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Your horse rears up and leaps across the body of the dead Cave Leekhon, its senses ablaze with the choking, rancid odour of the Leekhon’s spilt blood. Banedon’s steed follows close on your heels as you race through the tunnel, heedless of the many obstacles strewn in your path. Suddenly you emerge from the suffocating passage into the chill evening air: you have escaped. From the slopes of a wooded hill you stare down at a tiny village called Varta, perched on the edge of the Tahou flats.
The flats comprise fields of cultivated crops that form a fertile market garden two miles wide. They are farmed right up to the banks of the great moat that encircles the capital. Varta is deserted: its male inhabitants now shelter within the city walls, whilst the women and children have since travelled south to the safety of Navasari. As you ride through the empty village and descend onto the flats, you catch your first awe-inspiring view of the ancient city itself.
