Bladud could not forget Hermias’s last words. After a sleepless night he went straight to the White Mound, hoping there he might meet Alcestis just as he had met with Imogene in his youth. But the place seemed to have lost its magic — or perhaps he had lost his capacity to respond to it. No spirit came to speak with him.
Disappointed, he returned to the city. There he found messengers from the north who brought news that Arrak’s war with Pellor was not going well. The northern tribes were rampaging far and wide into neighbouring kingdoms, and would soon threaten regions that had never been raided by them before.
Bladud grimly retired to his private chambers, and would see no one.
* * * *
Then, after two days, he sent for Yaruk.
‘My lord?’
‘I must ask you to go north again, Yaruk,’ he
