Skoda had become a stone rose with jagged petals on a field of green. Rings of towering granite, interlinking to create a gargantuan bloom.
To the north-east Katan could just make out the fortress of Delnoch, while to the south-east were the glittering cities of the Drenai. It was all so beautiful. From here there was no cruelty, no torture, no terror. No room here for men with small minds and limitless ambition.
He turned again to the rose of Skoda. The outer petals concealed nine valleys through which an army could march. He scanned them all, gauging the contours and the gradients, picturing lines of fighting men, charging horsemen, fleeing infantry. Committing the facts to memory, he moved on to the second ring of mountains. Here there were only four main valleys, but three treacherous passes threaded their way through to the open pastures and woodlands beyond.
At the centre of the rose the mountains bunched with only two access points from the east – the valleys known as Tarsk and Magadon.
His mission completed, Katan returned to his body and reported to Decado. He could offer no hope.
‘There are nine main valleys and a score of other narrow passes on the outer ring. Even on the inner ring around Carduil there are two lines of attack. Our force could not hold even one. It is impossible to plan a defence that stands a one-in-twenty chance of success. And by success I mean standing off one attack.’
‘Say nothing to anyone,’ ordered Decado. ‘I will speak to Ananais.’
‘As you wish,’ said Katan coolly.
Decado smiled gently. ‘I am sorry, Katan.’
‘For what?’
‘For what I am,’ answered the warrior, moving away up the hill until he reached the high ground overlooking several spreading valleys. This was good country – sheltered, peaceful. The ground was not rich, like the Sentran Plain to the north-east, but treated with care the farms prospered and the cattle grew fat on the grass of the timberlands.
Decado’s family had been farmers far to the east and he guessed that the love of growing things had been planted in him at the moment of conception. He crouched down, digging his strong fingers into the earth at his feet. There was clay here and the grass grew lush and thick.
‘May I join you?’ asked Katan.
‘Please do.’
The two men sat in silence for a while, watching distant cattle grazing on fertile slopes.
‘I miss Abaddon,’ said Katan suddenly.
‘Yes. he was a good man.’
‘He was a man with a vision. But he had no patience and only limited belief.’
‘How can you say that?’ asked Decado. ‘He believed enough to form The Thirty once more.’
‘Precisely! He decided that evil should be met with raw force. And yet our faith claims that evil can only be conquered by love.’
‘That is insane. How do you deal with your enemies?’
‘How better to deal with them than to make them your friends?’ countered Katan.
‘The words are pretty, the argument specious. You do not make a friend of Ceska – you become a slave or die.’
Katan smiled. ‘And what does it matter? The Source governs all things and eternity mocks human life.’
‘You think it doesn’t matter if we die?’
‘Of course it does not. The Source takes us and we live for ever.’
‘And if there is no Source?’ asked Decado.
‘Then death is even more welcome. I do not hate Ceska. I pity him. He has built an empire of terror. And what does he achieve? Each day brings him closer to the grave. Is he content? Does he gaze with love on any single thing? He surrounds himself with warriors to protect him from assassins, then has warriors watching the warriors to sniff out traitors. But who watches the watchers? What a miserable existence!’
‘So,’ said Decado, ‘The Thirty are not Source warriors at all?’
‘They are if they believe.’
‘You cannot have it all ways, Katan.’
The young man chuckled. ‘Perhaps. How did you become a warrior?’
‘All men are warriors, for life is a battle. The farmer battles drought, flood, sickness and blight. The sailor battles the sea and the storm. I didn’t have the strength for that, so I fought men.’