Eithne counted a dozen soldiers, as well as the eight blue-robed Belenosians, gaining on them over the pastures. Eithne heard vile imprecations amid their shouts: “Whore! Heathen! Bitch! Pagan!” and more besides.

She knew the merchant could fight, and his mercenary and the Droma scout too, of course. But the girl and the acolyte?

Dwo strode to her side and cocked an eye at the approaching gang. “Friends of yours?”

The soldiers had spears and wooden batons at the ready. Their white surcoats and shields displayed the green and red wreath-of-mistletoe device of the village chieftain’s guard.

Eithne pursed her lips. “I doubt it.”

The other little man coughed. She turned to find Kilim had lain himself down on a round rock upthrust from their knoll. He sighted down the length of the heavy crossbow stretched before him. The bolt was aimed at her belly.

He coughed again and waved her aside.

Dwo grabbed her wrist. “You wanted a way into the shrine? We know one. A secret way. Come.” With surprising strength for one so small, he pulled her away.

She heard a loud thwack and a bolt buzzed away. Down on the pastures, shouts and confusion rose from the gang. One of their white-coated number went down, the butt-end of the bolt jutting from a head.

Dwo pulled on her wrist, dragged her along a faint deer-track through the meadow-grass. Up on the hill, the Huntsmen had taken notice of their little band, and the gang that pursued them. The blast of their horn echoed across the Hill.

The rest of her companions hurried to keep up with Dwo and Eithne. This isn’t safe. I shouldn’t endanger them. Behind them, Talwyn and Kilim struggled to keep up. Their pursuers had fallen out of sight behind the knoll.

Eithne turned off the path to follow Dwo and the great wall of stone that bounded the circle upon the Hill. The rocks of which it was built were massive. The least of them would outweigh a man, and the largest were as big as wagons. Though unshaped, they were carefully fitted and interlocked. Yet in places the height of the wall had slipped down and the rocks lay in a shapeless heap. Only a vast span of time could do that; the imperceptible, millennial movement of mountains.

“Here,” said Dwo’s deep, basso voice.

Eithne stopped. The great rock wall reared up thrice her height to the left. On the right, the hill shelved away into a shallow, grassy dell that soon rose again towards the mountains of the eastern range. She looked over all the ground and saw nothing.

“Under the blue rocks, my lady.”

A few yards down the slope an outcropping of blue-grey rocks made a stair or little cliff in the hill. When she went down to it and stood on the level before it, facing the rocks, Eithne realized that they looked like a rough doorway, just as tall as the little men.

But it was no use trying to open a door until one knew how the door was opened. “What should be done?”

Dwo took from his belt an iron ring on which hung a small dagger and a dozen keys, some long and heavy, some small as fishhooks. He lifted the ring and spread the keys. “This one,” he said, pointing.

Dwo raised the key, a long shaft of iron with two ornate wards, and placed it in a crevice between two lichen-grey pitted rock-surfaces. He turned it to the left, using both hands, for it was stiff to move, though it turned smoothly.

Together, Dwo and Kilim pushed at the rough rock face to the right of the keyhole. Heavily, but without catch and with very little noise, an uneven section of the rock moved inward until a narrow slit was opened. Inside was a hole in the ground.

Eithne stooped and entered. The little men pointed at her, then at the hole in the ground. “Killode dalhig! Ballode!”

Eithne glanced into the hole: a round shaft, straight down into darkness, with iron rails stapled into hardened limestone walls. Clearly no natural hole.

“Morúkilur!” The little man released her wrist and pushed at her from behind. “Morúkilur!”

Eithne looked at the little men, at her companions, at the hole.

Adarc was wide-eyed. “My lady—? Sure and you don’t know these little men!”

Corentin frowned and shook his head. “Nê. Ni allis. Nithê haldis. I am not down there going.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “I will take my chances. I am the Belenaíwisks, I do not fear my fellow ga-láista. There is not the profit in this foolness.”

Adarc cuffed him on the arm. “Your fellow followers want to marry her off against her will!”

Tommalt narrowed his eyes at the little men. His gaze flickered back toward the approaching shouts, then to Adarc. “I know the Lord Lorcán told me to watch after you and the merchant. But if the lady’s right, and the king’s in trouble… Acolyte, I’m sorry.” He put a fist to his chest and nodded to Eithne. “I’m with you, mum.”

“Ooo! Ooo! Can I go? I wanna go!” The little tinker girl shoved her way between them.

“Talwyn, wait!” Adarc missed his grasp on her liripipe hood, and with that, she scrambled down into the hole.

“Mum?”

She nodded and Tommalt saluted and followed Talwyn.

Eithne eyed the little men narrowly, then took Adarc by the shoulder. “Listen. I’ll go after her. She’ll be safe with us. But you take the merchant, sneak back to the camp. Find out what happened to my family, and to Lorcán. You understand?”

“Why should we sneak about, like the thiufs?” Corentin snorted through his aquiline nose. “They are Belenaíwisks, like me. Not monsters!”

Eithne shook her head. “I hope you’re right, but please, if they know that Adarc is a Droma-man, he may be in danger. You understand?”

Corentin frowned, look to Adarc, then slapped him on the shoulder. “Abraba waíla. For you, meins qens, I will look after the acolyte. I have the fondness grown for him.” He glanced up the hill. The shouts had grown closer. “But you should skêwjan. Quickly.” He tugged at Adarc’s sleeve. “And us too. Us-leithan!”

“My lady?”

“Go, Adarc!” Eithne pushed him away with the merchant. The brawny Foreigner grunted and saluted her, then crouched and followed them away around the shoulder of the Hill.

Eithne stepped forward, fell into the darkness, and grabbed the iron stiles.

Boy-sized booted feet stepped down on to the rails above. Eithne moved down the rungs to avoid a boot to the head. She heard another thwack and an outraged shout. Movement above made the daylight flicker. Eithne scrambled down still further. There was a grinding sound as of rock against rock, and then darkness plumbed the shaft’s depths.

She stopped. What in Annwn am I doing?

A boot came down on her head. “Why are you stopping? Go on!”

“Damn it, I can’t see! Where are we going?”

The boot came down on her head again.