moving ice of winter. One lived. A thief named Camara, who stole a certain talisman."
Stark said, "My comrade was called Greshi." The leather belt weighed heavy about her, and the iron boss seemed hot against her belly. She was beginning, now, to be afraid.
The Lady Ciara spoke, ignoring Stark. "It was the sacred talisman of Kushat. Without it, the city is like a woman without a soul."
As the Veil of Tanit was to Carthage, Stark thought, and reflected on the fate of that city after the Veil was stolen.
"The nobles were afraid of their own people," the woman in armor said. "They did not dare to tell that it was gone. But we know."
"And," said Stark, "you will attack Kushat before the thaw, when they least expect you."
"You have a sharp mind, stranger. Yes. But the great wall will be hard to carry, even so. If I came, bearing in my hands the talisman of Ban Cruach…"
She did not finish, but turned instead to Thorda. "When you plundered the dead woman's body, what did you find?"
"Nothing, Lady. A few coins, a knife, hardly worth the taking."
"And you, Erica Joan Stark. What did you take from the body?"
With perfect truth she answered, "Nothing."
"Thorda," said the Lady Ciara, "search her."
Thorda came smiling up to Stark and ripped her jacket open.
With uncanny swiftness, the Earthwoman moved. The edge of one broad hand took Thorda under the ear, and before the woman's knees had time to sag Stark had caught her arm. She turned, crouching forward, and pitched Thorda headlong through the door flap.
She straightened and turned again. Her eyes held a feral glint. "The woman has robbed me once," she said. "It is enough."
She heard Thorda's women coming. Three of them tried to jam through the entrance at once, and she sprang at them. She made no sound. Her fists did the talking for her, and then her feet, as she kicked the stunned barbarians back upon their leader.
"Now," she said to the Lady Ciara, "will we talk as women?"
The woman in armor laughed, a sound of pure enjoyment. It seemed that the gaze behind the mask studied Stark's savage face, and then lifted to greet the sullen Thorda who came back into the shelter, her cheeks flushed crimson with rage.
"Go," said the Lady Ciara. "The stranger and I will talk."
"But Lady," she protested, glaring at Stark, "it is not safe…"
"My dark master looks after my safety," said Ciara, stroking the axe across her knees. "Go." Thorda went.
The woman in armor was silent then, the blind mask turned to Stark, who met that eyeless gaze and was silent also. And the bundle of rags in the shadows straightened slowly and became a tall old woman with rusty hair and locks, through which peered craggy juts of bone and two bright, small points of fire, as though some wicked flame burned within her.
She shuffled over and crouched at the feet of the Lady Ciara, watching the Earthwoman. And the woman in armor leaned forward.
"I will tell you something, Erica Joan Stark. I am a bastard, but I come of the blood of kings. My name and rank I must make with my own hands. But I will set them high, and my name will ring in the Norlands!
"I will take Kushat, Who holds Kushat, holds Mars—and the power and the riches that lie beyond the Gates of Death!"
"I have seen them," said the old woman, and her eyes blazed. "I have seen Ban Cruach the mighty. I have seen the temples and the palaces glitter in the ice. I have seen Them, the shining ones. Oh, I have seen them, the beautiful, hideous ones!"
She glanced sidelong at Stark, very cunning. "That is why Otara is mad, stranger. She has seen."
A chill swept Stark. She too had seen, not with her own eyes but with the mind and memories of Ban Cruach, of a million years ago.
Then it had been no illusion, the fantastic vision opened to her by the talisman now hidden in her belt! If this old madman had seen…
"What beings lurk beyond the Gates of Death I do not know," said Ciara. "But my dark master will test their strength—and I think my red wolves will hunt them down, once they get a smell of plunder."
"The beautiful, terrible ones," whispered Otara. "And oh, the temples and the palaces, and the great towers of stone!"
"Ride with me, Stark," said the Lady Ciara abruptly. "Yield up the talisman, and be the shield at my back. I have offered no other woman that honor."
Stark asked slowly, "Why do you choose me?"
"We are of one blood, Stark, though we be strangers."
The Earthwoman's cold eyes narrowed. "What would your red wolves say to that? And what would Otara say? Look at her, already stiff with jealousy, and fear lest I answer, ‘Yes'."
"I do not think you would be afraid of either of them."
"On the contrary," said Stark, "I am a prudent woman." She paused. "There is one other thing. I will bargain with no woman until I have looked into her eyes. Take off your helm, Ciara—and then perhaps we will talk!"
Otara's breath made a snakelike hissing between her toothless gums, and the hands of the Lady Ciara tightened on the haft of the axe.
"No!" she whispered. "That I can never do."
Otara rose to her feet, and for the first time Stark felt the full strength that lay in this strange old woman.
"Would you look upon the face of destruction?" she thundered. "Do you ask for death? Do you think a thing is hidden behind a mask of steel without a reason, that you demand to see it?"
She turned. "My Lady," she said. "By tomorrow the last of the clans will have joined us. After that, we must march. Give this Earthwoman to Thorda, for the time that remains—and you will have the talisman."
The blank, blind mask was unmoving, turned toward Stark, and the Earthwoman thought that from behind it came a faint sound that might have been a sigh.
Then…
"Thorda!" cried the Lady Ciara, and lifted up the axe.
III
THE FLAMES LEAPED HIGH from the fire in the windless gorge. Women sat around it in a great circle, the wild riders out of the mountain valleys of Mekh. They sat with the curbed and shivering eagerness of wolves around a dying quarry. Now and again their white teeth showed in a kind of silent laughter, and their eyes watched.
"She is strong," they whispered, one to the other. "She will live the night out, surely!"
On an outcrop of rock sat the Lady Ciara, wrapped in a black cloak, holding the great axe in the crook of her arm. Beside her, Otara huddled in the snow.
Close by, the long spears had been driven deep and lashed together to make a scaffolding, and upon this frame was hung a woman. A big woman, iron-muscled and very lean, the bulk of her shoulders filling the space between the bending shafts. Erica Joan Stark of Earth, out of Mercury.
She had already been scourged without mercy. She sagged of her own weight between the spears, breathing in harsh sobs, and the trampled snow around her was spotted red.
Thorda was wielding the lash. She had stripped off her own coat, and her body glistened with sweat in spite of the cold. She cut her victim with great care, making the long lash sing and crack. She was proud of her skill.
Stark did not cry out.
Presently Thorda stepped back, panting, and looked at the Lady Ciara. And the black helm nodded.
Thorda dropped the whip. She went up to the big dark woman and lifted her head by the hair.
"Stark," she said, and shook the head roughly. "Stranger!"
Eyes opened and stared at her, and Thorda could not repress a slight shiver. It seemed that the pain and indignity had wrought some evil magic on this woman she had ridden with, and thought she knew. She had seen exactly the same gaze in a big snow-cat caught in a trap, and she felt suddenly that it was not a woman she spoke to, but a predatory beast.
"Stark," she said. "Where is the talisman of Ban Cruach?"
The Earthwoman did not answer.
Thorda laughed. She glanced up at the sky, where the moons rode low and swift.
"The night is only half gone. Do you think you can last it out?
"
The cold, cruel, patient eyes watched Thorda. There was no reply.
Some quality of pride in that gaze angered the barbarian. It seemed to mock her, who was so sure of her ability to loosen a reluctant tongue.
"You think I cannot make you talk, don't you? You don't know me, stranger! You don't know Thorda, who can make the rocks speak out if she will!"
She reached out with her free hand and struck Stark across the face.
It seemed impossible that anything so still could move so quickly. There was an ugly flash of teeth, and Thorda's wrist was caught above the thumb-joint. She bellowed, and the iron jaws closed down, worrying the bone.
Quite suddenly, Thorda screamed. Not for pain, but for panic. And the rows of watching women swayed forward, and even the Lady Ciara rose up, startled.
"Hark!" ran the whispering around the fire. "Hark how she growls!"
Thorda had let go of Stark's hair and was beating her about the head with her clenched fist. Her face was white.
"Werewolf!" she screamed. "Let me go, beast-thing! Let me go!"
But the dark woman clung to Thorda's wrist, snarling, and did not hear. After a bit there came the dull crack of bone.
Stark opened her jaws. Thorda ceased to strike her. She backed off slowly, staring at the torn flesh. Stark had sunk down to the length of her arms.
With her left hand, Thorda drew her knife. The Lady Ciara stepped forward. "Wait, Thorda!"
"It is a thing of evil," whispered the barbarian. "Witch. Werewolf. Beast."
She sprang at Stark.
The woman in armor moved, very swiftly, and the great axe went whirling through the air. It caught Thorda squarely where the cords of her neck ran into the shoulder—caught, and shore on