Mounting the brow of a hill and coming towards them was a man on a horse. He was slumped in the saddle and plainly had not seen them, but Corum drew his sword nonetheless, and the others drew theirs. The horse moved slowly, plodding on as if it had been walking for days.
They saw that the rider, dressed in patched and battered leather, was asleep in his saddle, a broadsword hanging by a thong from his right wrist, his left hand gripping the reins of the horse. He had a haggard face which gave no indication of his age, a great hooked nose and untrimmed hair and beard. He seemed a poor man, yet hanging on his saddle pommel was a crown which, though coated with dust, was plainly of gold studded with many precious gems.
'Is he a thief?' Rhalina wondered. 'Has he stolen that crown and is trying to escape those who own it?'
When it was a few feet from them the horse stopped suddenly and looked at them with large, weary eyes. Then it bent and began to crop the grass.
At this the rider stirred. He opened his eyes. He rubbed them. He, too, peered at them and then seemed to ignore them. He mumbled to himself.
'Greetings, sir,' said Corum.
The gaunt man screwed up his eyes and looked at Corum again. He reached down behind him for a water bottle, unstoppered it and flung back his head to drink deeply. Then, deliberately, he put the stopper back into the bottle and replaced the thing behind him.
'Greetings,' said Corum again.
The mounted man nodded at him. 'Aye,' he said.
'From where do you travel, sir?' Jhary asked. 'We ourselves are lost and would appreciate some indication of what, for instance, lies beyond that brown waste there…'
The man sighed and looked at the waste, at the white, winding river.
'That is the Blood Plain,' he said. 'The river is called the White River - or by some the Milk River, though it is not milk…'
'Why the Blood Plain?' Rhalina asked.
The man stretched and frowned. 'Because, madam, it is a plain and it is covered in blood. That brown dust is dried blood - blood spilled an age since in some forgotten battle between Law and Chaos, I understand.'
'And what lies beyond it?' Corum said.
'Many things - none that are pleasant. There is nothing that is pleasant in this world since Chaos conquered it.'
'You are not on the side of Chaos?'
'Why should I be? Chaos dispossessed me. Chaos exiled me. Chaos would have me dead, but I move all the while and have not been found yet. One day, perhaps…'
Jhary introduced his friends and then himself. 'We seek a place called the City in the Pyramid,' he told the haggard rider.
The rider laughed. 'As do I. But I cannot believe it exists! I think Chaos pretends such a place resists it to offer hope to its enemies so that it may give them still more pain. I am called, sir, the King Without a Country. Noreg-Dan was once my name and I ruled a fair land and, I think, I ruled it wisely. But Chaos came and Chaos minions destroyed my nation and my subjects and left me alive to wander the world seeking a mythical city…'
'So you have no faith in the City in the Pyramid?'
'I have not found it thus far.'
'Could it lie beyond the Blood Plain?' Corum asked.
'It could, but I'm not fool enough to cross it for it could be endless and you, on foot, would have a smaller chance than would I. I am not without courage,' said King Noreg-Dan, 'but I still retain a little common sense. If there was wood in these parts, perhaps it would be possible to build a boat and hope to cross the desert by means of the White River, but there is no wood…'
'But there is a boat,' said Jhary-a-Conel.
'Would it be wise to go back to the Lake of Voices?' Rhalina cautioned.
'The Lake of Voices!' King Noreg-Dan shook his tangled head. 'Do not go there - the voices will draw you in…'
Corum explained what had happened and the King Without a Country listened intently. Then he smiled and it was a smile of admiration. He dismounted from his horse and came close to Corum, inspecting him. 'You're a strange-looking creature, sir, with your hand and your eye-patch and your odd armour, but you are a hero and I congratulate you - all of you.' He addressed the others. 'I'd say it would be worth a foray down to the beach and recover old Freenshak's boat - we could use my horse to haul it up here!'
'Freenshak?' Jhary said.
'One of the names of the creature you encountered. A particularly powerful water sprite which came when Xiombarg began her reign. Shall we try to get the boat?'
'Aye,' grinned Corum. 'We'll try.'
Somewhat nervously they returned to the lake shore, but it seemed that Freenshak was beaten for the moment and they had no difficulty in harnessing the tired horse to the boat and pulling it up the hill and halfway down the other side. In a locker Corum found a sail and saw that a short mast was stowed in lugs along one side of the boat.
As they prepared the boat he said to King Noreg-Dan,
'But what of your horse? There'll not be room…'
Noreg-Dan drew a deep breath. 'It will be a shame, but I will have to abandon him. I think he will be safer alone than with me and, besides, he deserves a rest, for he has served me faithfully since I was forced to flee my land.'
Noreg-Dan stripped the horse of its harness and put it in the boat. Then they began the hard task of dragging the vessel down the hill and across the brown, choking dust (all the more unpleasant now that they knew what the dust was) until they reached the nearest shore of the White River. The horse stood watching them from the hillside and then it turned away. Noreg-Dan lowered his head and folded his arms.
And still the sun had not moved across the sky and they had no means of knowing how much time had passed.
The liquid of the river was thicker than water and Noreg-Dan advised them not to touch it.
'It can have a corrosive effect on the skin,' he said.
'But what is the stuff?' Rhalina asked as they pushed off and raised the sail. 'Will it not rot the boat if it will rot our skin?'
'Aye,' said the King Without a Country. 'Eventually. We must hope we cross the desert before that happens.' He looked back once more to where he had left his horse, but the horse had disappeared. 'Some say that while the dust is the dried blood of mortals, the White River is the blood of the Great Old Gods which was spilled in the battle and which will not dry'.
Rhalina pointed to the hillside from which the river appeared. 'But that cannot be - it comes from somewhere and it goes somewhere…'
'Apparently,' said Noreg-Dan.
'Apparently?'
'This land is ruled by Chaos,' he reminded her.
A light breeze was blowing now and Corum raised the
sail. The boat began to move more quickly and soon the hills were out of sight and there was nothing to be seen but the Blood Plain stretching to every horizon.
Rhalina slept for a long while and, in turns, the others slept also, there being little else to do. But when Rhalina awoke for the third time and still saw the Blood Plain, she murmured to herself: 'So much blood spilled. So much…'
And still the boat sailed on down the milk-white river while Noreg-Dan told them something of what Xiombarg's reign had brought to this Domain.
'All creatures not loyal to Chaos were destroyed or else, like me, had jokes played upon them - the Sword Rulers are notorious for their jokes. Every degenerate and vicious impulse in mortals was let loose and horror fell upon this world. My wife, my children were…' He broke off. 'All of us suffered. But whether this took place a year ago or a hundred, I know not, for it was part of Xiombarg's joke to stop the sun so that we should not know how much time passed…'
'If Xiombarg's rule began at the same time as Arioch's,' Corum said, 'then it was much more than one century, King Noreg-Dan…'