The victims had been gagged to stop their screaming. Tied to poles, they struggled futilely against their bonds.

"It's hopeless," Pronos said. "Gob-bocari cannot be trained to use human weapons."

Standing before the row of posts which lined the southern end of the upper market square, five gob-bocari stared at the spears in their hands or whirled them around recklessly and dropped them. Hundreds more watched and made turkey like noises from the surrounding rooftops.

"We made them shorter and their points smaller as you said," Andral complained.

Despite his size, he's still only thirteen, Pronos reminded himself. I don't know where he got this power over the gob-bocari, but perhaps he can be reasoned with, or at least manipulated. "Listen, Andral. These things are little more than animals. You might be able to train them to do simple tasks, but they will turn on you. They will attack us all. You need to get rid of them. We can still build a soreav of men. Now that the merchants are all gone there's no one to stop us—"

"No." Andral said. "The spirits have given me the gobos to use." He looked over at his ragged gray followers who smiled and nodded their heads approvingly at him. "The men are pets. Train the gobos. There are more... things coming too."

"What kind of thing?"

Andral smiled knowingly. "Bigger things. Wait until winter. You'll see."

<====|==|====>

Garanth hid behind his tree watching the men on the river's far side stop and discuss how they were getting their warriors across. He hoped they wouldn't send men far to scout ahead. There was no reason for them to think anything but cold and mud awaited them here. He eyed his men, checking to make sure they were hidden though there was nothing he could do about that right now. He fingered the horn Karux had given him. If they were discovered, he would give two quick blasts signaling the attack. He didn't want to be the one to have to struggle through the muddy ditch, but if so, surprise, flying spears and the sudden rush of maccunai would have to get them across that morass.

Placing the dogs had been a challenge. Though trained to be quiet until they charged, they still had to be kept away from the tireav at the edge of the field. They were also placed on the other side of the muddy "river" where they could charge at the enemy from the side and not attack their own men. Their men had been forced to wear blue colored sashes around the waists, and though the dogs had been trained not to attack those, they didn't always notice.

To Garanth's great relief, the enemy decided to put their faith in their numbers. Once reformed on the near side of the river, they marched straight into the ditch, effectively eliminating their two-to-one advantage. They stumbled down into the muddy riverbed where they struggled to lift their feet, practically glued into place by the mud. Those who managed to pull free used their spears as walking sticks, staggering up the southern river bank.

Garanth waited until the first men walked past his tree. With their force divided and nearly half their number stuck in the ditch, he blew his horn and charged, sword in hand for close quarter fighting. His men's cries rose up around him in answer. Few of the enemy could even raise their spears to rattle uselessly against their shields before being cut down. Seeing they were under attack, those on the near side turned around and fled back into the mud. Garanth and his men picked up the enemies' fallen spears and struck most down where they were stuck. Those who managed to stagger back up the far slope were dragged down by the slavering maccunai.

Many of Garanth's men leaped across the mud river using the corpses of their foe as bridges. Together with the dogs, they drove the enemy back, at least a third of their number either dead or wounded. When the enemy was far enough away to feel safe enough to regroup and consider a counter-attack, Garanth sounded out the triple blast to recall his men. Even as he sounded the horn, he could feel its strangely insistent pull.

"We won that one!" Labrose said as the arcanths gathered.

"There will be plenty more battles," Garanth assured him. He wanted to tell them that was hardly even a battle, that it was barely more than a clearing of the throat, but he didn't want to discourage any of his men.

"Shall we send the reserve across the river to help Kerwyn's Hill?" Anankaes asked.

"Not yet," Garanth said. "I first want to see what the enemy will do here. Send a scout over to the other side and find out how they're doing though."

"Right away, dra."

Garanth shook his head as Labrose raced off. He still wasn't used to being called that. He looked out over the lines of wounded men from both sides being gathered and treated, searching for the source of his unease. While this miscalculation was a serious setback on Nur's part, they had plenty more fight left in them. But beyond even that, he felt that something else was amiss, something for which they would pay dearly if he could not see it coming, just as the men who had walked carelessly into that ditch had done.

<====|==|====>

Pronos sat alone in Sheider's tavern in one of the few intact chairs. Smashed crockery and splintered wood, decorated with splattered blood, lay scattered about the hauntingly empty place. He had found a hidden jug of beer in the cellar which had escaped the rampant destruction. As he sat drinking, he played with a knife, pressing the point against his chest over his heart. One sharp jab and everything would be over. He could escape Andral's mad soreav and those accursed gob-bocari. He propped the handle against the bar and leaned forward.

"When I want you dead, I'll kill you myself."

Pronos jerked his head around. Andral stood in the doorway with an attitude of arrogant confidence, very unlike his usual stance. His manner had changed so much over the last few months that there seemed little left of the boy he had found beaten in the streets of Mari. Old wives' tales of evil possessing spirits came back to him from his childhood and he wondered what he was actually looking at. "Andral is that you? Is that still you in there?"

"Of course. Now get back to the square. We have one last group to train before the rest of our warriors arrive."

Pronos stared at the knife. For one brief moment he considered shoving it in just to spite Andral. He put it back in his sheath instead. "Very well. I assume you've rounded up some more victims?"

"They are waiting for you in the square."

Pronos sighed and rose from his stool.

"One more thing. Have someone bring Apaidia down here. I need her to do something for me."

Pronos didn't ask what. He just nodded and crossed the street to an abandoned building that a couple of his surviving guardsmen had moved into. Bania was alone and he jumped as Pronos entered.

"Oh. I thought you were one of them."

"Thought they'd drag you out and make a practice dummy out of you?"

Bania looked around as if expecting one of Andral's followers to sneak up on him. "I wouldn't put it past them."

"Well they might if you don't go find Apaidia."

"What?"

"Andral wants you to go get his madra."

"You can tell him to go jump in the Void," Bania said.

"I wouldn't advise it."

"Why?"

Pronos smiled. "Then he really would make a practice dummy out of you."

"No. He'd just laugh at me."

"Why do you say that?" Pronos asked.

Bania shook his head. "Because I did it once. He ordered me to drag some hapless victim from their house for his monsters. I told him 'Void take you'. He just laughed and said it already had."

Pronos turned back to the door. "Well, unless you want to help teach gobos how to use a spear—and not as their instructor—I suggest you go get Apaidia."

"As you say." Bania followed him out.

Pronos found all the practice poles in the market square occupied but one. "I thought you said you already had your victims," Pronos said, regretting it almost immediately.

"You're right." Andral looked around. "We need one more victim."

"Choose me, Oracle! Choose me!"

Andral gestured to one of his ragged grey followers, an old man who happily ran to one of the poles. Pronos started to tie him there and Andral shook his head. "I don't think that will be necessary."

Pronos shrugged and stepped back. "Line up!" he shouted, and to his surprise, the gob-bocari actually lined up before the poles. Months of practice had conditioned them to behave more like warriors, or at least intelligent beings. Pronos handed out their short spears and stood at the end of the line. "Strike!"

The gob-bocari lunged forward. Because of their height, they struck their victims in the gut.

Pronos winced at the muffled groans of the gagged victims. He knew a gut wound was a terribly painful way to die. The old man, however, seemed to swoon in pleasure. "Recover!"

The gob-bocari stepped back. Blood spilled from open wounds as the spears withdrew.

"Strike!"

The gob-bocari struck again and again and again as Pronos called out the drills.

Andral watched the whole scene with the boredom of a teenager, then glanced up abruptly. "They're here."

"Recover." The lifeless corpses hung motionlessly from their poles. Pronos followed Andral's gaze and noted hundreds of dark shapes walking towards them down the city street through the growing twilight. They were drwg, multiple scores of them, each the size of a donkey, pulling at chains held by angorym.

<====|==|====>

In some indefinable way, Apaidia felt trapped. The customers had stopped coming to see the oracle, which was just as well, as Andral had lost any interest in even pretending to care about their concerns. He still considered himself an oracle and thought it conveyed some sense of authority, especially when he didn't want to do whatever Apaidia asked him to do.

With no money coming in, they would have starved if it weren't for the strange ragged followers who left offerings of food, coin, or whatever they could find on her doorstep. The money wasn't all that useful. Few people would even talk to her, much less sell her anything. To make matters worse, even the merchants with no scruples, who would sale to anyone, had begun disappearing.

Apaidia jumped at a persistent knocking on her door. She opened it and one of Pronos' guardsmen stood outside. "What do you want?"

"Andral is calling for you."

Apaidia reached around the corner and grabbed a shawl. "Where is he? Is he hurt? unwell?"

"No," Bania led her toward the upper market square. "He just wants to see you for some reason. I don't know why."

This is strange, Apaidia thought. Certain that something was wrong, she strode down the street so quickly that Bania had to hurry to keep up. The sight of the market square, filled with monsters straight out of childhood's darkest nightmare, with the smiling Andral among them as if completely unaware, filled her with panic.

Apaidia rushed to him. "My boy! Are you all right?"

"I'm fine, Madra."

"But..." Apaidia clutched him and looked around the square of monsters. Pronos stood nearby staring at the ground. His hopeless expression told her that he thought they were all already dead. "Let's go home, Andral. Let's go home right now."

"I can't right now." Andral gently tore her off of him. "But I want you to go home."

Apaidia hugged herself. "I can't leave without you."

Andral smiled. "I have to talk with our new friends. I will join you later. Right now I want you to go home and take a message with you."

"Take a message to whom?" Apaidia asked. "There's no one at home."

"Not our house here," Andral laughed. "Our home. Nur. Where we're from."

"But...you want me to go there? Why?"

Andral's smile faded. He loomed over her, his large hands slipping away from her shoulders. "I want you to find the man who killed my adra, and find my half-brother. I want you to tell them I'm coming for them and that I'm going to kill them."