"She may be a goddess," thought Zenas to himself, "and she is beautiful enough to be a real one; but if she hasn't gone silly as a cow-girl over this lad of ours, then I'm a donkey, and a blind one, to boot. O Trouble, you've worn skirts ever since you quit fig-leaves."
Zenas shook his head. The geologist had never married.
It was no brief pleasure-jaunt on which Glorian led, but nearly two days' hard riding into the northwest from Zele-omaz, across heavily-wooded mountains and through valleys deep with snow.
Leaving the hills at last, the party came to a vast, dark forest, silent, somber and covering the rolling land like a black pall. Into its soundless glades the riders penetrated and rode for miles.
Presently they saw ahead of them a clearing in the depths of the wood, and a stretch of long buildings, built of stone, and with their windows set high in the walls near their roofs.
It was late afternoon when the riders entered the clearing and approached the buildings, which stood about the four sides of a square, enclosing a space of nearly three acres. As they rode into this court, following a path between two of the buildings, the travelers saw that a number of smaller structures of stone and wood occupied a part of the square. Here and there in the court, fires of brush were burning—for it was bitter cold in the forest depths—and dark figures of men passed to and fro about the fires. A pack of shaggy, wolf-bred dogs came yapping at the horses' heels.
"Who comes?" cried a voice. Men bearing spears ran forward from the fires.
"Glorian of Ruthar comes to visit Zoar of the Amalocs," answered Oleric.
Straightway the armed men knelt in the courtyard, and one in a stern voice called back the dogs.