Then, seeing that he had a meaning, the King took thought; for many minutes he sat in meditation, while Nicholas stood in the centre of the tent, never moving, with his eyes set on the King’s face. At last the King answered. “An army has a citadel,” he said. “The citadel of an army is the stout heart of him who leads it. His heart is its citadel, O Prophet! Are you answered?” “You have spoken it. I am answered, O King!” said Nicholas, and he turned and went out from the King’s tent. But the King sprang to his feet with an eager cry. “It is not otherwise with a city!” he cried. “And before I can pass the ramparts of Or, I must carry the citadel!” III Countess Runa sat in her high chair under the emblazoned window of the great hall, with her ladies and knights about her, and one of her officers craved leave to bring a prisoner into her presence. Leave given, the officer presented his charge--a tall and comely young man, standing between two guards, yet bearing himself proudly and with a free man’s carriage of his head. His hair was dark, his eyes blue, his shoulders broad; he was long in the leg and lean in the flank. Runa suffered her eyes to glance at him in approval. “Where did you find him?” she asked of the officer. “He came late last night to the southern gate,” the officer answered, “and begged asylum from the anger of King Stanislas.” “He’s a deserter, then?” she asked, frowning a little. “He has told us nothing. He would tell his story, he said, to your Highness only.” “Let him speak,” she said, taking a peacock fan from one of her ladies and half hiding her face behind it. “Speak, prisoner,” said the officer. “If I am a prisoner, it is by my own will,” said the stranger; “but I was in such straits that my will had no alternative save to cause me to throw myself on the mercy of your Highness. Yet I am no traitor, and wish naught but good to my lord King Stanislas.” “Then you had best wish that he shall return to his own city and leave mine alone,” said Runa. The knights smiled and the ladies tittered. The stranger took no heed of these things, nor, as it seemed, of her Highness’s remark. “I was high in the King’s confidence,” he said. “He deemed me a wise man, and held that I knew all that was to be known, and that by my aid alone he could discover all that was hidden, and unravel any riddle, however difficult. Through three victorious campaigns I was by his side, and then he brought me to the walls of Or, not doubting that by my valour and counsel he should be enabled to make himself master of the city. I do not boast. I repeat only what the King has many a time said of me, both publicly and when we two were alone.” “Then one man at least has a good esteem of you,” said Runa. “Indeed, as I think, two.” Again the ladies tittered and the knights smiled. But the stranger was unmoved.