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(18) The yellow eyes did not press upon his mind. Instead, they did nothing; they said nothing. They were simply there, damming up the passage of time. The expressionless eyes gave no reason for Ikov to return their stare, no reason for him to maintain his concentration. No time passed, and any reason Ikov had had to spend the timelessness locked upon the yellow eyes faded from his mind. But Ikov did not turn away; he did not accept the implicit invitation to relent. The eyes narrowed. Armadyl and the army had charged into the crater, had killed hundreds and hundreds of helpless, disoriented troglodytes. Ikov could find no reason to remain fixed upon the squinted eyes, but he persisted anyway. The eyes showed panic, and Ikov did not yield. Then the eyes fled: a shadow shot forth from where the reddish figure had stood. The shadow fled from the chasm and out into the west. Ikov blinked his eyes several times and looked about him. Without a casualty, Armadyl and his army had completed the slaughter; the troglodytes were dead, and the demon was gone. Far above him light shined upon the open summit; it was dawn.

(19) It took Ikov several days to recover from the confusion of the fight, from having lost his sense of time and purpose as he held fast the power behind the yellow eyes. But slowly he made sense of what had happened and returned to his old self. Meanwhile, Armadyl ordered the construction of a watchtower high upon the mountain. The company pitched their camp within the warm, volcanic bowels of the mountain during the weeks of construction. After the bodies of the troglodytes were burned upon the shore, the chasm and caves of the mountain fortified, and the watchtower completed, Armadyl charged the villagers with maintaining the tower, so that from it they might protect all the lands to the west and south, and watch for threats from the sea.

(20) Then Armadyl had the army assembled and spoke to them thus: "I am concerned about the flight of the demon into the west. I don't know what shelter he seeks there. We had planned to wait out the winter in camp, but now I think we should march west in pursuit and see what further challenge awaits us. Every one of you is free to choose whether to continue our journey or to remain here among the settlers." In the next days, the soldiers procured from the village what supplies the villagers could spare. Then just over three hundred returned to continue the quest. In the dead of winter, Armadyl and Ikov led their army west, onto the frozen beaches of the northern coast. It had been two months since their departure from the moors.

Part 6: Coast

(1) After leaving their camp within the mountain, Armadyl, Ikov, and their company crossed the isthmus of rock. Within a mile of their march along the rocky coast, they came upon a massive pillar toppled on its side. It appeared to be cut from black, volcanic glass, to make a demonic figure: lionlike in the face, horned, winged and reptillian in the body; its expression was somber, its face pressed against gritty sand. The soldiers studied it as they walked by.

(2) Soon the company came upon rocks in their way, the beginning of a ridge running directly west for as far as they could see. On its right were piled dunes of sand, then a sandy beach exposed to freezing wind, and large sheets of ice which extended out into the sea. On its left lay the entrance to a gorge cutting deep into the earth, offering protection from the wind but also a long, narrow, and winding path, the end of which lay beyond their sight.

(3) For fear of what they might meet in the gorge, all chose to brave the winds upon the beach - they were prepared for the cold, wrapped in many layers of wool given to them by the Asgarnian villagers. For some time, they walked upon the soft sands among the dunes, which provided partial shelter, but which also exhausted them quickly. Soon they moved out onto the flat, hard sands of the beach, and there suffered constant, driving, freezing wind, carrying sand and bits of ice. Grit soon found its way into every crease and crevice in their clothes. Tears brought to their eyes by the wind froze upon their faces. At night they pitched camp in the shelter of the dunes, and at dawn they continued their march on the beach.

(4) After some days on the march, the company encountered a group of men - about a dozen of them, dressed in robes of black and carrying stone bowls; they were hurrying back and forth between the ridge and the sea. They ignored the approaching army, so Armadyl, Ikov, and the company stopped to watch what they were doing. The men in black formed two lines strung out from amidst the dunes, across the beach and ice, and stretching to the sea. Upon reaching the edge of the ice, one one would dip his shallow bowl into the water, filling it, and then shuffle back across the ice and sands and disappear amidst the dunes, careful never to spill a drop; then he would reappear to repeat the ritual, rushing back to the sea.

(5) Commanding the army to remain where they stood, Armadyl and Ikov followed one of the men into the dunes. There they beheld a break in the ridge, a cut bounded by two steep and jagged edges, through which they could see the far wall of the gorge and above it the blue sky and distant plains beyond. At the bottom of the break, at ground level, stood a large, rectangular stone altar. Its front face was smooth and flat; the top had cut into it two flat faces which slanted towards the gorge at its back. The man they followed dumped the water he carried onto the stone altar, so that the water ran along the crease between the two flat faces on its top and trickled into the gorge behind and below. Then the man turned around to retrace his steps to the sea. Armadyl and Ikov watched for some time as several men repeated the rite, spilling water upon the altar and into the gorge. Finally, puzzled and without any insight into the strange ritual, they returned to their army. Armadyl, Ikov, and the company continued their march, carefully avoiding the robed men as they crossed their path. That night they pitched camp again among the dunes and slept.

(6) Horns sounded the alarm in the camp at dawn. The men scrambled to prepare to fight. Armadyl and Ikov were informed immediately that the last sentinels on duty before dawn were missing, as well as several more. They ordered the surrounding dunes, ridge, and beach to be searched and for all to remain on alert. But no trace of intruders nor of the missing soldiers was found. Scouts reported that they could no longer see the men robed in black pacing across the beach as on the day before. With grim demeanor, Armadyl ordered the soldiers to continue the march; twice as many soldiers would be assigned to keep watch in the night, and the wood they carried would be used for fires to keep their surroundings lit. For another week, Armadyl, Ikov, and the army encountered no one on the beach and no change in the land. They simply endured the cold and wind and bleeding from the grit which collected around their necks and armpits, knees and elbows. All remained alert and uneasy at the disappearance of both their fellow soldiers in the night and the men upon the beach.

(7) Then, one day at midday scouts reported more robed men on the beach ahead - about a hundred of them. They enacted the same ritual as before, but at a much larger altar set within a wider break in the ridge. Furthermore, on the far side of the altar they saw dwellings cut into the dark sheets of stone which made up the ridge. In front of the dwellings, they saw women and children, also dressed in black, seated together around cooking fires, eating from large cuts of strange black meat; they guessed it came from some kind of serpent from the sea. "We must demand from them whatever they know of our missing soldiers," said Ikov, "If they do not speak to us, we will confront the women. If that does not work, we will interrupt their ritual. If they resist, we will avoid harming the women and children as best as we can." All agreed with Ikov's plan.

(8) They armed themselves and marched between the ridge and the dunes of sand so that they would emerge among the robed people at the site of their altar and village. When they arrived, the men continued their ritual, taking no notice of them, just as before. But the women and children got up from their fires or came out from their stone houses and gathered in a silent crowd, watching the newcomers from beyond the lines of shuffling priests. Ikov shouted to the women, "Who are you and why do your men perform these rites?" He received no answer. Then, "Some of our soldiers disappeared in the night. Do you know who or what is responsible?" Again no one answered.

(9) "Interrupt the ritual," said Armadyl, "Block their access to the altar." The troops moved forward. As the first soldier stepped between the altar and the priest closest to it, the man in black dropped his bowl and shoved the soldier onto and over the altar, so that he tumbled down into the gorge. The next soldier slew the priest where he stood. The men in black dropped their bowls and retreated quickly. The women and children likewise ran to join the men a hundred paces away. All of them remained silent. Then, all of them, even the children, drew silver swords from among their robes.

(10) "Lock your shields together; do not strike them unless you must," said Ikov, "We will drive them back." The crowd in black charged at them, but just as Ikov commanded they drove them back with their heavy shields; they slew only a few. The robed people retreated some hundred paces, and in silence gathered again. They charged again, and again the army drove them back. "Stop this," Ikov shouted to them, "or we will drive you into the sea." Again they charged, and again the company broke their charge and forced them to retreat. All the while, the enemy maintained their silence.

(11) Armadyl called two soldiers away from the defensive line and sent them to find the one who was pushed into the gorge. They quickly returned to report that beyond the altar lay a soft slope of sand which led to the bottom of the gorge; though they could not see him, they expected that the missing soldier was alive. Armadyl thanked them, and they rejoined the bulk of the army which had slowly pushed the people in black to the very edge of the ice. The robed people attacked one final time, and the army of Armadyl and Ikov pushed them into the sea. Some they slew at the edge of the water. Others swam away from the ice as if to regroup again, but soon they could not withstand the cold and sank forever beneath the waves. None of the robed people remained alive. All were silent; they heard only the wind and clapping of the waves against the thick sheet of ice. Armadyl ordered them to retreat to the ridge, where they would pitch camp for the night.

(12) The soldiers had suffered only minor injuries from the fight, some shallow cuts from the serrated silver blades. Armadyl and Ikov ordered the collection of the bodies of the slain, which they burned upon the beach. The empty stone dwellings were searched for supplies. There the soldiers found dry wood, stores of fresh water, strange skins from which the black robes were made, and frozen cuts of black meat. Armadyl and Ikov ordered the skins and meats to be left alone but had the soldiers take the wood and water. That night Ikov walked through the camp, listening to and encouraging the troops. All were shaken by the strange battle, especially those who had killed women and children, women and children who had attacked them in silence. A few soldiers disobeyed the command to leave alone the black meat; they ate it and immediately became sick. Ikov kept watch over them throughout the night, but by the morning they had died. After their bodies were buried, Armadyl had the army assembled before the stone altar.

(13) Armadyl stood still in front of them. Then suddenly he turned and swung his staff and struck the altar, and it cracked in two. He lept upon the broken halves, turned towards the soldiers, and spoke thus: "My loyal soldiers, of every land we have crossed, none has been so strange and so miserable as this one. Yet you have endured the cold and wind and unnerving battle. We have cleansed the northern coast of a strange cult, bound, I think, to the worship of demons from another world. Now I see that we have nearly come to the end of this land: only a few days' journey west lies the end of this barren beach and the end of this stony ridge and the end of the gorge we have not explored. There begins a country of foothills, lying before an enormous range of ice-capped mountains and plateaus. Before we reach our refuge among the hills, we have two tasks yet to fulfill. First, Ikov and I have still have a spirit to conquer in this land - which we will conquer when the time is right. Second, one of our soldiers waits for us in the gorge, and maybe several more. I do not know what brought our enemies to offer to the gorge water and human captives, but whatever lies down there it is now time for us to face. Here the way down is easy and the path is broad; it will not be long before we will have followed it to its end and found peace among the hills. So take heart, and enter with Ikov and with me into the gorge."

(14) The soldiers cheered. In small groups they descended from the broken altar down the sandy slope into the gorge. To the east the gorge narrowed and the path lay in shadow. To the west, the gorge widened. Immediately the first soldiers to reach the bottom identified tracks leading to the west: first a fresh set of footprints, and then an older collection of many tracks, belonging to the soldiers missing from before - everyone captured by the cult had been cast into the gorge. Once the whole army had reached the bottom, Armadyl, Ikov, and their company marched west.

(15) Some soldiers went ahead, examining the tracks of those who had gone before them, while Armadyl, Ikov, and the rest of the army marched behind. Soon the sun hung low in the western sky, just above the southern wall. Armadyl called for the army to halt. Before the order was given to pitch camp, one of the scouts reported that the tracks became confused: at least two of the soldiers' footprints led nowhere; one led up to and then stopped at a wall of rock. Ikov followed the scout to where the footprints stopped. He studied them, but he could discern nothing from them. He dismissed the scout and stood alone before the end of footprints which led up to a shadowed wall of rock. Ikov placed his feet in the footprints, and mimicked the steps, walking right into the shadow cast across the wall. But he did not hit the rock; he took a few more steps and emerged again into the waning light. He had passed through an unseen crevice in the wall and emerged in a small cove leading back to the main path. From there he could see Armadyl on the main path, standing in the midst of the army. Another rock formation lay at the opening of the cove, which he would have to crawl under or climb over in order to reach the camp.