They passed onwards, along a smooth, well-lit road with but a small gradient, bearing them slowly deeper into the mountain. These tunnels were not busy, but neither were they deserted and they would occasionally meet dwarves travelling about their business. They lunched and slept in guard-rooms, which took on more of the character of taverns as they went further from the gate, and their stocks of food, firewood and water were well replenished by the time they reached the Beyond Gate.

Here, they new they must leave behind the comfort they had experienced in the last few days. This had indeed been a pleasant interlude, but the reality was that the lands outside the secret gate were even more hostile than those they had travelled in so far. This was the Dark Lands, beyond the Worlds Edge Mountains. Home, if rumour were to be belved, to savage tribes of chaos-worshippers, honourless canibals, hobgoblins, and many other terrors that the mothers of the Empire used to quiet their children.

The door opened. It was dark outside, for secrecy was better preserved thus. Sir Robert stepped out into the wild and his companions follwed. Behind he heard the door shut, and when the torches were lit no trace cood be seen in the rock face. They were alone once more.

They pressed on that night, making camp in the morning a short way off the track. Their food was cold, for although they had replenished their stock of wood they dared not light a fire here where its smoke might be seen by day or its light by night. They slept for a while, then moved on. Flatter ground was needed for an encounter: the rocks around here would break a horses leg in battle, and the slope favoured their enemy.

That night, they could see campfires across the rocky plain below the mountains. Every fire marking an enemy camp. They shone like baleful stars in inverted sky, showing the light of hell while heaven was cloaked in inky cloud.

On the second day, they reached a small patch of flatter land. Here had obviously been a camp before, for there were blackened ashes and half-burnt logs. A shoulder of the hill also hid them from the dreadful plain below, while the path down the mountain could be seen winding above. Here was where they would wait and they made their camp a short way off the path in the shelter of some broken rocks, where they would not be immediately visible to any unfriendly eyes.

Two days they waited, then they saw a fire on the path above. "Tomorrow." Sir Robert thought. "By the evening, I shall either be a true knight or I shall know nothing of it. Come, grandfather. Let us test our fates and see which is stronger."