They had done what they could, four hundred of them against an enemy that swarmed like the vast migrations of the beasts—fifteen thousand men, Agat had guessed.
They had done what they could, four hundred of them against an enemy that swarmed like the vast migrations of the beasts—fifteen thousand men, Agat had guessed. Fifteen thousand warriors, between sixty or seventy thousand Gaal in all, with their tents and cookpots and travois and hann and fur rugs and axes and armlets and cradleboards and tinderboxes, all their scant belongings, and their fear of the Winter, and their hunger. He had seen Gaal women in their encampments gathering the dead lichen off logs and eating it. It did not seem probable that the little City of Exile still stood, untouched by this flood of violence and hunger, with torches alight above its gates of iron and carved wood, and men to welcome him home.
