's mine."

"Liar," Elvar hissed. "I say you stole it." Beris pressed forward. "Excuse me, milord, but I think that the horse does belong to him. She seems to obey his-"

"Shut up!" Elvar commanded. "If I say he is a thief, then he is a thief." He gestured to a trio of mercenaries. "Lead the horse to my stable, then take this man and cut off his hands so everyone will know him for the thief he is." With that, Elvar waddled toward the large stone manor house in the center of the stockade.

Beris tried to protest, but the other soldiers pushed him roughly aside. Two grappled the wanderer, ruthlessly twisting his arms behind his back. Another grabbed the gray mare's reins. She let out a defiant whinny, rearing back on her hind legs. "Stop!" a commanding voice thundered. Everyone froze—the townspeople, the soldiers, even Lord Elvar—staring in amazement. An aura of power surrounded the wanderer, who now looked more like a king than a vagabond. The pale horse quieted and let out a soft nicker.

The wanderer fixed Elvar with his pale green gaze. "If there were no rats in your granary, would you have given me something to eat?"

Elvar licked his lips. "Of course," he lied hastily.

Reaching into a leather pouch at his belt, the wanderer produced a set of bone pipes. He lifted them to his lips and began to play. The throng stared in trancelike wonder. Beris had never before heard such music—mournful, vaguely threatening, yet so achingly beautiful he thought it would break his heart. As the man continued to play, a gasp rose from the crowd. From a dozen dim corners and shadowed alleyways emerged countless small, dark, lithe forms. Cats.

In moments there were a hundred of them, as black and silent as smoke. The wraithlike felines padded swiftly toward the granary, emerald eyes winking mysteriously, before disappearing through the open door. The hideous cacophony that followed nearly drowned out the piper's music. People clapped hands over their ears against the horrible din of squealing and yowling. Abruptly, the noise ceased. The dark cats streamed out of the granary now, each bearing a gray bundle in its mouth. As they passed the stunned Elvar, each of the cats dropped its grisly burden at the lord's feet. In moments there was a furry mound of dead rats heaped before the lord of Triel. The wanderer lowered his pipes; the strange music faded into the air. The dusky cats melted once more into pools of darkness.

"Now may I have something to eat?" the wanderer asked solemnly.

Elvar gaped at him, then nodded emphatically. "Of course! You shall have my very finest!" This time, Beris noted, sincerity was written across the lord's porcine face. "But please, stranger," Elvar implored, "tell me your name, so that I can know who has saved Triel from disaster."

The wanderer hesitated a moment, as if he did not quite remember his name. When at last he spoke, he seemed a figure of majesty no longer, but simply a weary traveler.

"Cal," he said haggardly. "You can call me Cal." 

*****

The statue watched over the ancient crossroads with deep, moss-filled eyes. A cool wind rushed through the sentinel trees, and the misty forest air was filled with cast-off leaves of copper red and burnished gold. Mari reached out and touched the timeworn stone.

"I've found another one!" she called out.

There was a crashing in the underbrush as the others approached, leading their horses among the trees.

"It is indeed a Talfirian Watcher," Morhion agreed after a moment of study. "You have found the path again."

Whether the statue had once represented man, woman, or god, Mari could not tell. An eternity of wind and rain had worn away all features except the staring pits of the eyes. They had come upon a dozen of the mysterious stone figures over the last two days as they wended their way southward, deeper into the Reaching Woods. It was Jewel who had first discovered the path, the morning after their harrowing flight from the three shalevari in Hill's Edge. At first they thought it was a game trail that paralleled the river. Here and there they turned up what seemed to be cracked paving stones. Then they came upon the first of the Watchers. Morhion instantly realized the significance of the crumbling statue. "This was a road, once," he explained, "built by the Talfirc, the people who dwelt in this land a thousand years ago. They set the Watchers here to guard the way." They had decided to follow the ancient road southward. Again and again they had lost the faint tracks in the underbrush and were forced to stop and make a laborious search. The loss of time worried Mari.

"This path divides in several directions," Kellen noted in his grave manner. "Which way do you think we should go?"

"Whichever way leads fastest toward something to eat, besides hardtack and acorns," Cormik said forlornly. He picked futilely at the dried leaves and burrs that clung to his once-elegant attire.

Jewel parted her ruby hps in a wicked smile. "Personally, I think our strict regimen is doing you good, my sweet, expansive elephant. Sparing amounts of food and generous amounts of exercise are exactly what you need."

With his one good eye, Cormik glared darkly at her. "If I had wanted your opinion, my dear geriatric tart, I most certainly would have requested it. I know exactly what I need, and it involves large and plentiful quantities of roasted pheasant, sweet subtleties, and red Amnian wine. And soon!"

"This path has gradually veered east, away from the River Reaching," Morhion said. "Let us try west. Perhaps that way leads to a ford. We have to get across the river if we're going to pick up Caledan's trail again."

The green forest light was fading to dusk when the narrow path broadened, and they came upon the ruined city. The endless wall of trees parted before them, and the voice of the river roared like thunder on the air. Here the paving stones were intact, though late wildflowers and sweet herbs pushed their way up between the cobbles.

Most of the city's structures were little more than jumbled heaps of stone, tangled with vines and crowned by stands of oak and ash. However, in the center of the city was a circular plaza, in the middle of which rose a tapering, step-sided building.

"I think this was a city of the Talfirc," Morhion said, raising his voice above the rushing river.

"What happened to them?" Mari asked in wonder. "Why did they leave?"

Morhion shook his head. "It is a mystery. The Talfirc dwelt in this land for a long age. However, by the time our ancestors came westward over the mountains, the Talfirc were already centuries vanished. No one knows where they went, or why."

"They built this city awfully close to the river," Cormik noted. "I wonder if they built a bridge as well."

Morhion's eyes gleamed brightly. "Let us find out if you're right."

The Talfirc had indeed built a bridge. Unfortunately, the river had shifted in its course over the centuries. The ancient yet solid span of stones now arched over the verdant flood plain. The river came nowhere near it.

"Well, that's about as useful as a rowboat in the deser," Jewel said drolly.

"Not even that," Cormik chimed in.

They made their way back to the central plaza. The light was failing rapidly.