We could as soon get horses over it as to the topmost cliffs of the Palantuken.
Hussin stared at it in consternation.

'May Allah forgive my folly, for I should have known.

We must return to the highway and find a bridge.
My sorrow, that I should have led my lords so ill.' Back over that moor we went with my spirits badly damped.

We had none too long a start, and Hilda von Einem would rouse heaven and earth to catch us up.

Hussin was forcing the pace, for his anxiety was as great as mine.
Before we reached the road the mist blew back and revealed a wedge of country right across to the hills beyond the river.