“Of what land?” said Mevrian, while they hastened back to look.
“What but Goblinland?” said Ravnor.
“O say not so too hastily!” cried she. They came round the turret wall, and the sea and Stropardon Firth opened wide and void before them. “I see nought,” she said; “or is yon flight of sea-mews the fleet thou sawest?”
“He meaneth Thunderfirth,” said Ravnor, who had gone on ahead, pointing to the west. “They shape their course toward Aurwath. ’Tis King Gaslark for sure. Mark but the blue and gold of his sails.”
Mevrian watched them, her gloved hand drumming nervously on the marble battlement. Very stately she seemed, muffled in a flowing cloak of white watered silk collared and lined with ermine. “Eighteen ships!” she said. “I dreamed not Goblinland might make so great a force.”
They were silent for a time, watching the ships sail in to the mouth of the firth and make land at Aurwath. “Dear heavens,” she said, “were I a man to help them. Will Spitfire be there in time? The Witches be in great force.”
“Your ladyship may see,” said Ravnor, walking back along the wall, “whether the Witchlanders have slept while these ships sailed to port.”
She followed and looked. Great stir there was in the Witchland army, marshalling before the camp; there was coming and going and leaping on horseback, and faintly on the wind their trumpets’ blare was borne to Mevrian’s ears as she beheld them from her high watch-tower. The host moved forth down the meadows, all orderly, a-glitter with bronze and steel. Southward they came, passing at length through the home-meads of Krothering, so near that each man was plainly seen from the battlements, as they rode beneath.
Mevrian leaned forward in an embrasure, one hand on either battlement at her left and right. “I would know their names,” said she. “Thou, that hast oft fared to the wars, mayst teach me. Gro I know, with a long beard; and heart-heaviness it is to see a lord of Goblinland in such a fellowship. What’s he beside him, yon bearded gallant, with a winged helm and a diadem about it, like a king’s, and beareth a glaive crimson-hafted? He looketh a proud one.”
The old man answered, “Laxus of Witchland: the same that was admiral of their fleet against the Ghouls.”