THE PATH OF RENUNCIATION

53

A wide white road wound through the green-yellow hills. Slightly touched by the gilding of the dawn, the high walls of the ancient fortress cast long blue shadows on the misty ground.

Liramel had never seen Bartayota, but she knew her story well, and her first impression was right. Unlike Gorgoth, famous for its architecture, it was a real military stronghold - ascetic and severe. The jagged thick walls that surrounded the city in an even ring reached almost twenty meters in height and more than eight in width. Bartayota was not just called the "stronghold of the North": for the second time she was to be in the center of the war between the two peoples of the Small World. Impregnable and majestic, it has traditionally been home to the most numerous garrison of the Kingdom. About nine thousand soldiers guarded the inner city, where the Academy and the general's residence were located. As Yakir once said, in Bartayota any woman or child could defend the walls and fight on an equal footi