They hurried out through the gap. The boy looked back when they were clear of the ivy, and saw it collapse into place, concealing the darkness beyond. They had emerged onto a circular stone area with dead trees standing all around, ivy-smothered all over their branches. The valley walls stretched above them left and right. To the north, the vale spread onward and downward until it evened itself roughly into grey hills, foggy and tree-patched. The landscape ahead of them was a new one. Far off to the west a pall of smoke hung over what seemed to be a town of some size, and mud-brown roads sprung from that place going north and west and south. Behind them now, the mountains marched. Presumably, the road that left the town and went south cut through the great pass where the dragon gates stood. All the rest of the landscape was hills, paddocks, fields and wildwoods. In the very distant north the air had a strange veil over it – silvery and gloomy as if the air was in perpetual shadow.
They had made it through the pass in the mountains. They had reached the northern lands.
“The Princedoms of Sorthe,” said Caewen. “All these lands are slave-farms and it’s mostly soldiers and slavers passing through Baght Town.” She nodded towards that distant squat grey-brown settlement with its blanket of lazy smoke.
“We should avoid it then?” said the boy. “Walk straight north?”
“No. We must go there, to Baght. I do not know these lands well, none of us do. We need to find out the whereabouts of our friend Athairdrost. There will be someone in Baght who can tell us what we need to know.”
“For the right price,” said Dapplegrim.
“Yes. For the right price.”
“Still seems risky to me,” muttered Dapple. “We might ask at farms and homesteads instead? Seems a bit safer.”
“I agree,” said Fleat. “Or I could fly about until I see signs of his sigils. Each of the princes has a different crown on their flags above the dragon skull. Athairdrost’s line has the little circles on the crown. I think? Doesn’t it?”
Caewen shook her head. “I’m not sure. I don’t know anything much of Sortheland badges or heraldry, and we can’t take the risk of getting lost or chasing off after the wrong prince. There are four princes who rule Sorthe. That’s three more princes than we want to tangle with. And to my mind, calling at farms will make us more noticeable. We’ll won’t stand out in a crowd. But we’ll stick out like the strangers we are if we’re wandering around farmyards. No, it’s better to be anonymous in a crowded city.”
“For all we know,” said Dapplegrim, gloomily, “Athairdrost might have already gone west or south with the soldiers and knights we saw in the valley.”
“Well, let’s hope not,” said Caewen. “Let’s hope not. I don’t much want to trek all the way back down where we’ve come. That would be dispiriting.”