The Citadel had looked massive and sprawling from the top of Anthelion's tower but, I came to understand, I had only seen the visible part of this ancient structure.

Planio had neighbouring states, beyond the mountains that made up its principle borders, and had cheerfully engaged in violent warfare with them many times over the centuries - both in adventures of conquest and in defence of their own territory. The Citadel of the Mount was one consquence of these adventures: a bastion that oversaw passage through the pass at its feet, which was the main trading route to the countries to the south and west of Planio.

I say "south" and "west", by the way, purely based on the fact that Anthelion had drawn the sea border of Planio at the top of his drawing, which I had interpreted as "north". Whether they had a magnetic field, or compasses or even a concept of absolute direction wasn't something we had talked about, yet. Thenum just pointed, and I inferred.

In any case, successive rulers of Planio and the nobles awarded the fief that included the Citadel had built it down and out and up over many centuries until it drilled deep into the stone. It had been designed as a refuge against invasion - as somewhere for the neaby towns and cities to flee from an aggressor. So when Gazenthlion had reached this area, it had been a natural response for the local population to head for the Citadel. What had not been expected was that those same towns and cities had already been glutted with refugees from futher north, from the cities already annihilated by the dragon.

So now, despite its capacious interior, the Citadel was bursting at the seams.

In the space immediately around the Keep, the surviving nobles had occupied apartments adjacent to the Citadel's enormous kitchens and laundry facilities, giving them regular and reliable access to food and hot water. Everyone else had to make do with whatever they could manage. The fields I had seen below the Citadel were still cautiously farmed, but with the number of people in the fortress, it was apparently proving difficult to build up a surplus they would need if and when Gazenthlion turned up. Hunters still went out to find game which, with the massive reduction in the human population, was apparently plentiful, but the work was dangerous. As well as Gazenthlion, thousands of un-slain monsters still roamed the dark woods and wild places.

And the Citadel itself had great barns cut into the rock, where the various herds of goats ate whatever could be spared for them, and a creature almost indistinguishable from a pig, other than its small horns, ate everything the goats rejected.

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I saw most of this as Thenum took me around. In my local clothes, I barely drew so much as a look. And Thenum used me as a pack horse - so no one would mistake me for a noble, he insisted, as he stacked yet another sack of goods over my shoulders. But he smiled as he said it.

We made several trips back and forth from the tower into the Citadel, so I could get a lay of the structure. It was confusing and labyrinthine, and the resemblance to a Jordanian refugee camp just over the Iraqi border that I had once visited on a humanitarian mission was striking. Spaces clearly not intended for habitation had, nevertheless, been converted into homes. People still tried to dress respectably and to live in as much comfort as they could manage, but no one wanted to get too comfortable - doing so would be to admit that this arrangement was permanent; that they were never going home. But there were children around, too, of all ages. Some, babies and toddlers, must have been born here. This was their "normal".

The Tattered Lamb was our last trip and it took us along several routes we'd visited before, which I could probably have recalled under pressure. Then Thenum guided me down a gap between two temporary structures that I would have missed entirely without his guidance. That led to a wider, open space and a door beneath a slab of scrap wood that had, nevertheless, been artfully painted with a picture of a flag, flapping in the wind. On the flag, I could just make out the image of a baby goat. Up to this point, the words "Tattered Lamb" had mostly just been noises to me, but now I kind of grasped what they meant.

Thenum pushed open the door and my eyes widened at the scene that met me.

For most purposes, this was every inch the classic fantasy tavern, practically built upon the foundations of Tolkein's Prancing Pony. There was a long bar in front of a row of barrels, and a mismatched array of tables and chairs, and a crowded atmosphere of smoke and the general fug of working men and women enjoying an evening's drinking after a hard day's work. There were even shady corners where the body language of the occupants suggested equally shady deals going down.

But the Tattered Lamb was part of a Citadel built into a mountain. And this particular part was a natural cave that had been turned into a balcony that opened out onto a spectacular view of the valley below.

'Stop staring,' muttered Thenum. 'Locals have seen it before.'

'Why haven't the nobles claimed this place?' I asked. It seemed too much of a privilege to let the common folk have this for their watering hole.

'Mostly because they don't know it's here,' said Thenum, guiding us to an empty table. 'Even Anthelion wouldn't know how to get here, and he's a lot less fussy than the proper nobles. But even if they did, they wouldn't want it. Can you imagine this place if Gazenthlion attacked us?'

I could see his point. Exterior spaces like this would be incredibly vulnerable to attack. The fact of its existence spoke to a phase in the Citadel's history when it must have been more of a statement of authority to rule than it was a serious defensive position.

Thenum gestured towards a passing servant, who nodded and disappeared.

Once furnished with ale - of which the Citadel seemed to have a plentiful supply - I settled back to watch and to listen.