At dusk, the enemy's campfires came on, one by one, in greater profusion than on any night before.
The lights sparkled like fiery jewels out in the grayness of the plains, so numerous it seemed an enchanted city had sprung up from the earth.
By contrast, within our walls the houses had their shutters closed, their lights blacked out.
A strange reversal had taken place-Prague itself was dark and dead, while the countryside around it flared with life.
Soon afterward, the wind began to drop.
It had been blowing strongly from the west for hours, carrying word of the invaders' movements -- the rattling of the siege engines, the calling of the troops and animals, the sighing of the captive spirits, the odors of the incantations.
Now, with unnatural speed, it died away and the air was steeped in silence.
I was floating high above the Strahov monastery, just inside the magnificent city walls I'd built three hundred years before.
My leather wings moved in strong, slow beats, my eyes scanned the seven planes to the horizon.
