There came a day when dusk found the Thane and Pran in the Thane’s private quarters, on the top floor of the northwest corner of the building. The omniscient eye of the sun, half below the horizon, partly obscured by ochre clouds, appeared at once tired and disappointed at what it beheld, as though it might decide to withdraw its gaze forever, to leave the world to its own devices, in perpetual night. The study was in near-darkness. It was a fairly small room, panelled with dark hardwood, with a high vaulted ceiling. The Thane lighted a pair of candles from a log burning in the fireplace and placed them in holders on either end of the table.
‘If the situation is as bad as you believe, then why do we not begin a full-scale evacuation?’ Pran asked him.
Reseating himself, the Thane considered his answer.
‘We simply do not have the means to protect an exodus,’ the Thane told him. ‘If the King or Prince Cir got wind of such, they would attack. My army would be driven off and forced to abandon the refugees, who would then be massacred to the last woman and child. I realize that this is not what you wanted to hear, but that is exactly what would happen.’