The redhead reined in her horse, laughed mockingly down at the black-haired Tlokine. She cried, "I warned you, black one. I told you Kohonnes favored me."
Grim saw despair on Tlokine's face, and fright beneath it. Althaya whispered, "Now I will give you back to the Breath ... on one of my own altars!"
The redhead looked past Tlokine; saw Grim, and stared. Her puzzled green eyes raked him from the soles of his space-boots to his thick, tawny hair. Grim saw her eyes fill with curiosity over the gold and black Fleet uniform, over the stars-and-bars emblazoned in gilt thread on his chest and sleeve.
"Who are you?" she asked suddenly.
"Grim Thorssen. Commander in the Interstellar Fleet."
She shook her head. She said, "I don't know what to do with you. Perhaps Ran—" Althaya paused and looked frightened. Biting her full lower lip, she looked quickly around her. Then she waved a hand at Tlokine and Grim, saying to her men, "Take them."
Grim would have fought, but the odds were too great. He shrugged his shoulders philosophically and let his wrists be bound. Then he swung up behind one of the men-at-arms on the broad croup of his horse.
The sun drew golden glints from the smooth dun walls of the tiny castle on the black rocks. All around the base of the cliff was splashed the red color that denoted a zone of safety from the change and the storm that swept the countryside around it. The little cavalcade pounded across the wooden drawbridge that extended across the little red-splashed gully and into the dark cobblestoned courtyard beyond.
Althaya looked at Grim as he slipped from behind the saddle. She said, "Come with me, man." Obediently he followed her beneath a broad archway, along a cool corridor and into a small room.