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"Let’s say that there’s a cave mouth somewhere on the face of this cliff," Keselo continued, "or maybe even down at the foot of the cliff, for that h the mountains here to someplace on down the ravine If the enemies wanted to hide that cave from us, this stairould be the perfect way to conceal it First they’d build a kind of corridor that’d lead to the cave, and then they’d cover the corridor by building this stairway right over the top of it"

"Keselo, you’re talking about so that would have taken hundreds of years to build," Rabbit scoffed

"Let hi to the creatures of the Wasteland, and this notion of his explains what’s happening down there Go ahead, Keselo"

"All right," Keselo continued "The stairway hides the corridor--or tunnel--that leads to the cave o?" He snapped his fingers "Obviously! It goes right straight through the mountain and comes out somewhere on down the ravine--where the enemies could coht behind those old villages that nobody seeested

"Of course!" Keselo exclaimed "Red-Beard told ets curious and tries to explore one of those ruins, but those people alo have a look," Longbow said bleakly "How close is the nearest one of those ruins?"

"Red-Beard said that there’s one a few miles down on the north side of the ravine," Keselo replied "He toldon the rih that we’d be able to see it if ere on the north bench Rabbit and I saw several on the south side while ere co up the ravine, but they all seemed to have been built in places that wouldn’t be visible if you happen to be directly under the notions here, but they’re just guesswork Let’s see if we can find anything to back those guesses up" Longbow’s face was bleak, and his tone of voice seeive you any idea of how extensive these caves bow asked Keselo as they started down the north bench in the bright spring sunshine

"He didn’t really go into toothat he’s not really curious enough about caves to go exploring--or possibly the caves make him sort of nervous I’ve heard that soot the impression from what he said that the caves are quite extensive Fro possibility that the ene the caves to slip behind us so that they can block us off"

"Well, all we know for certain is that a sizeable number of our enemies disappeared when they reached the foot of the stairway," Longbow replied "These ruins are a possibility We may have to come up with others, but let’s look into this possibility first"

Keselo looked on down the ravine "I think thatRed-Beard toldup toward the ribow said "If there are eneht below them"

The wall of the ravine was steep, certainly, but it wasn’t a sheer rock face such as the cliff at the edge of the Wasteland They cliht alert anyone--or anything--in the ancient stone ruins

They angled up the side of the ravine until they were a short distance frobow stopped, his eyes searching "There," he whispered, pointing at a grassy protrusion that lay between them and the ancient ruin "If we rass without alerting anyone that we’re there"

They climbed carefully up the back side of the knoll, and as they neared the top, Keselo rass until the ruins were in plain sight Then he crawled back to rejoin Rabbit and Longbow "We’ll be just a bit above and a little to one side," he whispered "If there’s anybody there, we should be able to see thebohispered back "If our suspicions turn out to be right, it won’t be long before there’ll be toothrough the rustling grass until they could see htly below thee, doesn’t it?" Rabbit suggested quietly "That front wall’s fairly flat, except for the places where part of it crumbled away and rolled on down the hill Maybe it really was a fort, and part of that front wall got knocked down during a war" He frowned "But if that flat front as solid, how did the people who lived there get down to the river for water?"

"If my suspicion is anywhere close to what that fort really is, nobody ever actually lived there," Keselo said "The only purpose it serves is to conceal the mouth of the cave Red-Beard said that the Dhralls avoid those ruins because they believe that they’re cursed--or e, there wouldn’t have been any need for water or for any level ground for growing food" Then Keselo saw a brief flicker of movement in the ruin below "There!" he hissed "Over near the west side of the ruin"

As the three of theures caures were all cloaked and hooded and very small, buterect was strange for them Then one of theh Keselo The hooded figures all stopped, and four of thes

The one which had previously spoken reached up and pushed back its hood with a gleae that looked much like the claw of a crab The face of the creature was rounded at the top; it had taving things protruding froed