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find our feet he pushed the boat away and it rushed off down the river. The sound of his strange sing-song carried back to us for a while.

    “Where will he go?” I wailed.

    “There is shallower water down the river. He will get back to his side and drag the boat back up here.”

    “Ready for the next fool who wishes to cross, no doubt. What was all that he was on about?”

    “Sadly, my lady, the tale he tells is true. That is what your people did to his family. And thousands of others likewise.”

    “They are not my people, Eluned. They are not my people.”

    In my heart I knew they were. But I dared not imagine how such cruelty could be associated with the world I had known.

    “Let’s get away from this river,” I said, heading up the steep bank, back to the road.

Chapter 11

    When I reached the crest, my first instinct was to plunge on, leaving the river behind me. But I paused, and turned. Now well below us, the shattered bridge was still clearly visible. I could even make out the large fallen stones into which he had thrust the pole, stopping our crossing. At the thought of his hand clutching at my arm in that unstable little boat, my head began to swim. Images of my face looking up as the fast-flowing river closed over my head shook me.

    “Why did this happen?” I thought to myself. “How could these people, who taught us that friendship and co-operation were the only way to produce an effective society, be so violent?” Images of the woman dangling from the neck of a man without hands filled my head. Tears ran freely down my cheeks, even as I tried to wipe them away. Blindly, I reached out and clutched at Eluned. My hand grasped the strap of her heavy bag and when I pulled on it she fell heavily to the ground.

    It did not seem to matter to me. “Why?” I said, as she pushed herself up to her knees. “Why? What purpose is there in such things?”

    Brushing the dirt from her shift, Eluned looked up at me. “None but revenge, my lady. The lust for retribution. That is all. I have seen it too much.”

    “Revenge? Revenge for what? What did those people do to bring this upon them?”

    “The ferry man’s father had destroyed the bridge. Stone by stone, when he was told your people were heading this way, he smashed at the bridge until, as you have seen, it fell into the river. For this your people killed him.”

    “How could one man destroy a bridge built hundreds of years ago? It is not possible.”

    “It should not be possible, my lady. But, with some help from his wife, and some from another son, together they managed it.”

    “Another son? You mean there was another son beside the mad one?”

    “An older son. He has not been seen since your people killed his parents. Some say he lives. Some say he drowned himself in the river.”

    “Was there a body?”

“None was ever found. That is why there are those who believe he lives still. One story tells that he lives in Uricon.”

    “Uricon? Isn’t that where we are supposed to be going?”

    “Yes, my lady. But I do not know how much truth there is in this story. There are many different accounts.”

    As she spoke these last words, now standing upright again, she pulled her bag over her shoulder with the blankets and turned away from the river.

    “Tomorrow we will be in Uricon, the Lady be praised. Tonight we rest in another dwelling of the old people. We must find it before the darkness falls.”

    I took one last look at the river below where I stood, with its bridge and its terrible past, then turned and followed her.

    For an hour or so we walked along the road as it passed through a landscape similar to that on the other side of the river – once cultivated fields long since untouched. The sun shone from a bright blue sky, fierce in its heat, bright in our eyes. It was just beginning to descend behind us, a welcome cool breeze rising as it did so, when Eluned stopped. A huge tree stood to the left of the road, its heavy