The stock was mostly huddled in the shelter of board sheds, and the herd-wards forked down hay for them from the stacks or walked their rounds. They had thick cloaks and jackets and knit vests and leggings, and booths to take shelter from the worst of the weather; they and hunters in the woods and unlucky travelers were the only ones who'd sleep outside walls this night.

The song wasn't one he'd have picked if he were going to be rolling in a sleeping bag beneath a tree. Not out where wolves and bears and tigers and woods-fey roamed-the fey could be friendly or unfriendly, and were usually tricksey-and where a stranger met might be anything from an outlaw to a wood-sprite or godling in disguise.

But it was a fine tune when you were heading back to stout gates and bright fires and a good supper. Rudi filled his lungs with the wet chill air and bellowed out:

"Upon his shoulder, ravens

His face like stone, engraven

Astride a six-hoofed stygian beast

He gathers the fruit of the gallows trees!

Driving legions to victory

The hunger of war walks tonight!"

The kilted children poured up the sloping road to the dun in a chattering mass, eager for home and supper. It took a bit longer than usual for the wall to loom ahead of them out of the swirling white; the rough surface of the light-colored stucco was catching the snow now, obscuring the curving flower-patterns painted beneath the crenellations of the battlements. The great gates were three-quarters shut, and the snow had caught on their green-painted steel surfaces too, making little white teardrops where the patterns of copper rivets showed the Triple Moon above-waxing, full, and waning-and the wild bearded face of the Horned Man beneath.

One of the gate guards yelled down: "What were you trying to do, Chuck, feed the little twerps to the Wild Hunt? It's as dark as a yard up a hog's arse out there!"