“A mighty bunch of keys,” she says, then looks at me, inquiring.

“The castle's,” I tell her. I shrug, a little embarrassed. “A keepsake.”

She rolls them clinking round her hand, then with a flourish pockets them in her torn jacket. “You know, we need some place to hole up for a while, Abel,” she tells me. “Bit of rest and recreation.” She smiles at you. “How far is this castle?”

“It took us since dawn to get this far,” I tell her.

“Why did you leave? A castle ought to be protection, no?”

“It's small,” I tell her. “Not very formidable. Not formidable at all. just a house, really; it used to have a drawbridge, but now there's just an ordinary stone bridge across the moat.”

She makes a show of being impressed. “Oh! A moat…” She draws smirks from the soldiers around her (and I notice for the first time how tired and beaten looking many of them are, as some gather round us, some carry away the body of the young soldier and others start to usher the people behind us round our carriage and onwards down the road. Many of them seem wounded; some are limping, some have arms in frayed slings, some dirty bandages on their heads like grey bandanas.)

“The gate is not very strong,” I say, and feel that my words sound as lame as some of these grubby, motley soldiers. “We were worried it would be sacked if we stayed and tried to hold out,” I continue. “There were soldiers there; trying to take it, yesterday,” I conclude.

Her eyes narrow. “What soldiers?”

“I don't know who they were.”

“Uniforms?” she asks. She looks slyly around. “Any better than ours?”

“We didn't really see them.”

“What sort of heavy equipment did they have?” she asks, then when I hesitate waves one hand and suggests, “Tanks, armoured cars, field guns…?”

I shrug. “I don't know. They had guns; machine guns, grenades…”

“Mortar,” you say, gulping, startled eyes looking from me to her.